Last Summer I was able to go to San Francisco on a tour. It was a lovely visit and I had a great time except for the fact that a packed for a trip in SoCal not Nor Cal. I was freezing. ( This is an old post from my old blog btw!)
Being in San Francisco has made me realized, although I was born in a suburban neighborhood, my heart belongs to the city. The architecture, the overcrowding streets, the overall atmosphere feels like home. Although, my tour allowed us to only spent one day in San Francisco. I wished I could stay there a bit longer. Hopefully I will be able to go back one day.
Thinking that Northern California would be like sunny Southern California, I packed my bag full of shorts. So my legs were freezing during our stop in China Town. Luckily, I had brought a blazer and trench coat with me. This was my first time being in a China Town. I have never been to one, not even the one in LA. The decorations in Chinatown was very pretty and inspirational. When we got there it was around 7 o' clock in the morning so the stores weren't yet. So we couldn't do anything other than get some Dim Sum or some cake from a bakery. The pastries were very good though.
On the first day of our trip the tour bus took us to the city of Solvang. Solvang is a Dutch city that still has european architecture from the medieval times. It is a very beautiful town, the people there are really nice and bubbly. Since the town is a tourist attraction many of the stores were gift shops and had many pretty souvenirs. The architecture there was very interesting. It reminded me of Belle's town in Beauty & the Beast because it looked kinda cartoon-ish. Due to the way the walls were painted.
We also went to Hearst Castle but I couldn't take any pictures since my dad took my camera. The castle is quite beautiful. It was filled with many paintings and drawings from Europe. I even saw some images from my art history textbook. The place was huge, we had to drive all the way up to a hill to get there. The view was magnificent. You could see the Hearst Ranch and the ocean from the Castle.
The second day was where we explored the city of San Francisco. This was my favorite part of the trip. We started off the day at 6 o'clocking the morning and went to Chinatown for breakfast. After that we walked up one of the steepest streets to get up to the Lombard Street. It was quite a morning workout. However this street is not known for it's steepness but for being the most winding street in the world. I discovered that the painting and drawing building of the Art Academy was on the next street. The next stop was to Pier 39. We spent most of our time on a boat sailing around the coast. It sailed us around Alcatraz, Angel island, under the San Francisco Bridge and back. After lunch at the pier, it was off to the palace of fine arts. I wished we could have went inside but we were limited to only 15 minutes around that area. Then it was off to the 6 lucky houses. The houses were the only ones who survived through the city's two massive earthquakes and was believed to be a good luck charm. The next stop was San Francisco bridge and then to St. Mary's Church. The third to last stop was City Hall, across the street was the city's huge library it was about 3 stories high. It was gorgeous, and so much different than the library back home. We drove up to this hill top and was able to see the city in a 360 kind of view. I wished my camera had a 360 fuction. Too bad it doesn't. Our last stop was to Stanford University. The school was very large and peaceful. The campus kind of had a sad atmosphere to it.
We only had one stop on our third day, and it was Yosemite park. I loved the park, it would be a great place for a photo shoot. The air was so fresh and it just felt refreshing. The rest of the day was spent driving home. I slept the whole way there. Well that was my San Francisco trip for you.
I woke up at 6 this morning to go to the beach. I really like to got to the beach either in the morning or in the late afternoon. It feels much more relaxing than in the afternoon. This was the first time we bought our dog to the beach and he loved it. Everyone at the beach said he looked so spiffy with his little jacket. This little fella ran everywhere, sniffing seaweed, and playing with dogs that we met at along the sea shore. Some of the dogs were five times his size, I could not stop laughing when I saw him bark at this huge husky twice his size. It was so cute.
