San Francisco

So originally I had flown into SF from Auckland, staying in San Bruno for a night before flying to Seattle the following day. Now I was back for a few days to soak in some sight seeing and enjoy my time off in this spectacular city! 
I was meeting up with my brother Tyrone and cousin Redmynd (Sydney) who were both flying in from L.A to all unite at SFO. Rather exciting being able to see your family during time away in another country! Tyrone was celebrating his 21st birthday by travelling around the U.S, while we were able to squeeze in time altogether in SF and Las Vegas before they flew to New York. 


Where to begin? let alone what to do! We kind of had an idea of the sight seeing stuff we were wanting to do and one of them was cycling the golden gate bridge. . me? cycle? across a bridge as well! I was rather confident, more so then my capabilities - I vaguely remember the last time I was on a bike (long long LONG ago) let alone get across the golden gate on one!  
What made this experience more momentous was the fact that we did it on the year of Golden Gate's 75th Anniversary. 

We made it! 

So off we travelled from Fisherman's Wharf on our bicycles, it turned out to be more challenging then I had assumed and of course involved quite a bit of navigation and perseverance. Locals along the way informed us that it was a great day to be riding the bridge with the clouded sky, the weather worked in our favor as when we reached the end of the bridge the sun decided to shine. 

The scenery was pretty spectacular most of the way, I think there was far more to see on foot/bike, then in a car or bus. You couldn't help but stop every few meters just to take another photo in another angle! (landscape admirer remember) 


Visiting Alcatraz was some what out of this world with it's audio tour, which had some of the ex prisoners and wardens as the narrators. Being able to live and breath an insight of Alcatraz made you feel so much more apart of it all, especially hearing from those who were actually part of the Alcatraz history. 
It also makes you wonder what really did happen to those un-accountable prisoners that "escaped" Alcatraz in 1962. 

Mint shot! 

Arriving at Alcatraz 

Tourist Shot 

Excited tour guide meeting NZ'ers

It was actually rather interesting meeting a lot of Americans and their assumptions on where they thought we were from sometimes. Hawaii was quite the classic line, the brown skin, brown eyes and sparkling smile that seemed to have sold the look to be Hawaiian in the U.S. Mind you it was quite the geographical test asking them if they knew where NZ was on the global map. It always proved to be quite a chuckle, as our accent and "brown" looks attracted quite a few interested folks especially with these 2 tourists. 

Union Square 

Staying near Union Square saw a lot of visits to the popular shopping spots, Macy's, H&M, DSW Shoes - just to name a few! Oh the joy of travelling is indeed the shopping for me at times. I have to say SF was probably one of my favorite places, or have I said that about every city? 





Las Vegas here we come!