{Weekend in San Francisco!}

A couple weeks ago Andy had the week off, so for my 'weekend' we decided to take a quick trip to San Francisco :) We left early Tuesday morning and arrived at San Francisco International Airport around 9 or so. We took the tram to the BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit--pretty much their version of the subway) and made it downtown around 11 or so. We walked to our hotel and got all checked in. The hotel was beautiful (the Hilton-Union Square). We got changed and decided to go grab some lunch. We spent the afternoon checking out some of the shopping, china town, then taking a double decker bus tour of the city. The tour was cool because it gave us a chance to see most of the city that we may not have otherwise seen in such a short visit. The tour took us down to Fisherman's Wharf, near Lombard Street (the crookedest street in the US), through many different neighborhoods and finally over the Golden Gate Bridge. Once we crossed the bridge we were able to get off the bus for a few minutes and take some pictures of the bridge from the other side. Although it was very windy and cold, it was a beautiful view of the bridge and the city.

That night we were pretty tired from getting up early and traveling so we had diner at "Lori's Diner" which was a 50's style diner and I finally got my Turkey Dinner I've been craving!!! It was sooo good :) After dinner we did some walking around, then headed back to our hotel room to watch a movie and call it a night! :)

Wednesday was Andy's Birthday, we woke up early to catch a taxi down to the pier for our 9:30 Alcatraz Tour!! This was defnitely the highlight of the trip. We took the ferry across the water to the Island where we were able to take a self-guided Audio tour of the prison. It was a really good recording with tons of information about the prison and history of the island. We both enjoyed walking through the cell blocks and imagining what it may have been like living in such a place 40 or more years ago.

After the tour we returned to the Wharf and walked around the many shops and restaurants. We had lunch at Joe's Crab Shack, then went to the Museum of Wax. It wasn't the best wax museum I've been to, but it was still fun! After that we walked up to Ghiradelli Square for some of their ice cream and famous chocolate!!! My hot fudge sundae was DELICIOUS!! And Andy got the waffle cone he had been wanting all day :) The rest of the day was spent riding the double decker bus again. We got off near the City Center in hopes of finding the "Painted Ladies" (the houses like the one on Full House) but after a TON of walking realized we must have been in the wrong area or something. So we made the couple mile trek back to our hotel area. We decided to relax for a while since we walked so much, then went to a late dinner at Puccini and Pinetti which was recommended to us by Andy's aunt who travels to San Francisco often. I wasn't all that hungry so I just had soup and salad which was ok. Andy had an interesting pizza. It wasn't really our style of restaurant, but it was ok. We then walked up to a bar that had a live piano player and listened while Andy had a couple birthday beers :)

The next and last day was spent with more wandering around Union Square as well as up to Chinatown again. We also did some shopping at Ross and Old Navy. After shopping we decided a trip to San Francisco wouldn't be complete without a ride on the Cable Cars! So we got tickets and waited in line for about an hour before finally getting to ride. We took the cable car down to Fisherman's Wharf where we had lunch at Boudini's (which is famous for their sourdough bread). I had some delicious clam chowder and a sandwich with sourdough..yum!! We made sure to buy any last minute souveniers before taking the cable car back to Union Square to get ready to head home.

Overall, we had a very eventful couple days and hope to someday come back to San Francisco,maybe with a little more time for more tours and possibly an excursion to Napa Valley for some wine tasting! But that will all have to wait until after the little one is here :)