Day 2 in San Francisco

On Thursday I started the day off by visiting the place recommended by Wayne for breakfast, Mo's Grill. I had the eggs benedict and I'd say they did a great job! The amount of food was great and the price was not bad considering the neighborhood.



I actually did what I planned to do and took the ferry to Alcatraz! I had to find Pier 33 and the ferry to the island, first. I called my friend Kirstie to get help with that... I thought it would be more obvious than it was. I walked there and got a ticket, then waited in line to board the ferry. On the ferry I got a cup of coffee and took a bunch of photos of the San Francisco skyline and Alcatraz Island as we approached.



On the island, you are free to wander around. It's a fairly desolate rock in the middle of the treacherous waters of the Golden Gate - the narrow strait between the Pacific Ocean and the San Francisco Bay. When we got near the dock, I could see the current crashing against the pier as the tide went out. I walked the long way around toward the top of the hill because I wanted to take in the skyline view on the south side of the island. Then I made my way up to the cell house where I could take an audio tour of the US Penitentiary Alcatraz. Of course, the prison is what makes this island so famous... so I was excited to walk through the cell house and get loads of pictures.



Most of the cells were empty, but some were furnished to show how the convicts lived. The scariest rooms were referred to as "the hole" and were metal floored rooms with solid steel doors. They kept the rooms dark to increase the solitude of the prisoners kept inside. I went inside one and felt a chill down my spine... the audio tour had an interview with one of the convicts describing his time there. After that I walked outside and the sun had come out. The city skyline from the top of "The Rock" was amazing! I got a few more photos before resuming my audio tour of the prison. The cafeteria ceiling had a system for delivering tear gas in case of a riot. There was a description of the escape conducted by 3 clever inmates and I was able to see the cells from which they had escaped, complete with the carved out area in the back wall.





Finally I had finished the tour and bought a t-shirt at the bookstore. I get t-shirts wherever I go to remind me of the place and to give me something to wear!! The ferry ride back was nice because the sun had come out and the views were amazing. Once back on land, I took the electric tram to the western end of Fisherman's Wharf and then the cable car to the other side of Russian Hill where I could walk back to the apartment without scaling steep grades.

The headache that I had all day had progressed to a full blown migraine. My skull was throbbing as I walked back to the apartment. When I got back, I took a couple Advil and fell asleep for an hour. When I woke up it was dark out and I was hungry! I walked over to Golden Boy Pizza again and got the local specialty, clam and garlic. While I waited, I had a beer (Lagunitas IPA draft) at the bar and looked around. This place looked really cool, very unpretentious. As for the pizza, I walked it back to the apartment to eat it. This garlic is some extremely potent stuff... and they flavored the garlic with a little clam and pizza. It tasted great, but was seeping out of me the whole next day!

First Day in San Francisco

I took the 5:30 United flight to San Francisco on Jan 6th. Everyone was saying, "The weather this time of year is unpredictable! It's the rainy season! Why don't you go someplace warm?"

I'll tell you why. First of all, a $116 + tax flight. Second of all, a place to stay in the coolest part of the city thanks to my gracious friend Wayne. Third, I needed to "use up" the last of my vacation time before the end of January. Isabelle's schedule was already set, so I booked my flight and had a week by myself in the city by the bay! The apartment where I was staying is right by the (made up) coffee house where Mike Meyers did his beat poetry in the movie "So I Married An Axe Murderer" and the "butcher shop" is on the same street!

I took a taxi from my Chicago apartment to Jefferson Park where I got on the "El" bound for O'Hare. The flight was delayed a bit for de-icing, but we made it to San Francisco around 9:30pm PST. I hopped on the BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) and got off at Powell Street where I jumped on the cable car to get over the hills. I got off at Chinatown and walked a few blocks to the apartment where I'd be staying for a week. I picked up some beer (Anchor Steam, brewed locally) and pizza at Golden Boy Pizza in Northbeach since it was on my way. After eating, I was pretty tired... it was getting late on my home clock. I fell asleep and woke up early the next day.



I had breakfast at La Boulange in Northbeach. I discovered this restaurant last time I was in San Francisco in August and loved their quiche. This time I wanted to try their french toast. It is really, really good! They also had a fantastic selction of quiche as I had remembered.



After eating, I walked to the beginning of the touristy dockside area called Fisherman's Wharf. From there I wandered to see the sea lions on Pier 39 and grabbed a lunch of 6 oysters and a crab salad sandwich at The Eagle Cafe. After lunch I walked around a little more and then took a streetcar back to the apartment to rest my feet for a bit and find a place to get dinner.



I found a restaurant online, but now I forgot what it was. Apparently it's closed and this new restaurant was in its place. Iluna Basque, a basque tapas restaurant in Northbeach, had good reviews posted in their window (of course) and the menu looked great. I went inside and got a seat. Being a tapas style restaurant, I had in mind two savory and one sweet. I started off with a seared tuna steak on "bleu Basque sauce" and then had egg toast with marinated anchovy fillets. I finished with a pineapple carpaccio creme brulee that was soooo amazingly rich.... *floats away thinking about it* ....



After that I was getting tired so I came back to the apartment and had a small glass of Muscat wine and drifted off to sleep planning on going to prison the next day...

San Francisco Daze

Lunar Perigee from Twin Peaks, San Francisco, originally uploaded by zuctronic.

I took this photo from the top of Twin Peaks in San Francisco. The moon rising is a full moon at lunar perigee, and it's also the largest moon of 2009. The sun is still setting behind me, as you can see the light hitting the tops of the buildings. It was a crisp and windy night on top of that hill, and I actually didn't know anything about this lunar perigee business until I got up there and met a South African photographer who had come just for the shot. I guess the REAL money shot would have been from the Marin Headlands with a telescope since the night was so clear.

Still working on my S.F. blog. I'll begin the posts this weekend and hopefully get it wrapped up by mid-week.

- Andy

Remembering January - Part 3

Alright, I totally let my readers down (are you still out there!?) by promising a third installment of the "Remembering January" series and failing to deliver. Well, better late than never.

After three weeks in Leeds, I would finally be heading home on Sunday after the last week. This left me with a Saturday free to do something either in Leeds or somewhere nearby. I had been to York once before with a friend and wanted to go back. There is something special about traveling alone that provides a different perspective and an opportunity to explore on my own.

The train to York is quick, only about 20 minutes. I got on at the Leeds Station and then back off at the York Station. York is old! The railway station was built in 1839 but that doesn't even begin to scratch the surface. This city was founded by the Romans in 71AD just 8 years before Mount Vesuvius buried Pompeii in ash. Some of the walls around York still incorporate bits of the old Roman fortifications.



Upon arriving, the sun was already on its way off stage. I wanted to take a walk around the wall, so I took the stairs up to the top of the wall and began my tour around. From the top of the wall, you can see the York Minster, a large Cathedral near the center of town. I decided I would make my way toward the Minster and snap some photos along the way.

Halfway toward the Minster, I got distracted by the Museum and the ruins of an old abbey on the museum grounds. This is the old Saint Mary's Abbey in York... the abbots were featured heavily in the medieval stories of Robin Hood. I wandered into the ruins.. ran my hands along the carved stones. Founded in 1055, William the Conquerer himself had been here, along with countless other ancestors of the English people. I had fanciful thoughts of my own ancestors helping to carve these stones, or visiting this abbey... or at least living in this country during that time. It gave me goosebumps, but I was thrilled to be able to walk around and touch something so old. Near the Abbey were the ruins of an old hospital and a crypt. Finally I continued on my way toward the Minster.





Once I got to the Minster I remembered (well, re-discovered) that they charge for entrance. That wasn't what I had in mind, so I left and decided to look around the actual city of York. I walked through the maze of medieval alleys and streets conatining shops and restaurants. It was stereotypically English in a lot of ways, but the commercial nature of it all lent an American feel. Also the mutiple Starbucks, Subway, Borders, and so on made me feel disappointingly at home. I wandered into a two story book shop to browse. I picked up a book about the battle of Hastings. By now the sun was pretty much down so I wandered over to the dramatically lit "Clifford's Tower" to get some photos there.

Finally I decided to head back to the station where I grabbed a cup of coffee and a ham sandwich to eat on the ride back to Leeds. Back in Leeds, I bought a half bottle of Shiraz at the Marks & Spencer and ordered another of those fantastic Box Pizza specials.

If you're ever in England, I do recommend seeing York.

I'm not big on Holidays

But when it comes to Thanksgiving, at the very least I like to cook a lot on a free day off.

This year I was expecting Isabelle to be working on Thursday and Friday so we planned on doing a roast chicken on Saturday ... I know this is totally inappropriate ... but we were planning to have a turducken later in the year and I have some good roast chicken recipes.

Isabelle ended up having Thursday off because the hospital had a low census (she got paid anyways) and so I had to rush to the store to find a big chicken. Nobody had chickens out, just turkeys. A couple of giant rainbow trout fillets at the meat counter caught my attention, so that's what we had.




Rainbow Trout fillet and ratatouille, with brownies and ice cream for dessert. I didn't get a photo of the finished fillet because I couldn't wait to eat it!

Sometimes the bear eats YOU

Well my company has eliminated a few jobs in our Sydney office. You may know that I had been excited about my upcoming relocation to that region. Well one of the jobs eliminated there was mine.

The good news is that I still have a job here in Chicago, but I've got some thinking to do about my future. I'm not sure I want to stay in Chicago. I need to reconsider all my options and figure out what makes the most sense at this time.

The economic downturn is what's to blame, according to my employers. I'm not sure Chicago's in any better position to weather this than Sydney, but at least it's familiar. Unfortunately, I think it's the familiarity I'm constantly trying to get away from. I need a novel experience, a change of scenery. My company also has offices in England, central Europe, and Singapore. I guess I've always wanted to stay in English speaking countries to live, but as far as long-term work, I'm open to suggestions. What do you think?