Tiburon

San Francisco RV Resort, Pacifica, CA:  Our objective was to drive to Muir Woods today and then have lunch in Tiburon.  Back on the PCH which is a twisty, windy, narrow road up through the hills.  There were a lot of bicyclists on this road.  It’s in the 50s, foggy, and windy.  No shoulders on this road.  And these people are up there biking.  Their legs were huge.  Masochistic if you ask me.  When we got to Muir Woods there was no place to park.  They were parking on the road as far as 2 miles from the entrance.  Decided to forget that.  Way too many people out here.  Drove to Tiburon which is one peninsula over from Sausalito.  Drove the whole peninsula taking in the beautiful homes and vistas.  We had lunch in a little restaurant with a view of San Francisco across the bay.  Drove back and sat outside on our bluff reading for a while until the fog rolled in.  Did some grocery shopping and had a light dinner at an Italian restaurant in Pacifica.  Mostly in the 60s today.  

View of San Francisco from our restaurant at Tiburon

San Francisco RV Resort, Pacifica, CA:  Today we drove the PCH north of San Francisco.  Got on the 101 and then Rt. 1 which eventually ends up on 19^th Street on the western side of San Francisco.  So, you’re basically on city streets.  But it’s three lanes and we’ll be fine when we leave with the fifth wheel.  Drove over the Golden Gate Bridge for the first time this trip.  I drove over it back in 1982, but it bothered me a lot.  Not sure why, because going over it today wasn’t bad at all.  Of course I wasn’t driving.  After exiting the Golden Gate we took the first exit for Rt. 1.  And the road was incredibly windy and twisty.  Had some gorgeous vistas, but no place to stop and take pictures.  Drove up only to the cute little town of Tamales and turned around, because we passed a place in Tamales Bay that the owner of a restaurant in Santa Barbara where we ate one night highly recommended—Nick’s Cove in Tamales Bay.  So we went back there and had lunch with a view of what we thought was a lake, but it’s an inlet off the Pacific.  There were some cottages on the shore and some floating docks, but what good is this place.  You can’t swim.  The water temps are in the 50s.  But we had an incredible lunch.  I had Dungeness crab eggs benedict and Mike had a dozen oysters on the half shell from different areas in the Bay.  After lunch we decided to take the Marshall-Petaluma road over to Petaluma and get the 101.  It took so long to travel the 40 or so miles on the PCH that we decided to take the 101 back.  We went through some cute little towns though—like Dogtown, population 30. and Tamales, another cute little town.  Like stepping back in time.  Some of the buildings I’m sure go back 100 years.  We were going to do Muir Woods and Tiburon today also but ran out of time.  As it was, we hit rush hour traffic again in SF.  Fortunately, most of it was going the other way.  Back to our site on the bluff overlooking the Pacific and sat out and read for a while, listening to the waves pounding the beach.  Then had dinner at a little Italian restaurant in a strip mall just down the road.  Temps were all over the place today.  63 down by the water and 80 up in the hills.

Going over the Golden Gate

The little inlet we thought was a lake.  The great white sharks breed here in the winter.

The traffic coming out of SF into Marin County.

San Francisco RV Resort, Pacifica, CA:  Drove up Rt. 1 through Golden Gate Park to a place called Lands End, which is a high point of land west of the Golden Gate Bridge.  Beautiful up there with old growth pines.  Smelled wonderful!  Drove through the Presidio which is a lot bigger than we thought.  Dropped back down to the Palace of the Arts, parked on Marina and walked a mile or so back to the Palace of the Arts.  Beautiful buildings that were part of the 1915 Exposition.  Walked back to where we parked on Marina past some beautiful town homes with great views of the bay.  Drove down by Union Street, parked, and browsed the tony shops on Union St. and had an early dinner at a neat little restaurant on Union.  Drove back in rush hour traffic again.  Mike is a saint!  A beautiful day today.  Sunny and 71 in San Francisco.  65 here at our park and clear skies.

The Golden Gate taken from Lands End

The Golden Gate from another perspective.

Lands End

Some of the housing at the Presidio

Palace of the Arts

Alcatraz

San Francisco RV Resort, Pacifica, CA:  Drove back to San Francisco this morning.  Had to be at the tour office on Leavenworth St. between 9:00 and 11:00 a.m. to pick up our Alcatraz tour tickets.  Luckily, our tour was at 12:30.  At least that’s when we boarded the ferry.  So we walked down North Point and stopped at the Hollywood Café and had breakfast.  Then continued walking down to Pier 33 and got in line for our ferry.  After we boarded, it was a short ride out to Alcatraz.  Another beautiful day.  It was a very interesting tour.  There were about 70 employees out there and their families who lived on Alcatraz in employee housing.  Actually, it was a great place for families.  There were several boats over to San Francisco every day.  And the children of the workers took a ferry to San Francisco to school every day.  The cell block was on top of “The Rock” and we had an energetic walk up the equivalent of a 12-story building.  One of the amazing things on this island was the gardens.  They built a fort out here in the 1860s during the Civil War.  And then it became a military prison.  That’s when they started the gardens.  They took soil from the adjacent islands and brought it over to Alcatraz which was basically a limestone rock.  During the time of Alcatraz as a federal prison, the families, and even the prisoners, worked on the gardens.  And they’re thriving today.  I bought a book, “Breaking the Rock” by Jolene Babyak who lived on Alcatraz as a child.  Her father was the acting warden.  It’s about the amazing escape in 1962 where four convicts escaped after placing dummy masks in their beds and spending months of digging through concrete, stealing supplies to make life vests and a raft.  Three of them were never seen again.  Should be a good read.  After our tour we had dinner at the Franciscan Crab Restaurant on the bay.  Then walked back to our parking garage and headed back.  We thought we’d head east on North Point to the Embarcadero and then on to the 280. That would have been a great way to get out of town if the Giants hadn’t been playing a game tonight at the AT&T Stadium on The Embarcadero (sigh).  We were in gridlock traffic until we passed the stadium and then it was clear sailing.  Made it back okay.  And no marine layer tonight.  70 today in San Francisco!  A beautiful, sunny day!   

A hang glider sailing along the bluff behind us.

A little bird has a nest on the edge of the bluff behind us.

The lighthouse and Warden's quarters on Alcatraz.

Approaching Alcatraz.  Power plant on the right.  Storage building in the center.

One of the cells.

View of San Francisco from Alcatraz.

Some of the gardens.

San Francisco

San Francisco RV Resort, Pacifica, CA:  Drove into San Francisco today.  Found out the Alcatraz tour was sold out until the end of July and the only way we could get out there was to take a city tour.  So we bought a 48-hour hop-on/hop-off tour which included Alcatraz.  Took the double-decker bus around San Francisco. Tomorrow we go back in and go out to Alcatraz and can jump on the bus again if we want.  After the bus tour we had lunch on Pier 39 at a really nice seafood restaurant with great views of Alcatraz, San Francisco Bay and the Golden Gate Bridge.  Then walked down to Ghirardelli Square.  Wanted to take a cable car, but people were lined up to get on, so we didn’t bother.  I liked it much better when I was out here in 1982.  I did all the driving back then and it seemed very easy to get around and not as many people.  Today there were SO MANY PEOPLE.  Of course Fisherman’s Wharf is a very touristy area.  Drove back to Pacifica.  Mike did all the driving—bless him!  As we were driving back the fog started rolling in.  The view in back of us is now shrouded in fog.  70 today.

Coit Tower

Ferry Building Spire

Beautiful City Hall

China Gate--Chinatown

Alcatraz

Golden Gate with the fog rolling in

Little seal on the dock--Pier 39

Ghirardelli Square

Same shot back in 1982

Homes on the hills around San Francisco.  Would you want to live here?

KOA, Moss Landing, Monterey Bay, to San Francisco RV Resort, Pacifica, CA:  Left Moss Landing this morning at 10:40 a.m. and took the Pacific Coast Highway north to Route 17 northeast.  Route 17 was a winding, twisting road up over the mountains through a lush conifer forest—a beautiful conifer forest.  Then dropped down into a pretty valley northeast of San Jose and took 280 northwest back to the Pacific Coast Highway just south of San Francisco.  Got to our park and were set up by 2:00.  Our site backs up to the Pacific on a 50-ft. bluff.  Beautiful!  You can hear the waves crashing in below us.  The sites here are really close together, but the view out our back window is priceless.  After getting set up we drove south on the Pacific Coast Highway, since we decided not to drive it with the fifth wheel in tow.  But it was doable—even though it would have taken us longer.  They’re just finishing up a tunnel and bridge to go around an area of the PCH that has a lot of rock falls.  Probably costs the state a lot to keep this section of road open.  Drove down to Pescadero and then turned around.  Mike drove down and I drove back.  It sure seemed a lot different than the drive I did down to Carmel from San Francisco back in 1982.  Half Moon Bay was a tiny little town back then.  Now it has a population of 13,000 with lots of traffic and lots of traffic lights.  Still a beautiful drive though.  On the way back we stopped at an eatery Mike saw on the show, “Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives”—The Gorilla Barbecue.  Really good.  Back to our park and waiting for, hopefully, an amazing sunset.  68 here in Pacifica but felt warmer.  One bad thing here.  Even though we have cable TV, we don’t have AMC channel.  The first show this season of “Breaking Bad” is on AMC tonight.  But we can’t see it.  Grrrrrrrrr!

The view behind our site!

Yikes!

Just south of San Francisco

The beautiful California coast

Another beautiful view!

The PCH isn't scary.  This is scary--Red Mountain Pass, Colorado--no shoulder or guard rails!  And we drove this with the fifth wheel in tow.  

KOA, Moss Landing, Monterey Bay, CA:  Spent the morning catching up on e-mails, banking, etc.  We got a break from the marine layer in the form of a nice sunny day.  After lunch we drove over to our little seal and sea otter colonies.  The seals were all asleep on the beach.  The sea otters were all asleep out in the little bay.  In the open sea, the sea otters wrap themselves in the kelp which anchors them and keeps them from drifting while they sleep.  Had dinner at the Whole Enchilada and then back to our park.  Tomorrow we leave for Pacifica which is just south of San Francisco.  We were going to drive up the PCH, but the park where we’re staying at in Pacifica doesn’t recommend we do that.  So, we’re going to have to find a different route (sigh).  Mid-60s today.

The old post office in Moss Landing--the new one isn't much bigger.

Probably a mercantile building at one time.

Nap time at the sea otter colony.

Sound asleep...

There were a bunch of jelly fish in the little bay.