Thursday, May 24, 2007 ;
5:42 AM
23 May (Wed)
Morning- we set off for Oakland because dh loves to roast his own coffee beans at home, then brew them himself. There is a store that sells the freshly harvest green coffee beans there.
We had to cross the Bay Bridge for that, and I really loved that experience. Bay Bridge is the longest bridge in the world (as I learnt from Wikipedia). It was a really long trip, across the SF Bay, then into a long tunnel then out onto the bridge again. Also, it was a multilevel bridge. When we went across to Oakland, we were on the lower level. And when we came back into SF city, we were on the upper deck.
(Again, these photos were taken from inside the car, through the windscreen, thus not as clear as I would like)
Above: call me crazy but I was very happy to see Ikea in Oakland too. Cos Ikea is a popular Singaporean destination and going there seems to be a favourite pastime of most of us. In Utah, the only Ikea just recently opened only, and it is super far away from my place (maybe 2hrs away), I don't think I will ever go there.
After that, we went to Fisherman's Wharf for lunch. Sun Sun (my friend/ ex-colleague) highly recommended the boiled Dungeness crabs there. From the roadside stall vendors. True enough! They were so delicious. The flesh was very firm because the crabs were very fresh. Kids had fish and chips which were as great too.
Around these stalls, there were limited seating areas so most people just crowd ard to eat, and there are many scraps left.. Hence, there were many birds waiting ard to scavenge, even perching on top of cars!
Then we took a leisurely stroll all along the Piers which are all numbered. The pics below all show the various views from the Piers and the Wharf.
Below: Alcatraz Island - the notorious prison for hardcore criminals. There were many tours to Alcatraz but we felt the kids may not appreciate it and waste our money, so we didn't go in.
Below: old and new (electric) cable cars
Then we went for dessert, because the world famous ice cream and chocolate is here at Ghirardelli Square. We walked all the way there and met police on horses along the way, as well as some "pirates".
We bought some cherries (not much) because they look very sweet, but didn't buy too many because they weren't really cheap (though cheaper than in Spore).
Below: I heard some 扬琴 sounds and at once searched for the source. This busker was playing a similar instrument, maybe dulcimer? But it is not identical to the Yangqin I used to play. Kids were intrigued so we stopped to listen for awhile.
Above: then we went to gawk at the sea lions basking and swimming in the bay. They are quite the exhibitionists, showing off their antics to everyone watching them. :-)
Although we stayed there for quite a long time, enjoying the various activities the sea lions engaged in, somehow it wasn't as exciting as seeing them in the wild, although we spotted much less than this number at Redwood NP.
We drove off to visit Sun sun and Stanford Uni after this. Below: shows the typical SF streets, straight down and across like grids (like Melbourne, due to trams)... But SF has v steep rds, going up and downhill. So the houses tt line the streets have unique structures and architecture. We also had to spend sometime in parallel parking on the super steep slopes! Can see tram lines everywhere too (see below right).
rainbows every day, do not worry for the morrow
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