I left my heart here??

I don’t think I left my heart here, but I did have a blast in San Francisco last weekend. I went with my friend Holly and her psychology club (from the high school where she teaches) and two other brave chaperones. We took a charter bus up on Thursday night and stayed in this crazy little hotel down town. The weather was so great on Friday and we walked all over town. I think my legs are finally not sore. We checked out Pier 39, walked down Lombard Street-the “crookedest street in the world,” perused China town, and went out for the last tour of the night at Alcatraz. Then it was back to the pier for dinner and shopping. I was so exhausted by the end of that night, but it was fun to see all the sights! I didn’t know all that much about Alcatraz, so that was so interesting to me. I learned about its famous prisoners, its history, etc. We toured the jail and heard about the history from both the inmates and the guards’ perspective. It was very interesting. We're in solitary confinement here, but obviously breaking the rules since there's two of us! What rebels.




The next day was COLD and rainy! We went to the Exploratorium and I loved it! It has all of these hands-on science experiments and it is divided into a ton of different sections with several experiments for each subject. I didn’t even get halfway through. We also reserved the “Tactile Dome” there-it is a maze that you go through completely in the dark. I was a little freaked out at first because there are sections that you have to crawl, climb up, and slide down and none of them are very big. One of the boys hid in the only room with a little bit of red light in it and jumped on me as I crawled through the opening. Yikes! It wasn’t so scary the second time through. Anyway, I would highly recommend the Exploratorium to any one of any age. I loved it! Next we went back to the pier to check out the U.S.S. Jeremiah. Apparently it is one of two fully-restored operating survivors out of 2,710 World War II Liberty Ships. It was part of the Normandy invasions. I didn’t spend much time outside walking the deck, but the engine room was enormous and amazing, and it was cool to learn the history of the huge ship. We rushed off after that to take a cruise of the bay, only to have it cut short by the huge swells that were coming over the edge of our boat. If it had been a clear day, it would have been amazing. Guess we can’t win them all. There was more running around town, a Chinese New Year Parade that we saw, and more eating and bus rides and counting kids. Needless to say I was exhausted by the time I got home Sunday evening, but what a cool trip! I’m so glad Holly invited me! The kids were pretty great too, so that was a huge blessing. I think I’m pretty much an expert at navigating down town (thanks to the bus driver that needed my help) so if anyone is looking for a tour guide, I’m pretty inexpensive. :)

Let me tell you-trying to get 39 students and 4 chaperones on one cable car is quite the feat, but we did it...several times!

Our lovely hotel room...that's right folks-those are TWIN beds. I didn't know that was possible in a hotel, but apparently it is.



This is the view from the top of one of the streets in China town.

Pier 39 has these docks set aside for the sea lions. There were tons of them just lying around doing their sea lion thing.

Can you tell it's chilly? The chaperones-me, Holly, Alissa, and Roy. They were all great and so much fun to hang out with.

The boat ride to Alcatraz-taking in the gorgeous view of the bay.

I wish I could've gotten a better picture of the bridge, but this was on the bay cruise where the waves were coming over the edge and it was rainy and windy- the spots are raindrops on my camera lens. It was neat to get to go under the famous bridge though and hear how it was built. Like I said-I'm an official San Francisco expert now. Ha ha.