California Dreamin' A week in San Francisco and the Bay Area

Sup brah?

As I went over in my previous blog post, my time at Camp Greentop has come to an end for the summer. Seeing as my J-1 US Visa allows you a 30 day grace period after working before expiring, I've used this time to go travelling starting off by visiting my cousins David and Michael in California.

'California here we come, right back where we started from'

Picking up from where I left you last time out, I left camp on 19th August and went to BWI Airport to catch a short flight up to Boston, Massachusetts before flying coast-to-coast over to San Francisco. After a surprisingly enjoyable (and cheap, I flew with JetBlue) flight, Michael picked me up from the airport and took me back to his apartment where he lives with his wife Daniya in Menlo Park, 30 minutes drive south of San Francisco, where I stayed for most of the week. On my first day of sightseeing, I had a brief tour around Stanford University where Michael studies before taking the train into San Francisco to meet up with Sam and English Sarah from camp as well as Sam's girlfriend Nikki. We had a great afternoon looking around Pier 39 and Fisherman's Wharf which included a boat tour out to the Golden Gate Bridge, around Alcatraz island and back-a definite highlight from the day.

Stanford University

The Bay Bridge in San Francisco

Pier 39

My kind of store

Sea lions

Piano stairs!

Having a Titanic moment on our boat tour

Alcatraz

Life size model of Michael Phelps! Had to get a picture with this

The following day was our final day together as Sam was going off to start a tour around California's National parks and Sarah was off to San Diego. We met slightly earlier and had a mooch around Union Square and the giant Westfield shopping centre before spontaneously deciding to walk all the way out to Golden Gate Park on the other side of town. The walk itself was great as we got to see some more traditional sights of San Francisco rather than just the standard city centre that I'd visited so far. It took us about an hour to get out to the park but it was totally worth it once we arrived with many exotic flowers and plants and superb architecture and sculptures. We then decided to go into the DeYoung Art Museum located in the park in which there is a tall viewing platform. At the top, we had an amazing 360 view of the park and surrounding neighbourhoods. Sam noticed that we could see the Golden Gate Bridge and the Presidio National Park that sits on its shoulder and so we decided (to Sarah's dismay who was quite tired at this point) to walk even further and make our way to the Golden Gate itself! This section of the walk was also interesting as we went through the Presidio, an excellent national park filled with Pine trees. I find it amazing that a place that feels so remote as this does is located so close to a busy city like San Francisco. Another hour or so of walking and we did get to the bridge. We spent a good while taking pictures, helping Sam with his moonwalking video (this summer, Sam has been making short films of him moonwalking past famous American sights which he hopes to put into one video in the end. I really can't wait till he's finished it!) and marveling at the sight of one of the most iconic world landmarks. To end the day and our time together, we caught a bus back into the city centre before hiking up to Lombard street to see the world's most crooked road. Although it was a lot of walking (Sarah reckons around 10 miles of it!) I really enjoyed my final day with these two and I'm sure I will see them again sometime in the future.

Union square

trying on a 49ers helmet in the Nike Store

cool church we found on our walk

Pagoda in Japantown

stereotypical San Francisco images

Golden Gate Park

View from the top of the DeYoung Art Museum

The Presidio

walking along the WW2 battlements on the way to the Golden Gate Bridge

group photo

on the bridge

Lombard Street

Friday came next and seeing as Michael and Daniya were going away for the weekend for a romantic break in Yosemite national park, I went to stay with my other cousin David over in the Oakland on the other side of San Francisco bay. My weekend with David largely consisted of a lot of cycling as he doesn't have a car and it would've been almost impossible (and very dangerous) if I rode with him on his Motorbike. So we peddled around and saw much of what there is to see in Oakland, which isn't a lot to be honest, taking in the famous Telegraph Avenue and Lake Merritt whilst the other half of the time was spent chilling and drinking with David's friends. It was a rather relaxing weekend however on the Sunday morning I woke up to find various messages from friends on facebook saying 'Are you ok?' 'How was the earthquake?'. "Earthquake? what Earthquake?" I thought to myself. I looked online and it turned out that in the early hours of the morning there had been an earthquake with a magnitude of 6.0 on the Richter scale just 30 miles away in the town of American Canyon that had injured several people. Now, I've always known I was a heavy sleeper but I didn't expect I could ever sleep through an earthquake so close to me!

Lake Merritt

a church now nicknamed 'God's Vagina', lovely

biking half of the Bay Bridge (the other half of the pathway hasn't been built yet!)

Michael, me and David

Later that night I returned back to Michael's for the remainder of my time in the bay area. Where Michael lives in California is very close to Silicon valley where a lot of the large tech and online companies have their headquarters. On the Friday before going to David's we visited Facebook HQ so on Monday we also went to have a look around Google. There wasn't much there but it was still interesting to see how a company with such a large presence in the digital world works on a day-to-day basis. In the afternoon, I finally got my taste of California beach life as we took a short trip out to Half Moon Bay, an excellent long sandy beach on the San Fran peninsula. A day or so before, I'd been nominated by my good friend Josh to do the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge (unless you've been living under a rock for the past two weeks or so, you probably know what that is by now) so I decided I wanted to film my challenge out on the beach. I'm going to put the video on youtube sometime and when I do, I shall attached a link to it here, stay tuned. After a rather successful trip, I then spent the evening watching 'Sin City: A dame to kill for' at my first American cinema in Redwood City. Was a top film, would recommended it if you like violence, gore and are familiar with any of Frank Miller's other films.

Stopping by Facebook HQ on Friday

Of all the things to find at Google, a dinosaur skeleton?

a conference bike, one of the weirdest inventions I've ever seen

anyone want to buy a gigantic steel shark's fin?

Sunflower field in Half Moon Bay

old-fashioned wheels

The beach!

the pacific

doing the 'Dunster' on the beach

For my final full day in California, Michael and I went for a morning swim at Stanford's Olympic size outdoor pool where the Team USA had trained before heading out to the 2012 London Olympics. It was an excellent facility to use however I could tell it had been a long time since I'd done any proper swimming-I've got to get back in shape! That afternoon, we took a trip to the other side of the Golden Gate Bridge to the Muir Woods to see some Giant Redwood trees, a unique Californian sight. It was truly amazing walking in the woods as it was oh so still and the trees were enormous. I remember one moment where we stopped to read something and you couldn't hear a single thing, complete silence. It was incredible. There are few places I've been to in the world that are more beautiful than there. It was a truly excellent trip and perfect way to conclude my time in California.

the pool at Stanford, simply stunning

Muir Woods

Just to put things into perspective. There's me, a 6ft tall man standing by the trees, they are truly are massive!

Michael and I

views on the drive back

So that was my amazing week on the west coast. For all the hype I'd heard leading up to going, San Francisco did not disappoint in the slightest. The city is one of my favourites in the US, and probably in the world too, due to its varied geography, rich history and its vibrant multi-culturalism. I saw pretty much everything San Fran had to offer, walked among Giant Redwoods, went to the beach and survived an earthquake. A true Californian experience. I'm extremely thankful to David, Michael and Daniya for having me stay for the week.

Tune in next time to hear all about the next part of my after camp travels: Chicago.

See ya later dudes, gnarly!

FP

#FraserOnTour