Day 14 Vancouver!

Got a hyper early flight, left for the airport 3am, arrived in Vancouver late morningish? View from the plane.

Nifty!

Dinner with family SO GOOD.

Day 13 San Francisco Chinatown

Got scared looking for parking, parked the car 8 blocks away so we walked up and down and up and down taking pictures of pretty fire escapes and buildings etc.

Golden Dust

Very steep

Now looking down, the whole city is very hilly!

Got into Chinatown and went to the bakery. The hot dogs in their hot dog buns are bigger.

The bbq pork bun was stranger, I liked it though. The bread fluffier, like french bread and the meat was grounded up more for softer texture.

The egg tarts BIGGER.

The park people hung out at playing cards and chess. A real crowd was out this was on a Sunday!

Neat mural!

I like the lanterns.

The egg tarts were BIG

The map of the place embedded into the ground!

More pretty lanterns.

Weird cauliflower, you can't really tell in the picture but the bunches at the top had tinier clusters that were clumped together and it was more brown looking. We didn't get a chance to try it.

So many fish markets.

Needed a rest, finally found a sit down restaurant on the edge of town. Most places were take out places.

BBQ pork, stir friend beef flat broad noodle, the classics.

On the drive home, we lived on a hill by the yellow SANCTUARY sign, you can see it from here, but teeny tiny.

Day 12 Alameda Naval Air Museum & In & Out Burger

Drove through the Bay bridge here in San Francisco.

To come here to the Alameda Naval Air Museum.

WWII times

Lot of things to look at and friendly folks with tons of interesting stories!

Antique medical supplies, some still in sterile packaging.

 Cool ship we went inside.

Tight quarters.

Still inside the ship.

Sick Bay

This is the same ship they fired astronauts into outer space with.

Jets that flew off this ship to win the war.

Badass paint job.

Spent a good 3 hours here! Was not expecting that. The most interesting thing I learned was about the American Japanese role in the war effort and later reconciliation about how they were treated in America at this time. By the end of it we were HANGRY and went to In and Out Burger, which can only be found in California. Like McDonalds but better quality. Smaller menu, just your basic burgers, fries and shakes, no bells nor whistles. Facilities were clean, staff were way more professional and efficient than my last McDonald's experience. Sorry no food pics or how cute it was inside, too hungry eating! 

Day 11 4/20 Valencia St. and Hippie Hill

Took a drive down to Valencia St. A boutique-y neighbourhood with lots of mom and pop places to eat, furniture stores and antique shops.

Wanna eat..

What do you want to eat though?

Vietnamese!

Spring rolls came with vermicelli (cold noodles), pickled carrot, leafy greens and lots of parsley. The vinegar sauce that smells like feet too but is delicious!

I got a fried tofu sandwich. Large chunks of tofu I like. I had to pick out the sneaky jalapeños hidden among the parsley and cucumber, you trying to kill me? A bit on the salty side, but tasty overall, they made up for it by pouring extra water, the pho was good.

Driving by Hippie Hill to park the car somewhere, facilities!

Walked to Golden Gate park, it's a big park! You had to line up and get your bag checked going in to the fenced off area at Hippie Hill. This is San Francisco's first legal 420 celebration, annually folks gather here at 420. The line moved fast and you got to witness this real spectacle of hateful and judgey types yammering on at the entrance. I'm not sure they changed anyone's mind with their tactics..

These stoners arrived early! Who said weed makes you lazy? They were expecting 15,000 folks, 20,000 showed up.

I don't know this lady but I had to snap a pic.

They do a countdown to 420, like New Years. People stand up the minute before and light up in time for the big and hazey "budd drop" lol. 

On the walk back home I took lots of pictures of pretty houses. I call this one Key Lime Pie:

From left to right: Sugar icing, chocolate dust, caramel taffy, cinnamon orange, pistachio, vanilla bean, tangerine dream, mint, sesame ice cream, walnut milk, almond butter and coconut dream.

A raw to cooked salmon gradient:

I notice people here with garages will park their cars like this, half on the sidewalk and half on the road so they can use their garages for other things. What interesting San Franciscan behaviour, what encourages this?