James Pearl Thinks Blogging is Dead
- Thread starter Norm
- Start date
Who does laundry on a three day trip?
Everyone other than you and me in Vermont apparently.
Hahaha, true. I went to Europe for two weeks and did laundry zero times.
I can add another element of sleeping well when you travel: obliterate yourself by biking a lot. This has seemed to work well, as I was shot last night and I slept like a log. Do logs sleep? I am not sure, but if they do I know how they feel. Felt good to get a solid night of sleep. The alarm went off too early and I could have slept more. But I also knew that once I was out there I would feel fine.
On Granogue - after riding in the brutal heat at KT I decided there was no way I was going to do that race unless the weather was unseasonably cool. We have decided to go to Stirling this weekend instead.
Hit the road and I was immediately feeling these 2 things: hot & tired. Yesterday it was cooler but the weather is starting to ramp up. I saw on the weather report this morning that it's creeping up to 100 next week. I'm not sure there's much of a difference between 95 and 100 to be honest. In any event, aside from the heat my legs are about done with this trip. I did warm up to the ride once I got out to the eastern country area. But I was definitely flat for the duration of this ride. I did the same out & back as I did yesterday. Probably a better sunrise pic today:
At 9:51 I checked in for the Friday flight. Both my legs and my brain are ready to go home. After 10 days in a row of travel, I am pretty much literally full of shit. I feel ready to explode.
Work is work.
Punched out of the office at 3:45 and was on the bike again around 4:00. I probably had plenty of time to do a much bigger ride, but at this point my legs are done and I just want to get the bike back before the shop closes, then tie up the loose ends of the trip. Due to last night's missed opportunity, I mapped a route to the shop that included a stop at Lick, which is what you could call an "artesianal" ice cream shop. They have flavors that you don't normally get. I got these 2 today:
1. Goat Cheese, Thyme, Honey
2. Chocolate Chocolate (vegan)
Then I rode to the shop and returned the bike, grabbed a shower, and got an Uber back to the hotel a little after 6:00. Final stats on the trip:
* 7:09 total time (8:10 if you include the Zwift ride on rainy day 1)
* 115 miles (133 including Zwift)
At this point, there are only 2 of "us" left, me and my boss. At this point I call him boss though he is really a friend. But it's easier to say boss. Anyway, when I asked what he was doing tonight he said hanging out with me. This is why I came back to the hotel instead of staying downtown and grabbing some coffee and dinner. He is Taiwanese, as it turns out, and he also likes dessert. So we sort of feed on each other when it comes to meal time. We started with a Chinese place he had found, that was in a...well, let's say Chinatown-ish kind of section, which was really just a parking lot mall that has been taken over by various Asian places.
Tonight I said F this no meat thing. Then when he asked if I wanted to go to the ice cream place I missed last night, I admitted that I had gone earlier but I was all-in to go back. So to extend the list from above:
3. Dewberry Corn Cobbler
4. Lemonade Pound Cake
5. Dark Chocolate, Olive Oil, Seat Salt
So to summarize my life since work ended: Bike, ice cream, meat, ice cream.
Back at the hotel and it is time to tie up all the loose ends of the trip, which starts by doing a load of laundry. I have done 3-day trips to Chicago with nothing more than a backpack before. However, the idea of me riding in 98 degree Austin heat and not washing it to use the next day is gross. So I wash & dry the clothes at the end of the day so they're not beyond-disgusting. While we are here, this is what I typically bring on a trip like this:
- 2 full bike kits
- helmet*, bike shoes
- shorts & t-shirt to travel/live in
- sneakers/socks to go with the above
- sleep shorts/t-shirt**
- 2 pair of work slacks
- belt***
- 3 work shirts
- 4 pair underwear
- 3 work socks
- work shoes
- toiletries
* no longer necessary as I found out today that the bike shop provides a helmet free with rental
** probably of questionable value unless I want to wash the travel clothes
*** no longer necessary because I can button my pants
Since I am doing the laundry, with the last load I will wash everything except the travel clothes, which I wear when I do laundry. Then I will pack it all away and when I get home I have an entirely clean suitcase. I can't really wash the helmet & shoes, but I do my best to dry them out like so:
That's about it for Austin. I fly out tomorrow at 9:45am and land at EWR at 2:30pm. Then I'll be home for roughly 63 hours before we go to California.
Last tidbit. I forgot to mention this yesterday but for the first time in my life I rode my bike past roadkill armadillo.
On Granogue - after riding in the brutal heat at KT I decided there was no way I was going to do that race unless the weather was unseasonably cool. We have decided to go to Stirling this weekend instead.
Hit the road and I was immediately feeling these 2 things: hot & tired. Yesterday it was cooler but the weather is starting to ramp up. I saw on the weather report this morning that it's creeping up to 100 next week. I'm not sure there's much of a difference between 95 and 100 to be honest. In any event, aside from the heat my legs are about done with this trip. I did warm up to the ride once I got out to the eastern country area. But I was definitely flat for the duration of this ride. I did the same out & back as I did yesterday. Probably a better sunrise pic today:
At 9:51 I checked in for the Friday flight. Both my legs and my brain are ready to go home. After 10 days in a row of travel, I am pretty much literally full of shit. I feel ready to explode.
Work is work.
Punched out of the office at 3:45 and was on the bike again around 4:00. I probably had plenty of time to do a much bigger ride, but at this point my legs are done and I just want to get the bike back before the shop closes, then tie up the loose ends of the trip. Due to last night's missed opportunity, I mapped a route to the shop that included a stop at Lick, which is what you could call an "artesianal" ice cream shop. They have flavors that you don't normally get. I got these 2 today:
1. Goat Cheese, Thyme, Honey
2. Chocolate Chocolate (vegan)
Then I rode to the shop and returned the bike, grabbed a shower, and got an Uber back to the hotel a little after 6:00. Final stats on the trip:
* 7:09 total time (8:10 if you include the Zwift ride on rainy day 1)
* 115 miles (133 including Zwift)
At this point, there are only 2 of "us" left, me and my boss. At this point I call him boss though he is really a friend. But it's easier to say boss. Anyway, when I asked what he was doing tonight he said hanging out with me. This is why I came back to the hotel instead of staying downtown and grabbing some coffee and dinner. He is Taiwanese, as it turns out, and he also likes dessert. So we sort of feed on each other when it comes to meal time. We started with a Chinese place he had found, that was in a...well, let's say Chinatown-ish kind of section, which was really just a parking lot mall that has been taken over by various Asian places.
Tonight I said F this no meat thing. Then when he asked if I wanted to go to the ice cream place I missed last night, I admitted that I had gone earlier but I was all-in to go back. So to extend the list from above:
3. Dewberry Corn Cobbler
4. Lemonade Pound Cake
5. Dark Chocolate, Olive Oil, Seat Salt
So to summarize my life since work ended: Bike, ice cream, meat, ice cream.
Back at the hotel and it is time to tie up all the loose ends of the trip, which starts by doing a load of laundry. I have done 3-day trips to Chicago with nothing more than a backpack before. However, the idea of me riding in 98 degree Austin heat and not washing it to use the next day is gross. So I wash & dry the clothes at the end of the day so they're not beyond-disgusting. While we are here, this is what I typically bring on a trip like this:
- 2 full bike kits
- helmet*, bike shoes
- shorts & t-shirt to travel/live in
- sneakers/socks to go with the above
- sleep shorts/t-shirt**
- 2 pair of work slacks
- belt***
- 3 work shirts
- 4 pair underwear
- 3 work socks
- work shoes
- toiletries
* no longer necessary as I found out today that the bike shop provides a helmet free with rental
** probably of questionable value unless I want to wash the travel clothes
*** no longer necessary because I can button my pants
Since I am doing the laundry, with the last load I will wash everything except the travel clothes, which I wear when I do laundry. Then I will pack it all away and when I get home I have an entirely clean suitcase. I can't really wash the helmet & shoes, but I do my best to dry them out like so:
That's about it for Austin. I fly out tomorrow at 9:45am and land at EWR at 2:30pm. Then I'll be home for roughly 63 hours before we go to California.
Last tidbit. I forgot to mention this yesterday but for the first time in my life I rode my bike past roadkill armadillo.
Friday
Wake up at 5:30, done & ready to go by 5:45, go to the lobby at 6:00 and meet my boss who drives us to the airport. My flight is a tad later but it's good to just BS a little bit and get the free ride. His flight is an hour before mine so it gives me a little time to grab some breakfast & coffee, both of which I feel is some of the best airport food I have ever had, which is a sure indication that I am exhausted. I am not going to question it, so I roll with the awesome coffee for a 2nd cup, and as expected, it is not as good as the first. But it's still good.
I have changed my approach to seat selection recently. In general I take aisle seats because I tend to get up and pee all the time. Plus my fear of heights makes the window a little iffy. But I've been taking the window lately as it has been harder to work on the plane. I think the working-on-the-plane strategy has lost some of it's luster, as I have been on 22 plane flights this year, with #23/24 coming up in the next week. I am finding it harder to muster the drive to work. And frankly, we are no longer a startup so I'm a little more comfortable letting the org buy me coffee and letting me read & listen to music on my travel time.
And look out the window. Nothing spectacular here but I have come to enjoy just looking out the window. That cloud looked like it was 50 feet away at the time.
Landed at 2:00, 30 minutes early so I got home earlier than expected. My parents dropped Julia off and we spent some time together adding things to the travel map. I have different layers/colors/icons but yellow is the color reserved for something that is a "potential" target. When we actually do it, the icon becomes the color that I have for the layer, such as blue (food), green (POI), brown (coffee), pink (dessert), etc. There are a bunch of layers and colors and it makes traveling more fun/useful for me. And it gives me something to do with my daughter that she really does love.
It appears that everything worth doing in this place is north. Our hotel is to the right of route 80, actually in between Berkeley & Oakland. The airport is south off the map.
Since Julia is going to be away for a week her mother asked if she could have her Friday night, so she came and got her after dinner and we had a nice quiet night to relax. I think we were asleep just after 10:00. I was crushed from this trip and D has been up working late working on a paper all week. So she was also exhausted as well. We didn't even watch TV.
Saturday
After scraping ourselves out of bed, we managed to just get out of the house by 9:00 and make Ryerson by 10:00 to meet @2Julianas @1sh0t1b33r Mark and a few of Mark's friends including @jimg1 (http://www.mtbnj.com/forum/members/jimg1.4247/) who has not been on the board since 2014. I don't know how the board works because you can't tag people who have not been active for some length of time, presumably indeterminate.
Anyway, all smiles before:
Plan was to ride through Ringwood directly to Shepherd Lake, then take the Art White Connector to Sterling, do a loop, then ride back. On the Art White Trail we ran into @UtahJoe & @Kirt & @Chris26er who said it was a solid loop we were going to hit. Made it to the Sterling lot in 50 minutes, then embarked on the Sterling loop, CW direction. Trails were fun, and a lot of work has been done on this. The last bit of the CW version of the trail was fun as hell, and I was loving jumping off anything I could.
Then I got to the Sterling lot and saw this rock that I decided to hop at the last second. And I missed, and smashed my face into the ground. Here I am a few minutes later trying to make sure my face still works. You can see the rock above, where the guy is sitting waiting for me to get my brain to function again. As the sign says, Build Your Next Adventure Here. Yup, hell of an adventure.
I thought I was doing ok but then Alex asked me what day it was and who the president it. I got Saturday right, but for some strange reason I keep wanting to say the president is Donald Trump. If I don't get better by next week I am going to go to the doctor to get that checked out.
We did the remainder of the ride without smashing into anything. I just wanted to get to the end after the above.
Then we went to see @seanrunnette and celebrate Bastille Day. Or "eat a bunch of meat like Americans" day.
Just hanging out. Sean looks so young without the Ubermensch Beard.
I washed off my face in the lake, and over time I started to get a little stiff. While I did land on the left side of my face, I think my neck/shoulders took the worst of it, as I was stiffening up as the evening wore on. Again, when we got home we passed on TV, as just laying on the couch felt dreamy.
I turned out the light and crashed totally & completely. I thought I was going to have a hard time sleeping but that wasn't the case at all.
Sunday
Woke up a little creaky but not too bad. We had no set plans today but we needed to get a bunch of things done before we left for California. So I made a list of things to try and get done. Nothing too heavy but plenty of stuff to cover the day. Thankfully, D took care of one of the big ones by cleaning up the demo bikes that Jay let us try out. For better or worse, neither of us liked these bikes. So we needed to clean them up before we brought them back:
Then @Glenn Rides After 4 PM CST texted me asking how I was feeling, and if I needed anything from Halters since he was going there. Fast forward 30 minutes and Glenn is giving me 2-3 hours of my life back by taking the bikes back for us. This was a huge gift, and we now owe Glenn a case of PopTarts. While we were on the porch talking to Glenn, the boys came back from Canada. As it turns out, Zac is now taller than D. He is probably taller than me too. If not now, he will be by the end of the summer. In reality, I may be shrinking. I am sure slamming myself head-first into the ground does not help my height.
Then we watched the World Cup while I rode up the Alpe de Zwift. We were all rooting for Croatia so we were a little disappointed. I guess that's somewhat interesting as we all have French heritage. Maybe that's some form of self-loathing coming out? Anyway, it was a good match, but it didn't go the way we wanted it to. Still, not going to lose sleep over it. Fun match to watch. And hell, solid family bonding time.
The afternoon saw the 5 of us packing for the trip. It was a relatively painless affair which was nice. So that was another thing off the list. Then I sat down to do my expense reports which is like doing taxes now. We book travel through Concur, but the org is too dense to actually use it for expense reporting. We use...an Excel spreadsheet. I am not sure what to make of that. Anyway, submitted my last 3 expense reports which was 1 of the few remaining thing on the list (which was ~15 in total).
The next to last thing to do was to call a NICA kid's mom and talk to her about her daughter joining the team. After a good conversation I can now say that we have our first ever junior on the team, which is exciting. She will be racing Nationals in orange & blue, which is pretty awesome. In addition to her, @StayHydrated and @WickedSistahEast are also now in team colors, and we have 1 more candidate who I am speaking with currently, where "currently" means "not actually at this moment but on & off."
The last thing to do was to blog. And here you go.
Tomorrow, San Francisco. We fly at 9:55am EST and land at 1:00pm PST. I will be hotel-Zwifting an hour a day just to keep the gears lubed. Nothing too deep and overall this coming week will serve as a rest week of sorts. After that, we have 4 semi-normal weeks where we will only be going to Raystown, Upstate NY (Whiteface), Cranks Around the Campfire, Canada, and back to Vermont for a quick 2-day KT teaser. Ideally, no airplanes will be involved in any of these trips.
Wake up at 5:30, done & ready to go by 5:45, go to the lobby at 6:00 and meet my boss who drives us to the airport. My flight is a tad later but it's good to just BS a little bit and get the free ride. His flight is an hour before mine so it gives me a little time to grab some breakfast & coffee, both of which I feel is some of the best airport food I have ever had, which is a sure indication that I am exhausted. I am not going to question it, so I roll with the awesome coffee for a 2nd cup, and as expected, it is not as good as the first. But it's still good.
I have changed my approach to seat selection recently. In general I take aisle seats because I tend to get up and pee all the time. Plus my fear of heights makes the window a little iffy. But I've been taking the window lately as it has been harder to work on the plane. I think the working-on-the-plane strategy has lost some of it's luster, as I have been on 22 plane flights this year, with #23/24 coming up in the next week. I am finding it harder to muster the drive to work. And frankly, we are no longer a startup so I'm a little more comfortable letting the org buy me coffee and letting me read & listen to music on my travel time.
And look out the window. Nothing spectacular here but I have come to enjoy just looking out the window. That cloud looked like it was 50 feet away at the time.
Landed at 2:00, 30 minutes early so I got home earlier than expected. My parents dropped Julia off and we spent some time together adding things to the travel map. I have different layers/colors/icons but yellow is the color reserved for something that is a "potential" target. When we actually do it, the icon becomes the color that I have for the layer, such as blue (food), green (POI), brown (coffee), pink (dessert), etc. There are a bunch of layers and colors and it makes traveling more fun/useful for me. And it gives me something to do with my daughter that she really does love.
It appears that everything worth doing in this place is north. Our hotel is to the right of route 80, actually in between Berkeley & Oakland. The airport is south off the map.
Since Julia is going to be away for a week her mother asked if she could have her Friday night, so she came and got her after dinner and we had a nice quiet night to relax. I think we were asleep just after 10:00. I was crushed from this trip and D has been up working late working on a paper all week. So she was also exhausted as well. We didn't even watch TV.
Saturday
After scraping ourselves out of bed, we managed to just get out of the house by 9:00 and make Ryerson by 10:00 to meet @2Julianas @1sh0t1b33r Mark and a few of Mark's friends including @jimg1 (http://www.mtbnj.com/forum/members/jimg1.4247/) who has not been on the board since 2014. I don't know how the board works because you can't tag people who have not been active for some length of time, presumably indeterminate.
Anyway, all smiles before:
Plan was to ride through Ringwood directly to Shepherd Lake, then take the Art White Connector to Sterling, do a loop, then ride back. On the Art White Trail we ran into @UtahJoe & @Kirt & @Chris26er who said it was a solid loop we were going to hit. Made it to the Sterling lot in 50 minutes, then embarked on the Sterling loop, CW direction. Trails were fun, and a lot of work has been done on this. The last bit of the CW version of the trail was fun as hell, and I was loving jumping off anything I could.
Then I got to the Sterling lot and saw this rock that I decided to hop at the last second. And I missed, and smashed my face into the ground. Here I am a few minutes later trying to make sure my face still works. You can see the rock above, where the guy is sitting waiting for me to get my brain to function again. As the sign says, Build Your Next Adventure Here. Yup, hell of an adventure.
I thought I was doing ok but then Alex asked me what day it was and who the president it. I got Saturday right, but for some strange reason I keep wanting to say the president is Donald Trump. If I don't get better by next week I am going to go to the doctor to get that checked out.
We did the remainder of the ride without smashing into anything. I just wanted to get to the end after the above.
Then we went to see @seanrunnette and celebrate Bastille Day. Or "eat a bunch of meat like Americans" day.
Just hanging out. Sean looks so young without the Ubermensch Beard.
I washed off my face in the lake, and over time I started to get a little stiff. While I did land on the left side of my face, I think my neck/shoulders took the worst of it, as I was stiffening up as the evening wore on. Again, when we got home we passed on TV, as just laying on the couch felt dreamy.
I turned out the light and crashed totally & completely. I thought I was going to have a hard time sleeping but that wasn't the case at all.
Sunday
Woke up a little creaky but not too bad. We had no set plans today but we needed to get a bunch of things done before we left for California. So I made a list of things to try and get done. Nothing too heavy but plenty of stuff to cover the day. Thankfully, D took care of one of the big ones by cleaning up the demo bikes that Jay let us try out. For better or worse, neither of us liked these bikes. So we needed to clean them up before we brought them back:
Then @Glenn Rides After 4 PM CST texted me asking how I was feeling, and if I needed anything from Halters since he was going there. Fast forward 30 minutes and Glenn is giving me 2-3 hours of my life back by taking the bikes back for us. This was a huge gift, and we now owe Glenn a case of PopTarts. While we were on the porch talking to Glenn, the boys came back from Canada. As it turns out, Zac is now taller than D. He is probably taller than me too. If not now, he will be by the end of the summer. In reality, I may be shrinking. I am sure slamming myself head-first into the ground does not help my height.
Then we watched the World Cup while I rode up the Alpe de Zwift. We were all rooting for Croatia so we were a little disappointed. I guess that's somewhat interesting as we all have French heritage. Maybe that's some form of self-loathing coming out? Anyway, it was a good match, but it didn't go the way we wanted it to. Still, not going to lose sleep over it. Fun match to watch. And hell, solid family bonding time.
The afternoon saw the 5 of us packing for the trip. It was a relatively painless affair which was nice. So that was another thing off the list. Then I sat down to do my expense reports which is like doing taxes now. We book travel through Concur, but the org is too dense to actually use it for expense reporting. We use...an Excel spreadsheet. I am not sure what to make of that. Anyway, submitted my last 3 expense reports which was 1 of the few remaining thing on the list (which was ~15 in total).
The next to last thing to do was to call a NICA kid's mom and talk to her about her daughter joining the team. After a good conversation I can now say that we have our first ever junior on the team, which is exciting. She will be racing Nationals in orange & blue, which is pretty awesome. In addition to her, @StayHydrated and @WickedSistahEast are also now in team colors, and we have 1 more candidate who I am speaking with currently, where "currently" means "not actually at this moment but on & off."
The last thing to do was to blog. And here you go.
Tomorrow, San Francisco. We fly at 9:55am EST and land at 1:00pm PST. I will be hotel-Zwifting an hour a day just to keep the gears lubed. Nothing too deep and overall this coming week will serve as a rest week of sorts. After that, we have 4 semi-normal weeks where we will only be going to Raystown, Upstate NY (Whiteface), Cranks Around the Campfire, Canada, and back to Vermont for a quick 2-day KT teaser. Ideally, no airplanes will be involved in any of these trips.
San Francisco - Day 1
The first of 7 days of our 2019 Summer Family Vacation is mostly a travel day. We get up at 6:00am and are out the door by 7:20. After a quick stop to get Julia from her mother's we are at the airport just after 8:00. Plane is on time, we are on board, and the 5 hour and 15 minute non-stop journey is pretty much as uneventful as you can get. This is a good thing. Flying Southwest, we are not guaranteed seats together and for this one, we are not together. The kids fly (kinda) together for the first half, then D & Julia swap for the second half when Simon's iPad loses power and they play cards. I had intended to work but the Internet does not function, so I read the second half of my book instead.
We land, go to the hotel, then head to the public market across the street. We are sort of in this Timezone Vortex, where it is late lunch PST and almost dinner EST. We eat a little something at this market, just because we're in the transition from EST to PST and our bodies aren't sure what to do. I am not especially hungry so don't get much. The rare times when I am not hungry I follow my stomach's lead and pass on a meal.
After the market we go to Trader Joes and get some food for the week. We have a suite which comes with an actual kitchen and a full-size fridge. We stock up a little bit for the week.
We drop the food at the room and then head out to Emeryville Marina & Park just to get some walking in. In all, we are out for almost 2 hours and we just enjoy the views and the cooler but nice weather. The road you see in the pic is route 80.
Taking a break in the grass.
Once we got back we hit the pool, then went to the room and made an odds & ends dinner, which is what you see here. This is something we do now & again, where we put out a bunch of things and you just sort of mix & match what you want.
Topped it off with ice cream then by 8:45 I was about barely keeping my eyes open. So we put out the lights at 9:00 and called it a night. By 9:30 I was out beyond out.
The first of 7 days of our 2019 Summer Family Vacation is mostly a travel day. We get up at 6:00am and are out the door by 7:20. After a quick stop to get Julia from her mother's we are at the airport just after 8:00. Plane is on time, we are on board, and the 5 hour and 15 minute non-stop journey is pretty much as uneventful as you can get. This is a good thing. Flying Southwest, we are not guaranteed seats together and for this one, we are not together. The kids fly (kinda) together for the first half, then D & Julia swap for the second half when Simon's iPad loses power and they play cards. I had intended to work but the Internet does not function, so I read the second half of my book instead.
We land, go to the hotel, then head to the public market across the street. We are sort of in this Timezone Vortex, where it is late lunch PST and almost dinner EST. We eat a little something at this market, just because we're in the transition from EST to PST and our bodies aren't sure what to do. I am not especially hungry so don't get much. The rare times when I am not hungry I follow my stomach's lead and pass on a meal.
After the market we go to Trader Joes and get some food for the week. We have a suite which comes with an actual kitchen and a full-size fridge. We stock up a little bit for the week.
We drop the food at the room and then head out to Emeryville Marina & Park just to get some walking in. In all, we are out for almost 2 hours and we just enjoy the views and the cooler but nice weather. The road you see in the pic is route 80.
Taking a break in the grass.
Once we got back we hit the pool, then went to the room and made an odds & ends dinner, which is what you see here. This is something we do now & again, where we put out a bunch of things and you just sort of mix & match what you want.
Topped it off with ice cream then by 8:45 I was about barely keeping my eyes open. So we put out the lights at 9:00 and called it a night. By 9:30 I was out beyond out.
Did u go back to the future?
Whatever you do, do not do anything that can alter future events from occurring, it could have grave consequences!
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The Kalmyk
Well-Known Member
If traveling outside of San Fran, The Mystery Spot is always a good time for a mind f-ck. Vortex/antigravity
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San Francisco - Day 2 (Tuesday)
Slept in this morning, 8 hours, no bike ride. I think I've decided that I'm not riding on this trip, just to give the legs a rest. It's been a big year so far. I have lots of time left, so we'll just walk & eat on this trip. Breakfast is a hotel deal, which isn't remarkable.
The first real day in the city. Yesterday was a voyage in Oakland, in the year 2019. I can tell you that the future is a lot like the present. I'll make this brief, as I don't think this will really change the future. Neither the Raiders nor the A's are World Champions in a year from now.
When we went to Seattle (also in 2019, the Mariners are not World Series Champs btw) we got the City Pass which worked out great. We did the same here, choosing the 5-option version of the pass. The first option we did was the Hop On/Off bus which stops at ~20 places around the city. Since we had no real plan we figured this would be a good way to kick off the trip.
The guy giving the tour was ok. He mentioned more than once he is writing a book. But at the end of the day, he was by far the best. Below is a picture from Haight-Ashbury. This is where Hendirx lived for some time when in SF:
Got off the bus at Golden Gate Park, which is not actually linked to the Golden Gate Bridge. Not being familiar with this city, I did not know that before I had looked into this trip. Now we know. At the suggestion of @taylor185 we decided to hit up the California Academy of Sciences, which was a good halftime stop on the tour of the day. This was our 2nd of 5 things on the CityPass. We've been to a lot of these museum-explore-ish places so we generally don't feel the need to spend 8 hours in each one anymore. We were here for 3 hours, which was plenty of time to do absorb a decent amount.
We brought lunch with us today, which was good as these places rape your wallet with prices. After this we walked across the way to the Japanese Tea Garden and in the park D spotted an espresso place, which I was in desperate need of. It was really good and well worth the reasonable $2.50 price tag. The Tea Garden turned out to be not free, so we skipped it. There was an observation deck across the park as well, but this was free. So we got a decent view from the top, which was 9 floors up.
Then I got another espresso and we hopped back on the bus and went to the Golden Gate Bridge.
It was really awesome. Also at the recommendation of @taylor185 we walked out to the first viewing area, just to get a feel for how grand & awesome it is. Indeed, it is deserving of many of the adjectives used to describe it. Really cool experience. I have no real memory of being here almost 20+ years ago.
One very cool phenomenon is the fog that rolls in from the sea. Below is a picture of a cloud that was just crawling over the hill. I once experienced something incredible like this in Taiwan while riding in the mountains, and this is only the second time I have ever really seen it. The first experience was more intense, as I was quite literally inside the clouds as they rolled over the roads. But it was very cool to see this happening from a distance.
Hopped back on the bus and took a few stops to Lombard Street, where we climbed up to see the "world's crookedest street". It was steep as hell and between the difficult roads and the insane number of tourists, this is a bit of a hectic place to imagine living. Street is neat, though the locals probably hate it in reality.
Wrapped up the bus tour by getting off a few stops early and looking for ice cream, which we found at Pier 39, which is where you go to see the sea lions. Here is a shot from the pier which has the Salesforce Tower, Coit Tower, Transamerica Building, and (former?) BOA building,
Took an Uber home at $50+ which is f'ing highway robbery. It is quickly becoming apparent that this town should be renamed San Francisco, Patron Saint of Cashectomy, as it seems the sole purpose of this town is to remove dollars from your wallet. It's not going to make a difference on this trip but holy hell, in hindsight the $2.50 espresso probably should have scared me due to it being too cheap.
Had dinner at the market where we had lunch yesterday. We tried a place on the other side of the tracks and it was 21+ only, so we cut our losses and went where we knew there would be something for sure. Back at the hotel the boys & D hit the pool and I shaved for the first time since my parking lot road rash facial. It hurts a bit but things were starting to get too itchy, so I had to do it. Look & feel more human now.
Slept in this morning, 8 hours, no bike ride. I think I've decided that I'm not riding on this trip, just to give the legs a rest. It's been a big year so far. I have lots of time left, so we'll just walk & eat on this trip. Breakfast is a hotel deal, which isn't remarkable.
The first real day in the city. Yesterday was a voyage in Oakland, in the year 2019. I can tell you that the future is a lot like the present. I'll make this brief, as I don't think this will really change the future. Neither the Raiders nor the A's are World Champions in a year from now.
When we went to Seattle (also in 2019, the Mariners are not World Series Champs btw) we got the City Pass which worked out great. We did the same here, choosing the 5-option version of the pass. The first option we did was the Hop On/Off bus which stops at ~20 places around the city. Since we had no real plan we figured this would be a good way to kick off the trip.
The guy giving the tour was ok. He mentioned more than once he is writing a book. But at the end of the day, he was by far the best. Below is a picture from Haight-Ashbury. This is where Hendirx lived for some time when in SF:
Got off the bus at Golden Gate Park, which is not actually linked to the Golden Gate Bridge. Not being familiar with this city, I did not know that before I had looked into this trip. Now we know. At the suggestion of @taylor185 we decided to hit up the California Academy of Sciences, which was a good halftime stop on the tour of the day. This was our 2nd of 5 things on the CityPass. We've been to a lot of these museum-explore-ish places so we generally don't feel the need to spend 8 hours in each one anymore. We were here for 3 hours, which was plenty of time to do absorb a decent amount.
We brought lunch with us today, which was good as these places rape your wallet with prices. After this we walked across the way to the Japanese Tea Garden and in the park D spotted an espresso place, which I was in desperate need of. It was really good and well worth the reasonable $2.50 price tag. The Tea Garden turned out to be not free, so we skipped it. There was an observation deck across the park as well, but this was free. So we got a decent view from the top, which was 9 floors up.
Then I got another espresso and we hopped back on the bus and went to the Golden Gate Bridge.
It was really awesome. Also at the recommendation of @taylor185 we walked out to the first viewing area, just to get a feel for how grand & awesome it is. Indeed, it is deserving of many of the adjectives used to describe it. Really cool experience. I have no real memory of being here almost 20+ years ago.
One very cool phenomenon is the fog that rolls in from the sea. Below is a picture of a cloud that was just crawling over the hill. I once experienced something incredible like this in Taiwan while riding in the mountains, and this is only the second time I have ever really seen it. The first experience was more intense, as I was quite literally inside the clouds as they rolled over the roads. But it was very cool to see this happening from a distance.
Hopped back on the bus and took a few stops to Lombard Street, where we climbed up to see the "world's crookedest street". It was steep as hell and between the difficult roads and the insane number of tourists, this is a bit of a hectic place to imagine living. Street is neat, though the locals probably hate it in reality.
Wrapped up the bus tour by getting off a few stops early and looking for ice cream, which we found at Pier 39, which is where you go to see the sea lions. Here is a shot from the pier which has the Salesforce Tower, Coit Tower, Transamerica Building, and (former?) BOA building,
Took an Uber home at $50+ which is f'ing highway robbery. It is quickly becoming apparent that this town should be renamed San Francisco, Patron Saint of Cashectomy, as it seems the sole purpose of this town is to remove dollars from your wallet. It's not going to make a difference on this trip but holy hell, in hindsight the $2.50 espresso probably should have scared me due to it being too cheap.
Had dinner at the market where we had lunch yesterday. We tried a place on the other side of the tracks and it was 21+ only, so we cut our losses and went where we knew there would be something for sure. Back at the hotel the boys & D hit the pool and I shaved for the first time since my parking lot road rash facial. It hurts a bit but things were starting to get too itchy, so I had to do it. Look & feel more human now.
family bike activity in SF
Connecting the presidio to the bridge and battery.....https://www.strava.com/activities/376029942
Eat at Slanted Door - did i mention this when you were on a business trip?
Looks like that nice sf cool weather. nice.
Connecting the presidio to the bridge and battery.....https://www.strava.com/activities/376029942
Eat at Slanted Door - did i mention this when you were on a business trip?
Looks like that nice sf cool weather. nice.