The San Francisco Tour (2007)
Welcome to San Francisco, the city by the bay. S.F. is the center of a huge metropolitan area that also includes Oakland, San Jose, Silicon Valley, and all of their suburbs.
Steep hilly streets, cable cars, and fog are all very distinctive of San Francisco seen below.
The fog is almost continuous here. Its a rarity to have a fog-free day in san fran, hence the city's nickname 'fog city'. It's actually pretty cool during the summer, mornings and evenings are especially cool (10c) and even during the day it barely reaches 20celcius.
The city is also really well known for its unique architecture and density.
Also among things S.F. is famous for: social progressiveness, liberalism, openness.
Critical mass? A gigantic bike rally in an upscale marina district neighborhood.
City hall on a gloomy, typical San Francisco morning. (It usually clears up in the afternoon though!)
Downtown is booming. It's quite dense and quite tall, much more so than any other Californian city.
Market Street. Cable cars! And some glorious stone architecture, almost a flavor of New York or Chicago in it.
I love this kind of stuff.
I also love dead-ends, as long as they end with a 40 story building. (Getting hit by oncoming cars is one of the sacrifices of getting those great shots).
A pretty line up of buildings leading into the financial district.
The Transamerica Pyramid. The tallest and most recognizable building in San Fran.
From the many hills, you can get some nice views of the cityscape. Here, on the left is the outer edge of downtown. Moving towards the right is the Pacific Heights Neighborhood.
A view down a typical street west of downtown. (Nob Hill/Pacific Heights area)
A look at the neighborhood we called home for a few days, The residential style here is uniquely San Franciscan.
Here's a view of the area from a higher vantage point, using some HDR. Notice the famous 'curvy street'.
Along the bay in this area is Fisherman's Wharf. It's one of the biggest tourist attractions in the city: great food, shopping, street entertainment, boat cruises, etc etc. Here's a wild sea lion swimming around at pier39.
Did I mention great food? It can't get any fresher than off the boat in the morning and into my belly by noon.
Another special neighborhood is of course Chinatown, literally one of the worlds most famous Chinatowns. Outside of Asia, San Fran has one of, if not THE largest Chinese communities in the world. This was the very first 'Chinatown' in North America.
Aside from some English writing, you might confuse this with China.
From a pier downtown, you can see the huge Bay Bridge entering the city.
The Oakland-Bay Bridge is actually longer and bigger than the more famous Golden Gate bridge, so what gives? Why is this bridge not as famous? Is it because it's not painted red? Comon' now!
I suppose the Golden gate is taller to the top, and it can be crossed on foot. But what's the point if you can never see the top! (Darn Fog!)
Jokes aside, the Golden Gate bridge is an exceptional feat in architecture. I probably took 50+ pictures of the bridge alone.
Another architectural wonder: the Palace of Fine Arts. Almost out of place, straight out of Ancient Rhome.
One of the hugest stone buildings I've ever seen!
Even from miles away, it's dome has a massive presence.
The water was COLD. The joke goes, "The coldest winter I ever experienced was a summer in San Francisco". Well, being from Winnipeg I can't really agree with that...but it actually did get quite chilly when the sun wasn't around.
This guy was actually really good. He sounded amazing, and used just about anything as a drum.
Next stop: Alcatraz. The worlds most infamous prison.
A bit of a closer look.
Only minutes away from a bustling city, yet so securely isolated from the outside world.
Your typical cell. Imagine this was your home for the next 30 years.
The saying went: "Break the rules of society and you go to jail; Break the rules of jail and you go to Alcatraz". Well I guess you break the rules in Alcatraz, and you go into solitary confinement.
Pitch black for a few days, or a few months. Can you imagine?
Rows of cells.
The Lighthouse, with its view of San Fran.
Anyways, Back to the city. Did I mention how steep some of the streets are? It felt as if these cars would tip over any second.
All in all, San Fran has a bit of everything. Culture, architecture, and awesome pizza.
~end~
SAN FRAN 2006- Next San Francisco Gallery