San Francisco & Napa Valley: Fog, Wines and a Red Bridge

Fog rolling in

Chinatown SanFran

Alcatraz Island

Alcatraz

Alcatraz Penitentiary

Alcatraz cell block

Alcatraz cell

SF view from Alcatraz

Golden Gate red

Golden Gate Bridge

Golden Gate bike path

San Francisco

SF steep street

San Fran Tram

Inglenook Estate

Inglenook tasting

Our final destination along Highway 1 was San Francisco, city of the Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz Island. The city with a European feel and steep hills (try biking...). But also an expensive city to stay in. The only reasonably priced hotels are either on the other side of the Bay or with shared bathrooms. And since we prefer stepping out of our hotel and walking around as much as we can, we chose the last option. And it wasn't all that bad. Just don't shower in the morning, or freak out over that dark hair in the bathtub.

Our first day in San Fran we spent walking around Union Square and Chinatown. The first is classy, with expensive shops and Parisian like buildings, while the second is more shabby, dirty and full of China-made souvenirs. Interesting to visit is the fortune cookie company, where three old Chinese ladies put the little papers in the cookies at an incredible speed, and the market street, where you can buy duck, whole pigs and vegetables you've never heard of. Close to Chinatown is the Coit Tower. It takes a couple of strong legs to reach it, but it offers a great 360 degree view of San Francisco.

The following day we planned to visit Alcatraz Island, but found out that you have to book tickets for Alcatraz two months in advance and that they'd sold out... We took our chances anyway and made sure we were at the ticket booth at 7.30 am sharp. The official website tells you there are never extra tickets available on the day itself, but in reality there always are. We were lucky enough to get a couple and hop on the boat to the famous prison. Mornings in San Francisco are cold and foggy, which gave the island a mysterious look from the boat. You are free to walk around on 'the Rock', where only a couple of buildings are still standing. The main attraction is the actual prison, where you get a free audio tour that guides you through it in about 45 minutes. Stories of escapes, famous inmates and riots are told by former prisoners, guards and staff. From where they got into the building and take their mandatory showers, to their cells and the place they had the same meal every day of the week. From several windows in the building the city is visible across the water, and apparently the inmates were very much able to hear the lively sounds at night. That, above all, made Alcatraz a tormenting prison no doubt. And for us a special place to visit.

To mentally cool down from it afterwards, we walked to Fisherman's Wharf and Cannery Row. These are the best places to get the signature dish "Clam Chowder", a kind of thick fish soup in a sourdough bread bowl, and to rent a bike. And that is exactly what we did the day after.

The city has well maintained bike paths and is relatively safe. The most used route is, obviously, the one from Cannery Row to the Golden Gate Bridge. A beautiful red structure that creates a sharp contrast with the grey foggy sky. It's highly photogenic, but that also means you're not the only one looking at it. If you feel like you are capable of biking through the crowds, try crossing the Bridge. We decided to skip that part and continue on a few miles to the Golden Gate Park. Since this part of town is not sheltered from the fog and winds blowing in from the Pacific Ocean, it was a cold and not very pleasant ride. But the park is nice and has a couple of pretty impressive museums, like the De Young Museum and the California Academy of Sciences.

We escaped cold (we are living in the desert, anything below 80 degrees is freezing to me) San Francisco for the weekend to go to Napa Valley. Only half an our from the foggy city a Mediterranean paradise awaits. A relatively short stretch of land is filled with hundreds of wineries and we booked the Inglenook Experience to start our stay in the valley. The Inglenook Estate is owned by Hollywood director Francis Ford Coppola and is a charming and classy winery. We got a very nice tour of the building and surrounding grounds, with a wine tasting paired with several cheeses at the end. They even tried to sell us one of their signature 'Rubicon' wines: a 2007 Rubicon, half a bottle, for 50 dollars if we would buy 6...Well, we bought the 30 dollar Sauvignon instead.

We continued our tasting tour at Sattori Vineyard, which was extremely crowded but has a large open bar inside where you can taste 6 wines for 15 dollars (try to decide who drives first...). And they have BBQ picnics every Sunday on the lawn. Our last stop in the valley was the pretty estate of Domaine Carneros, where we tasted some of their bubbles and had the best plate of cheese I had in a long time. The wines were good too, by the way...(gosh do I miss that cheese).

Back in San Francisco it was 4th of July celebrations time. And even though the street acts during the day where fun to watch, the highlight was obviously the Fireworks displays over the Bay. For a second it looked like a disaster since it was so foggy the fireworks on the other side of the bay weren't visible, but the show at Fisherman's Wharf was close enough to see through it. The patriotic music made it into a proper Independence Day show and a nice end to our tour of the West Coast.

It was time to move back East, with one stop left: Yosemite National Park.