San Francisco

Yes, my city. Lots of weird and crazy people. Everyone is different, some even totally different. I spent a day relaxing yesterday. After a total of 9700 miles on the bus and in the car, a day at work was real relaxation. And also an urgent top-up for the travel fund. As I said before, the boys here have pretty much the coolest flat you can imagine. And they have to work 10 hours a day for it. I’m alone in this castle all day.

The location is perfect. See the map on the left, blue dot in San Francisco. Right in the centre of everything, but nice and quiet on the 7th floor. Highway 101 runs one block through the city. This is also where the Academy of Art is located, surrounded by Asia-Aldis and bum supplies.
Downtown San Francisco is not that big anyway, only about 3.5 km / 4 km. All good to run, especially after hill training in Seattle. The hills there were higher. They are definitely steeper here.

After a day of extreme restoration, I’m empowered to show myself on the road again. I could even take my shoes off if I wanted to. A pleasant feeling. I walk down Franklin Street towards Fort Mason, then on to Fishermans Wharf. Colourful tourist hell, but still much more relaxed than Yosemite Valley. I treat myself to a thick steak for lunch and am delighted when the waiter whistles me back to the table for a smoke.

I haven’t read anything about San Francisco. All the preparations so far have dampened my anticipation. I think I’ll carry on like this. Just walk and discover. If you know nothing, everything can only surprise you. You don’t run the risk of travelling the beaten track. I discover the Maritime Museum by chance. The National Park annual pass gets me in for free. I spend a whole hour on a cargo ship from 1860, with original goods from the period lashed down below deck and videos showing the circumnavigation of Cape Horn. Smells very interesting.

I also discover the sea lions 5 metres in front of Pier 33 by chance. They are screaming like mad and making a fuss over the females. Up onto the pontoon, down, screaming and occasionally knocking their teeth into their neighbours. In between, the females scream. Sounds like: “Shut up!”. Delicious, almost like humans, only without tuned cars and gold chains.

I move on to Pier 29, where they sell tickets for Alcatraz. Great gag. Next free tour is in 7 days. Damn, now I have to swim over. I check Craigslist.org on the Internet. The ratio of those looking to those offering is about 8:1. Continue up to Coit Tower, overview of the whole bay, Bay Bridge, downtown. The sun is beating down, but the wind makes it pleasantly cool. There are no pavements on some of the streets towards the city centre, just steps. Nice.

For the life of me, I don’t understand why there is a Chinatown here. The whole of San Francisco is a single Chinatown, with around 25% Asians. Or as the radio said: San Francisco, the city with more Asians than China. I wander through the alleyways, but the offerings are nowhere near as weird as in New York. No skinned cats, no snake pills, not even bull dumplings. The people here are very proper. And there are adverts on the radio against online bullying, flanked by dramatic anti-pollution spots. A girl coughs and tearfully asks: Mum, why didn’t you do anything 50 years ago? Deliciously schizophrenic.