I hate to admit it, but I’m slightly jet lagged. I’ve been sleeping at 9:30pm every night and haven’t had time to post the updates. But I promise I’ll finish this USA travel journal asap.

And i got lazy with the photos. Putting them into poloroid templates takes too long, so i basically plonked them together side by side.

Third day in the U.S., we are still in San Francisco. Going on bus tours, you tend to be rushed from one place of attraction to another, so today we decided to explore the bay by bike!

There are several bike rentals along Fisherman’s Wharf, all you have to do is provide a credit card, fill out the indemnity form and off you go. If I’m not wrong, its about $25 for the whole day. You can choose from a village bicycle, mountain bike or a tandem.

We started off cycling along the bay, where we saw a group of Segway-ers on tour. Our initial plan was to go on a Segway tour, but it would have cost us nearly $200 each!

It started off quite chilly in the morning, so we had our hoodies on, but 15mins into the ride, we’re stripping off layer by layer. We cycled up to the Golden Gate Park through Presidio, stopping along the way to take photos or catch our breath. We stopped by the Rose garden to smell the roses, and plan our bike route for the rest of the day.

While we were sitting on a wooden log at the Rose Garden, we were so amused by a this little squirrel who had no fear of humans. He ran up to us, hopped on to Waynes knee, sniffed us out, realized we didn’t bring any food, hopped off, and scurried away. It was so cute!!

I won’t lie to you, but the cycle was quite painfully long! We took hours to reach The Legion of Honor. He California Palace of the Legion of Honor is a fine arts musuem, and i thought it would be nice to have a walk through with Wayne, and try to explain different art movements and appreciating the vast number of master pieces under one roof.

We saw works by Calude Monet, Vincent van Gogh, Auguste Rodin,Seurat, Cézanne and Picasso. There was even a special showcase on Women impressionist artists which I quite enjoyed. Growing up, I took art lessons from my mum, and when you reach the Advance class, she’ll teach us to paint on canvas mimicking the strokes,style and color of that movement. And i remember enjoying that very much.

One of the paintings which got me to take a second look is the one pictured here that looks like Keanu Reeves! I took a photo of it and sent it to my sister! Hehehe…

After a somewhat neverending day, we headed to our last stop, the Golden Gate Bridge. We’ve been cycling for hours, and were seriously contemplating just going back to the hotel to veg, but it would have been such a waste not to cycle across the bridge.

Thank goodness we took some good pictures yesterday, because today, the fog rolled in heavy, and you could hardly see five metres in front of you. We cycled past a sign which read “crisis counseling”. Did you know, on average one person jumps off the bridge every 15 days? Shocking! Read the wiki entry below!

Suicides
The Golden Gate Bridge is a frequent site for suicide. The deck is approximately 260 feet (79 m) above the water. After a fall of approximately four seconds jumpers hit the water at some 88 miles per hour (142 km/h), which is nearly always fatal. Most of those who survive the impact die in the frigid water.

People have been known to travel to San Francisco specifically to jump off the bridge, and may take a bus or cab to the site; police sometimes find abandoned rental cars in the parking lot.

Currents beneath the bridge are very strong, and some jumpers have undoubtedly been washed out to sea without ever being seen. The water may be as cold as 47 °F (8 °C), and great white sharks, which tend to congregate around the Farallon Islands, are sometimes seen under the bridge.

An official suicide count was kept, sorted according to which of the bridge’s 128 lamp posts the jumper was nearest when he or she jumped. The count exceeded 1,200 when the count ended in 2005, and new suicides were averaging one every two weeks. There were 34 bridge jump suicides in 2006 whose bodies were recovered, in addition to four jumps which were witnessed but whose bodies were never recovered, and several bodies recovered suspected to be from bridge jumps.

The California Highway Patrol removed 70 apparently suicidal people from the bridge that year. Currently, it is said that a person jumps off the Golden Gate Bridge every 15 days. An additional 200 may be added to the suicide count on the bridge, due to fog, night time jumpers and other jumps which couldn’t be counted.

As of 2006, only 26 people are known to have survived the jump. Those who do survive strike the water feet-first, usually suffering broken bones and internal injuries. Even when a jumper is promptly rescued from the water and rushed to the hospital, most die of internal bleeding from ruptured spleens. Only one person has ever been recorded as having made the jump without serious injury: in 1985 a 16-year-old wrestler landed on his buttocks and swam ashore; his first words reportedly were, “I can’t do anything right.” Another young man survived a jump in 2000, although the impact broke his back and shattered multiple vertebrae.
Credit: Wikipedia

We returned the bike and headed back to our hotel where we completely knocked out.

I forgot to add something to the Day 2 entry. We came across the famous bushmen on Fisherman’s Wharf. He’s a busker who makes money by scaring people from behind a handmade bush! And he’s been doing that since 1980 earning $60,000 on a good year… for doing just that.

And a bakery you must visit is the Boudin Bakery. They serve lovely Clam chowders in a sourdough bread bowl and a pretty decent cup of coffee. Hmmm….

Geek & Gadgets San Francisco, Travel, USA, wayne

Hokay, here goes. The whirlwind US holiday. So after settling in at our hotel, the next day’s itinerary was jam-packed with activities.

We set off pretty early to take a walk down Fisherman’s Wharf, but nothing much was open. Walked pass the USS Pampanito, a World War II submarine. Had a glimpse of the Alcatraz from Pier 39 and spent some time checking out the sun bathing sea lions. It’s so bizarre, these sea lions just swim into the marina and plonk themselves on to the wooden berths.

The Pier 31 was a nice stroll, lots of little tourist shops, street performers and restaurants. A bit early for lunch, so we watched a magic show, and tried on some crazy hats at Krazy Kaps.

Walking further down the street, we spotted the all famous In-n-Out Burger joint. I can’t begin to tell you how many friends have ranted and raved about this fast food outlet. They keep telling me its a must try and it’s only available in the West Coast. I think out of 10 people I spoke to about our holiday, 8 of them said we HAVE to try this burger. So we did.

With so much hype and expectations, the burger and fries DID live up to its reputation. There’s not much to choose from, it’s either a Double-double, hamburger or cheeseburger. But seriously, it’s so good, that’s all they need to serve.

By the way IN-N-OUT Burger is California’s first drive-thru hamburger stand.

After lunch we decided to take the City Sightseeing tour bus around the bay and across the Golden Gate Bridge. We went through the Marina district, a brief stop at the Palace of Fine Arts, continue on to Pesidio which is the area for the rich FILTHY rich, then it was a ride across the Golden Gate Bridge.

A bit about the Golden Gate Bridge, it’s not red by the way, it’s actually International Orange! Here are a few ‘did you knows’.

After the bus ride, there was still time to fit in another very San Francisco experience, riding on the cable cars!

The San Francisco cable car system is the world’s last permanently operational manually-operated cable car system, and is an icon of San Francisco, California. The San Francisco cable cars are one of two moving National Historic Landmarks. While the cable cars are used to a certain extent by commuters, their small service area and premium fares for single rides make them more of a tourist attraction.
credit: Wikipedia

It was a cool experience, and definately a very touristy one. Wayne looked like he was having fun hanging out of the sides of the cable car.

To finish off the day, we walked back to the Fisherman’s Wharf to have dinner. Apparently, you can’t go to Fisherman’s Wharf and not try their clam chowder and boiled crab, so we had both. After such a long exhausting day, we retired happily and snuggly under the cold sheets of our hotel room bed.

Food & Travel San Francisco, Travel, USA, wayne