Weekend Update: The San Francisco Treat! (Part One)

The story goes like this:

Sometime Sunday afternoon

Jay: Don't we have those non-rev tickets from Lynn somewhere? I think they are expiring soon. 

Amie: Oh yeah - they're in that box over there....

Jay: Here they are - and yeah they expire May 6. So where do you want to go?

Then we talked for a few minutes about Seattle, Portland or San Francisco for a weekend getaway sometime soon. 

Tuesday-ish

Amie: So when do you think we should go? Two weeks from now?

Jay: I was thinking we should go this weekend....

Amie: Oh sweet! I probably should talk to work about getting a day off...

Jay: Let's wait a bit...I'll check on hotels, etc. 

Amie: We can always go Saturday and come back Monday...or Friday and come back Sunday...

Thursday Morning

Jay texts Amie: I'm thinking San Francisco!

Amie texts Jay: Awesome! When are we going? Friday or Saturday? 

Jay texts Amie: I was thinking Friday...

Amie tells work she won't be coming in the next day. 

Thursday Night Before Bed

Jay books hotel.

Friday at 7am

Amie and Jay's flight departs to San Fran for the weekend!

Ok, now that you have the scene set, here's the first installment of our trip!

Arriving at the BART station & pimpin' it....

It was a PERFECTLY sunny and warm day which can be rare in this city with all it's fog! We had a nice & pretty short walk to check in at our hotel. We booked at the King George Hotel from a deal we found on TravelZoo. By the way, I love TravelZoo - it's where we got our hotel for our Montreal trip too. It was a great rate for this last minute booking and the King George was a really cute boutique hotel - I liked that it had character :) Jay and I called it the "Georges a Cinq" the whole weekend ala the movie French Kiss. Just pretend we're saying it with a nice strong French accent....

A quick freshening up and we were off! Well, more like UP! We decided to walk up the street our hotel was on - Mason Street - up towards Nob Hill. It was a fantastic workout! 

At the top of the hill were beautiful views of the city along with Grace Cathedral...

It was built with serious inspiration from Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris and is also famous for it's Ghiberti doors (which I remember learning about in Art History class!).

Magnificent inside:

After our visit to the Cathedral we started looking for a place to have lunch. One of my favorite things about San Francisco are the flowers that most corner shops have for sale on the sidewalks! There is fruit in most of the windows too! I can just imagine living here and walking by my favorite shop every day buying an apple and maybe some daisies...ahhhh....

Back to reality! We had worked up a serious appetite by this point and ended up having lunch at Nob Hill Cafe - a tiny Italian restaurant located right near the top of Nob Hill. We got there just as it opened, so we had a cozy little window table which was perfect! I had a white cheddar, apple and pancetta pizza and Jay had pasta with garlic tomato sauce. Both were very good! The only thing is that the pictures we took inside were pretty dark, so instead you get a picture of the outside...

Our next stop was Chinatown which was such an adventure!

We found our way to this tiny alley in search for something in particular....

The Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Factory! It is tucked away with a tiny little entrance that we didn't even realize was "the" place until an old man motioned for us to come inside! It was very cramped quarters and VERY hot! We had to pay 50 cents for each picture, so since I paid $1, I'm getting good use of them & posting both for you! 

This poor lady must have been so hot! She didn't even flinch having us right up there in her personal space to take the picture. I'm sure she's thinking, "Darn tourists..."

We went on a search for Durian. Those of you who have watched "Fear Factor" (hello 2001!) or "Bizarre Foods" might have heard about this stinky/yucky fruit. We were hoping to be able to find a place where we could try a piece of it...

...but it took us several fruit stands before we even found them! And they were up on this shelf with this dusty alarm clock. We decided to try Durian some other time....

We stopped at this tea shop for a free tea tasting. The lady there was awesome! She brews tea so fast and was full of knowledge about the benefits of each type of tea. Some were really good (rose!) and some were nasty (Angel!).

We ended up picking 3 of our favorites and left $50 poorer....(oops!)....

After a long day, I needed to sit down!

We walked by Union Square Park on our way back to the hotel for a much-needed nap. They had a beautiful installment of these heart sculptures that were so pretty I had to snap a picture!

More to come soon - the day is just halfway done!!

xoxo