San Francisco Superlatives

Hi all, I've made it to Hawaii! I am going to try to wrap up San Francisco though before I get into Hawaii (plus I just got here yesterday afternoon). Instead of summarizing everything I did in San Fran I thought it would be more fun to do some superlatives...

Most Gorgeous Woods/Biggest Trees: Muir Woods

There are really no words to describe how huge and amazing these trees truly are.

I have to admit I have a special place in my heart for Muir Woods, since Muir is my grandmother's maiden name. On this trip I learned that John Muir himself was not directly responsible for the preservation of Muir Woods. In fact, William Kent donated the land, and Theodore Roosevelt used his presidential power to make it a National Monument. Apparently, they wanted to name it after William Kent, but he felt that it was the spirit of conservation begun by John Muir that really inspired his desire to conserve the Muir Woods area.

Even though it was a bright and sunny day out, almost none of the sun actually made it to the ground, so cool.

Most Annoying People: Eric and I were last to get on the tour bus because our hotel was closest to the Golden Gate Bridge. The position landed us in front of the most annoying group of people ever. They were mostly post-college aged American girls, with one random French guy with them who bragged about balancing his American boyfriend and French boyfriend. Oh, and he was my favorite of the group by far. They began the day by being incredibly loud, and never stopping talking even with the tour guide was telling us interesting information about the area. Boo. Once they had some wine, they only got more annoying. Apparently they were stealing soap from every winery as well...who does that? At the end of the day they really wanted the tour guide to drop them off somewhere that was no where near their hotel (or anyone elses) so they discussed in detail how they were going to flash him to get him to do what they wanted. Fortunately, the driver (who was actually a really cool guy) wanted nothing to do with them and dropped them off on a random road so that they could take the bus to their final destination. Ha to them.

Most Yummy Wine: Clive Cellars and Jacuzzi Cellars in Sonoma. Located across the street from each other, these sister wineries (one French, one Italian) had delicious white wines and even a few reds I could get on board with.

Best Meal in California: La Casa Restaurant in downtown Sonoma. I haven't had the best experience with food in California, but this lunch spot in Sonoma did not disappoint. The chips and salsa were addicting and look at this delicious chicken and avocado sandwich on sour dough bread...

Mouth watering. If I was not currently stuffing my face with Boudin sour dough bread, I'd want it again.

Coolest Winery Grounds: Kunde Estate Winery and Vineyard. This winery is one of the ten in wine country that age their wine in caves, ideal because of the cool temperature and high humidity. The cave was very cool, and nice and cold which was welcome since the temperature outside was about 90.

Outside was not a let down either. All you could see for miles around was grapes, and more grapes. Except right around the winery building where they had the most beautiful pink hydrangeas I've ever seen...

I can't speak for the wine here as I only tried a couple. I was feeling disgusting from the bus ride (you should see the road to Muir Woods) at this point and relocated to the front seat after this winery.

Coolest View of Wine Country: The tower at Jacuzzi Winery (yes, same guy who invented the hot tub haha).

One of the major reasons Eric and I wanted to go back up to wine country was because when we came with my family 2 years ago, there was smoke everywhere from really bad fires and you could not see at all how gorgeous the area was. This time definitely make up for it.

Jacuzzi Winery also gets bonus points for having olive oil tasting...

Best Bridge: Golden Gate...no contest. I was also happy to be driving over it this time instead of trying to get my rental bike across haha.

Best Quick Stop for Food While Traveling: Subway. I love that for a cheap price you can grab a quick and healthy meal when you are sick of sitting down to 3 meals a day. I wonder if they have Subway in Hawaii?

Second Best Ball Park: AT & T Park (second to Fenway of course, if you had any doubt). Look at this view...

Eric and I decided to catch a Giants vs. Mets game since the Giants were not in town last time we visited San Francisco. It was fun to see a game where I don't care who wins at all...I like the Giants, I like the Mets, that's about that. Plus, no offense to Fenway, but it's kind of nice to be able to get tickets to a game that cost $14.50...and no, we were not at all in the worst section!

Most Likely to Know RANDOM (and I mean RANDOM) Sports Info: Eric. Don't get me wrong I know Eric knows a lot of stuff about sports, I do. However, this trip has proved to me just how far reaching his knowledge really is. It started on the wine tour when some people on the bus were from Nebraska. He got into a full conversation with them about college football in Nebraska. NEBRASKA? Okay, that's fine- football is Eric's sport, I expect him to know a lot about that. Fast forward a few hours, we are on a roller coaster of a cab ride to the baseball game and Eric starts talking sports with the cab driver. He says he likes soccer and his team is Algeria. Perfect, Eric does not watch soccer and there is no way he is going to know anything about Algeria. WRONG! "Oh, Algeria!" he whips out of his butt, "they have sick defense, huh?" "too bad they got eliminated right when we did, probably if they had a better striker they could've made it further." WHAT?!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Tomorrow for sure he will be talking about cricket with some Aussie...

Best Pre-Trip Purchase: Definitely my Ipod Touch. I watched two wonderful chick flicks (Valentine's Day and Leap Year) on the way to Cali and then Hawaii. I love that you can "rent" movies off Itunes and you have 30 days to watch them. Amazing. I also love that United actually shows movies and accidentally showed Diary of a Wimpy Kid instead of Bounty Hunter (which was a fine movie except we had see it already on the way to California) on the way to Hawaii. This is probably the most movies I've watched in a 2 day span, ever.

Now I'm off to go research things to do on our first full day on the Big Island. Since I seem to be waking up at 5:30 am, I'm sure you'll be hearing from me again!