Worth the walk...

We spent the day at Fisherman’s Wharf, one of the really touristy parts of San Francisco. There’s an aquarium at Pier 39, so we started off there. It’s a small aquarium, but they had a couple big tanks with see-through tunnels underneath that were really interesting. (On a side note – the funniest thing happened when we were walking toward the aquarium entrance. The entrance is on the second floor, so you have to walk up a flight of stairs or take an escalator to get there. As we were walking toward the stairs, a family of about six people stepped onto the escalator. They’d only been there for about two seconds when the escalator suddenly stopped for some reason. Now, I don’t know about most people, but if I was on an escalator that stopped suddenly, I think my first instinct would be to simply climb the stairs. After all, I’ve been climbing stairs for most of my life, and if I had to climb one extra flight, I don’t think it would ruin my day. However, when the escalator at the aquarium came to a halt, the family on the steps looked truly stumped. They stood there, unmoving, shooting questioning glances at one another and talking in confused voices. It was as if they honestly couldn’t figure out what to do now that their motorized transportation to the second floor had been cut off. They were still standing at the bottom of the escalator when Rick and I reached the top of the staircase. Maybe they’re still there… maybe they never figured out a solution to their dilemma… I hope someone eventually explained to them that it’s okay to MOVE on an escalator if need be…)

After the aquarium, we wandered around some of the shops at Fisherman’s Wharf, and ended up at the end of the pier where a whole group of sea lions was hanging out on floating docks. Apparently these things started showing up shortly after the 1989 earthquake, and more and more have been taking up residence in the bay ever since. According the info posted on the pier, during the summer there are up to 600 sea lions in that area. They make a lot of noise and they smell pretty funky, but it was cool to see them all lying around like that. They were like giant, lazy sultans, waiting for servants to peel grapes for them…

And while all of that was fun, as soon as we had taken pictures of the sea lions we walked back toward the main road. I had a mission to complete, and I forged ahead through the throngs of tourists to search for my target. Up several blocks, a block to the left, past the ticket counter for the trolley cars, another block or two, and finally – at last – I saw it. Like a warm beacon of light at the end of a dark journey, it welcomed me from atop a hilly slope – the original Ghirardelli chocolate store and soda fountain. After walking eight or nine blocks from the pier, we had to climb several flights of stairs to get to the actual chocolate store (too bad there were no escalators…), so by the time we got there, I felt more than entitled to one of their “world famous” hot fudge sundaes. And yes, I’m not ashamed to admit that I pretty much ate the entire thing myself. (Okay, I’m a little ashamed…)

But we had to walk back down all the stairs and back the eight or nine blocks to the parking garage, so really, it’s like I barely ate anything. (Right? Sure.) On the way back to the hotel, we took a detour and found Lombard Street – the really twisty crooked street you see in all those shows about San Francisco. That was an interesting adventure, actually, as Lombard Street is in an amazingly steep, hilly part of the city. Some of the roads were so steep that you couldn’t SEE them over the front of the car when you turned onto them. It was like driving on a roller coaster. A little bit scary if you don’t know where you’re going.

Maybe they could create some sort of escalators for cars to transport them up and down those sharp hills. You’d just have to hope they never ground to a halt…