After seeing most of San Francisco yesterday, Dena and I went out today with a shopping list of places we knew we wanted to hit again. Our first stop was the well known Lombard street, which the Echo handled like a champ. It almost didn't feel as extreme as it might have, had we not just done some of the west coast on highway 1, but it was still very twisted! When we got to the bottom there were quite a few people taking photos, even one guy who I guess was being taken around the city, since his driver took his photo for him.

Aftewards we went to Fisherman's wharf which was a pretty cool spot! There were plenty of shops and also art galleries. There was even one that featured sculptures by an artist we had seen in Las Vegas at Caesar's Palace. Weird coincidence! We got a few prints from a local artist, and Dena was tempted by some pretty cool jewelry, but it was hard to beat what we saw in Morro Bay.

As we were walking back to the car, there was a final call for a boat tour, and being only $10, we jumped right in. It was a smallish boat but not too cramped, and it was a good day for it. It was a little choppy heading out, so I held my camera pretty close and careful due to the spray, but as we turned under the Golden Gate, things improved. It was a nice little trip, and it was cool to see SF city from a distance, you could see up all the streets! We saw Alcatraz too, which I think is preferable to trying to actually get a tour on the island, which apparently takes planning in advance. Seeing it from the water is just fine!

We went back to the Palace of the Fine Arts afterwards, spending some more time than we had yesterday. It's massive! Richmond seriously needs something like this. If I had a spot like it nearby, I'd go to it all the time to just sit on the lawn and have lunch or read a book. Very cool.

The wind prevented us from really visiting the GG bridge, but we did walk out on it a little bit. We'd driven over it more than a few times, so we felt like we'd seen plenty of it. The day had worn us out pretty well, so we headed back to the hotel once more, where we packed our bags in preparation for another longish drive north.

Today Keith and I did touristy stuffs together! It was a day of walking around, planned stuffs and random stuffs. First we went to Lombard Street and drove that down. It is noted to be the crookedest street in the states. Crazy go nuts is more like it! We had to go down very very slowly in hopes nothing should happen. Brave souls who take a car down this road that is bigger than Miss Pearl!

From Lombard Street we head down to Fisherman's Wharf. We stopped at a chocolate restaurant where Keith got this giant thing of ice cream and I got cookies and a chocolate covered strawberry. YUM! Strawberries + chocolate = WIN! There were many shops along the Wharf but none we really were interested in. There were many art galleries in which I was absolutely amazed over. One artist captured my attention and I wished I could yet again be independently wealthy so I could purchase some of the original works by this person. We did stumble across a local artist and we bought two prints from him. I always feel no guilt spending money on local art.

We were heading back to the car when we stumble across a random one hour boat tour (Gilligan's Island here we come!). For the money it was well worth it. The boat ride took us under the Golden Gate then around Alcatraz. I love riding boats! I love the feeling of the rocking motion. To some it might be sickening but to me it's actually relaxing. Like a baby getting rocked to sleep, I can easily stay on a boat and simply ride the waves/current!

The boat ride ended and we got to our car and headed to the Palace of Fine Arts. WHOA! Awesome structure! It was built only to be temporary, like the Parthenon in Nashville, but it stayed! Keith and I contemplate why the heck Richmond doesn't have anything as nice as this. After all, it is an older city. Shouldn't we have enough money in Richmond to have nice things? Richmond is old and dirty compared to any and all cities of the West Coast. It makes me sad just thinking about heading back to Richmond after seeing such clean and bustling cities.

With many photos taken we head back to our hotel. Tomorrow we leave for Eureka California!