US Trip, Day 2 – San Francisco
USS Pampanoni, Ripples Believe it or not, lunch @ Pier 39, trolley car trip, more shopping, Chinese for dinner & Cable Car ride.
Late start today due to being kept up by our son who does NOT travel well, this time it was a 3am vomit call but in hind site it could have been worse!
We are staying at the Fisherman’s Wharf Holiday Inn Express & this is the first time at one of this chains hotels so we were not 100% sure what to expect from the free breakfast, so after one of the fastest & least appetising breakfasts I have ever had we set off for Fisherman’s Wharf, this is indeed “express” in every sense, I was lucky to get a coffee at 9:29 as they close at 9:30 ON THE DOT!
We picked up a Wharf Pass that includes a heap of goodies & discounts. First stop for me & Rory (my son) was the WWII Sub on Wharf 45. USS Pampanito (SS-383) is a World War II Balao class Fleet submarine that served in the Pacific and is very well looked after. After a pretty quick walk through we headed into the Mechanical Museum & had some fun with the 25c machine of yesteryear & of course the obligatory penny pincher for the sub!
My wife Alison & daughter Emily were over at the Ripples Believe it or not. I heard mixed reviews so can’t comment on that.
On our way over to lunch we went over to see the Seals at Pier 39 only to discover the real attraction we – hunting sea gulls, these abnormally LARGE gulls were swooping in and grabbing the tops of corn dogs from unsuspecting tourists, ourselves included, sans corn dog, although Rory is contemplating coming back with a corn dog to give it a go. Oh, for those that have no idea what acorn dog is! Think Pluto Pup or Dagwood Dog & your on the right track.
After a quick bowl of yummy Clam Chowder we jumped on the trolley and set off for Union Square, we ended up getting side tracked with shopping in the downtown area win the lour of the Apple store, Macy’s & Sketchers proving too much for us!
We took advantage if the great $ rate and bought both the kids an iPod touch each for respective birthdays and this turned out a winner for the next day.
Quick dinner at the closest Chinese restaurant we could find then we headed off to the world famous Cable Car for the trip back down to the Wharf, we ended up on quite a long one which worked out nicely with the exception of the rain.
On the way home we past an Irish pub that was pushing Irish Nachos (see pic), not something I could see myself chowing down on!
Tomorrow we are off to Yosemite National Park for the day which we are looking forward to.