We spent a long Memorial Day weekend in San Francisco to celebrate my graduation. We flew out on Friday, arriving early in the day. We stayed at the Hotel Triton, located across the street from the Chinatown gate, above is Joe standing in front of our hotel, gate in the background. After dropping our belongings off we headed out to find some lunch in Chinatown, and ended up at the House of Nanking after walking around for a while.
Chinatown streets.
In the afternoon we headed over to the Asian Art Museum, which has a fantastic collection and a great location in their new building at the Civic Center. Here Joe looks at some Indian sculpture.
The beautiful exhibit of Chinese jades.
This small Buddha sculpture is the earliest dated Buddha image from China, from 338 C.E. So awesome!
The Japanese galleries.
Joe in the interior of the building. The museum building used to be part of the library system; the interior was rennovated to house the galleries around 2003 I think, and has some interesting architectural features.
The exterior of the museum.
Across the street from the museum is the Civic Center.
I really enjoyed this sign on the subway.
After Thai dinner at Bannana House we met up with friends and headed out to Ruby Skye to see Tiesto on Friday night.
On Saturday we had a late brunch and wandered around the Haight, window shopping and people watching the afternoon away. The following two photos are of neat graffiti we saw in the area.
After relaxing back at the hotel for a little bit we grabbed some quick sandwiches for dinner.
We again met up with friends and headed out to the Cow Palace to see Marcus Shultz, Ferry Corsten, and Tiesto among many other djs.
This guy had an illuminated suit. It looked like a suit made of glowsticks, but I think it was battery-powered. Either way, it was pretty cool.
Looking out over the crowd to the stage. There were acrobats performing during Ferry's set, this woman was flipping around in a huge suspended mass of fabric.
The show at the Cow Palace was supposed to go on until 2 am, but at about 1:20ish the power went out (!) so it ended early. We went back to our hotel to wait for a little bit before the afterparty, which started at 3 at Ruby Skye. Here we are waiting to get into the club, looking pretty tired. Joe and I only made it to 4:30, I think the Ferry/Tiesto afterparty set lasted until 5 am.
After a great veggie brunch on Sunday we headed out to the beach for the afternoon.
Beachy.
Although we've seen it from the middle and the other side, it had been seven years since seeing the Pacific coast of the U.S.
The fog came in while we sat on the beach.
After getting our fill of ocean breeze we walked across the highway to the Beach House, where we enjoyed some microbrew and the ocean views.
The interior of the Beach House.
On Sunday evening we decided to do the tourist thing and headed down to Fisherman's Wharf for dinner.
We headed to Nick's because when we were in S.F. in 2001 we were treated really nicely by the guy who worked there, and enjoyed chatting with him. It was a little bit different than we remembered, and decidedly more crowded, but the food was still tasty and pretty cheap.
Clam chowder. Mmmm.....
Fried things from the ocean, so tasty!
As we rode the bus back to our hotel I spied a gelatto shop, so we hopped off for dessert.
This was definitely not a mistake.
I enjoyed Pear and Chocolate and Joe had a flavor that included cake and chocolate.
On Monday we headed out for coffee and a walk. We went uphill hoping for a good view and were not dissapointed.
Me with the Bay Bridge in the background and Joe with downtown.
We had a great lunch at Caffe Delucchi in North Beach.
After lunch we enjoyed strong espresso (for Joe), a cappucino (for me), and a great cannoli (for both) at Mara's, the bakery that we were scoping out as we ate lunch.
We then spent the afternoon at the SF Museum of Modern Art.
Looking up five floors to a walk-through installation suspended above the lobby.
After a bit of shopping in Union Square we went back to the hotel which had complimentary wine happy hour every day.
For dinner we met Jason at Greens, one of the first mainstream vegetarian restaurants in the U.S. It's run by a local group of Zen Buddhists, and most of the food is grown locally. We walked along the waterfront to get to the restaurant, and had a view of Alcatraz along the way.
From our table we watched the sunset behind the Golden Gate Bridge as the fog rolled in.
Jason and I at the end of dinner, a great finish to a great weekend.
