American Travelnotes 6/7 - San Francisco

From Santa Barbara to San Francisco, i confess, i made a mistake. I took the nightbus ... well, it's cosy, but the schedule is ... flexible. I arrived in SF at 6AM, instead of 9PM as written on my ticket... i love that, finish my night among the homelesses. Whatever, that's fine.
Can you imagine, thanks to the diligence of two friends, i have been able to visit SF in one day. Incredible!

Golden Gate Bridge

We started by the visit of the golden gate bridge, and the hills after the gate. The bay area is simply huge!
After that, direction Chinatown for a necessary dose of DimSum and TsingTao ... well, i have to say that the corner is really nice. In fact, all the city looks nice. We move then to the seashore, to 'Fisherman's wharf' and 'Pier 39'.

Chinatown, and its famous parkings

Old house in downtown San Francisco

In Pier 39, a funny thing happened 20 years ago: suddenly, a group of sea lions took the habit to come and live in the harbour. Their colony is a good success (see picture below). Anyway, i wonder who observe who: maybe they are just joking about this pack of humans on the wharf.
In front of the wharf lies the famous Alcatraz island. It doesn't seems so far away from the city, but apparently the water is so cold and the streams so strong that to swim from your cell to downtown unthinkable.

Sea lions at Pier 39

Alcatraz island

Crossing the bay, you arrive in Oakland and Berkeley. The Berkeley campus is really big, in fact you feel like in a city. Impressive, especially when you imagine how many Nobel prizes worked there. The place was also the cradle of the Hippie culture and protests in the 60's, and some remains are still noticeable in the Telegraph street. San Francisco is indeed a very tolerant city ... the visit of Castro (the gay quarter) at night definitely convinced me!

View of the bay from the Berkeley University