Open Top Tour Bus

While Joe's parents were in town this last week I was able to take a day off of work and join them on an open top tour bus. We see these buses drive by all the time and I've always thought they'd be a great way to see the city if you don't have a lot of days to spend roaming. We jumped off at the Golden Gate Bridge and walked.

The weather was perfect. Joe and I haven't seen the bridge this clear since we moved to San Francisco. It made for some great pictures.

We walked pretty much all the way across. Supposedly there were signs saying the walkway was closed 1.4 miles in, but Julie and I missed them. Jed kept saying we better turn back, but decided to keep walking. Long story short... we ended up turning back and walking the whole bridge again.

Workers are constantly painting the bridge bright orange/red. You could tell where some places had been touched up and where others needed to be badly.

We saw dozens of dolphins just below the bridge.

There were a couple kayakers muscling the ocean water and moving pretty quickly. We also watch huge ships drive in and out of the bay.

Other than the Golden Gate Bridge I didn't take many other pictures on our bus tour. We just sat back, enjoyed the ride and listened to the recording point out landmarks and iconic San Francisco locations.

Even though Joe and I have seen lots around town, I really enjoyed the tour and showing off the city to Jed and Julie! It was fun to get a different view of the city.

Photo Friday #3

President Obama was in California this past week. He hosted fundraisers in Los Angeles and San Francisco. Joe was walking to meet his parents downtown (they arrived via BART from the airport) and stumbled across the motorcade.

Obama hosted a luncheon at the W hotel which is just 2 or 3 blocks from our apartment. Apparently the traffic was way backed up because the motorcade rode through town. Pretty neat to see though and Joe captured it well on his phone.

Happy Birthday Joe!!

Happy Birthday to the man who always makes me smile, laugh and

look forward to the next day spent with him.

Triple D: HRD Coffee Shop

Continuing with our Triple D tour we went to HRD Coffee Shop over the weekend. This is the restaurant that I spotted on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives and knew it looked familiar. It was the restaurant we walk by all the time and is only 2 blocks from our apartment.

Here's the video we watched before going to eat there. These videos are always so persuasive, Joe got one of the items shown on the show.

I ordered the Korean tacos and they were delicious, but spicy. I knew most of the food at HRD would be pretty spicy, but I still ate everything on my plate! It was also a pretty warm day so we drank lots of water. Joe ordered the kimchee burrito featured on the video. Our two meals were pretty similar with the same meat, marinade and kiwi salsa. The main difference was Joe's burrito had rice and my tacos did not. They were both delicious!

The HRD Coffee Shop is a super small place and the type you would hardly notice walking by twenty times... like we did. There is one long table with stools and more stools along the window. The other goofy thing about the restaurant is the business hours. They're only open Monday-Saturday for breakfast and lunch. We actually tried going to eat there one night after work and realized it wasn't open... then later after looking it up on the internet we realized they don't serve dinner! Oh well, at least we found a Saturday to check it out.

Bridge School Benefit Concert

When we heard Dave Matthews was going to perform at the Bridge School Benefit Concert this fall we jumped in right away and bought tickets before they sold out. Ever since we started dating we have followed Dave Matthews Band on tour and seen at least one concert a year. We estimated this concert was our tenth time seeing him on stage.

This concert was much different than the other DMB concerts we've been to. It was a benefit concert with proceeds going to the Bridge School. The school is a non-profit and their mission is to help individuals with severe speech and physical impairments. The annual concert was founded by Neil young and his wife Pegi 25 years ago.

The lineup this year included

• Beck
• Norah Jones & The Little Willies
• Carlos Santana
• Eddie Vedder
• Arcade Fire
• Mumford & Sons
• Dave Matthews & Tim Reynolds
• Neil Young

Of course we were most excited to see Dave Matthews, but because this was a mainly acoustic show, his band was not with him. Although he did perform with Tim Reynolds who he tours with periodically. The other performance Joe and I were excited for was Mumford and Sons. They have some great songs and are fun to listen to.

The concert was located at the Shoreline Amphitheater in Mountainview, CA which is located about 30 minutes south of the city. It is the headquarters for Google and we drove by their campus of buildings. The venue was very similar to Alpine Valley, WI that we've seen DMB play at numerous times. Just like at Alpine Valley, we sat on the lawn at Shoreline and were pretty much dead center from the stage. The concert was sold out, but I'm not sure how many people were there.

We rented a party bus with a big group of Joe's co-workers to get to the venue. Once we were there we met up with a bunch of my co-workers and it worked out great to all sit together. The grea thing about concerts in California in October is the weather. Usually around this time we're use to wearing sweatshirts or even coats. Not this past weekend though, it was a hot sunny day! Then the sun went down and it was very comfortable.

Photo Friday #2

I had a completely different blog post ready for today... but Mother Nature decided to change all my plans. Yesterday afternoon we had a 4.0 earthquake with an epicenter across the bay near Berkeley. Joe and I were both at work and experience our very first earthquake! I was sitting at my desk and my chair just started to bounce... it felt like someone was jumping up and down really hard. Luckily it didn't last long at all.

Later last night we were sitting on the couch talking when we experience number two. This one registered at a 3.9, but we both agreed it felt stronger than the first and it lasted a little bit longer.

Coincidently San Francisco and the surrounding areas actually held an earthquake drill yesterday morning. I think it was called the Great Shake Up and it was an effort to make everyone aware and prepared for the next one. No would have ever guessed the next earthquake would come about 5 hours later.

I actually had a conversation with a co-worker shortly after the drill and told her that I wanted to feel an earthquake sometime (we've heard of 2 since we've lived in the city, but neither of us have felt either one). Guess now everyone's saying I jinxed it!

Addiction...

is really not such a bad thing when it's to freshly made guacamole! I could seriously eat this every day. Luckily in California they have been pretty cheap, under a buck each. Back in Iowa we were paying over two dollars easily. In the last two weeks I've probably had guacamole at least 7 times.

We've kept our guacamole pretty simple. One avocado smashed, one tomato seeded and chopped and about 2 tablespoons red onion finely chopped. I eased off the onion when I brought some guacamole to work. Don't want to breathe onions on my co-workers! I could really get use to this new routine.

Courtyard and NFL

Courtyard by Marriott recently became an official sponsor of the NFL. They are the only brand sponsor in the lodging catergory and are now the "Official Hotel Sponsor of the NFL." To help celebrate this new partnership our office had an NFL Friday where anyone could wear their NFL gear to support their team.

I borrowed a Denver Broncos jersey from a co-worker. I even has someone comment on it while I was walking home from work. I was caught off guard and just smiled knowing my co-worker would be so happy to hear someone else in San Francisco is a Bronco's fan... there's not many of them!

It was a fun day and a fun way to support Courtyard.

Presidio Take Two

We visited the Presidio a while back here, but that was barely scratching the surface when we went to the Palace of Fine Arts and Exploratorium so we decided to go back. We spent a good chunk of our past Sunday exploring the area thanks to the free shuttle around the park called PresidiGo... clever.

To give a little bit of history, the Presidio was founded in 1776 by the Spainards and later taken over by the US Military in 1846. It was the center for US defense during WWII and recently closed in 1995. Now there are commercial and residential tennants occupying some of the old military buildings.

Here is Immigrant Point and the view of land just north of the bay across the Golden Gate Bridge. Unfortunately we couldn't get a view of the bridge, but there were some large ships going in and out of the bay. It's nice to see the actual ocean every once in a while. For some reason it seems so different than the bay. It must be the never ending amount of water and no land on the horizon.

Near Immigrant Point was a WWII memorial for all of the men lost or buried at sea in the Pacific Ocean. There were 413 names in all. It was such a peaceful memorial.

We made our way to Inspiration Point and once again, no view of the bridge. It was hazy, but we had a good view of the Palace of Fine Arts and Alcatraz.

Funny story: my cousin Tina sent me a picture of a helmet our grandma wears while picking up walnuts. We were both laughing and giving grandma a hard time about it while Joe and I were walking through this trail with lots of trees:

And wouldn't you know it, right when Joe mentioned how he actually wished he had grandma's helmet to protect him under all of the trees a bird decided to poop on my forehead. No joke... I felt it, but wasn't sure what it was. I told Joe to snap a picture before cleaing it up. It was too funny not to share!

My aunt and uncle told us about artist Andy Goldsworthy and his sculpture at the Presidio. In 2008 he created this sculpture with trees that had fallen in the woods. It was pretty amazing to see in person and up close. Google his other works... they're pretty amazing too!

This picture gives you a better idea of how tall the spire is.

We have pretty much seen everything there is to see at the Presidio. Mark that off the list!

Triple D: Rocco's Cafe

Have you ever watched the Food Network show Diners, Drive-ins and Dives... also known as Triple D? I happened to be watching the show a couple weeks ago when I spotted something that looked familiar. They were featuring a restaurant about 2 blocks from our apartment! We pass by it every time we get groceries or walk to a local bar.

I decided we had to try it out. Then I got thinking more about Triple D locations and I knew there had to be multiple here in the city. So I Googled it and yes, there are a good amount.

Friday night we decided to give one of these Triple D locations a try. We went to Rocco's Cafe which is about 4-5 blocks away. We made sure to watch the video before going to eat and that even helped us decide what to order. Check out this video only if you just ate or you're about to eat. Warning: this will make you hungry.

The food was so good. Joe has some sort of Italian sausage pasta and I tried the linguine clam pasta that Guy tried on the video. They were huge portions so we both brought some home, perfect for lunch! We even saw Don Dial (the owner if you didn't dare watch the video) at the restaurant. He wasn't around for long and didn't cook our food (the stoves are behind the bar area so you could watch them making your food) but we still recognized him like a celebrity.

We already have our eyes on our next Triple D location. This might even become a theme for vacations! I might need to bookmark the website I found that maps out all of the locations.

Photo Friday #1

Today is the first of what is going to become Photo Friday. In effort to post (almost) every day of the week, Friday will now be brought to you from my camera phone. Anything interesting, curious, insane, funny or in between from the week will be featured here.

You win some, you love some. From this picture you'd think I stole someone's coffee, but it's actually mine. No one messes with my grande-non-fat-no-whip-mocha!

A Piece Of History

During Fleet Week we watched as the USS Carl Vinson ducked under the Golden Gate Bridge and paraded into the bay. It seems much too tall to even fit under the bridge.

We didn't know it at first, but this is the ship that disposed of Osama bin Laden's body after his death in May. It anchored in the bay over the weekend.

Just a little piece of history I wanted to share.

49ers vs Buccaneers

Believe it or not before this last weekend I had never been to a NFL game... ever! Glad I can finally cross that one off my list (and I don't only mean our San Francisco list).

We went to Candlestick Park to watch the 49ers stomp on the Buccaneers (they won 48-3). We were joined by some of Joe's co-workers, one who is actually a 49ers fan. He picked a great game to watch!

We were excited to see the Buccaneers play since Iowa alum Adrian Clayborn starts on their defense. Joe was going to get his attention by yelling at him, but the music was so loud there's no way he was going hear Joe. At least we got some good pictures since we were so close.

It was a hot sunny day with not much of a breeze at our seats. It was great to get some sun though.

We sat behind the endzone near some pretty hardcore 49ers fans.

It was fun to see Candlestick Park, but it will be nice for the team to have a new stadium. We could tell the park has been around for a while.

Our next NFL game will be at Oakland when the Bears come to play over the Thanksgiving weekend. We know, we won't wear our Bears apparel in fear of the Raider fans!

Fleet Week

Before last week I have never heard of Fleet Week. Now I feel like I've been missing out for all 25 years I've been alive. All of a sudden this past Monday and Tuesday everyone in my office was talking about going to Fleet Week. Joe and I looked up the schedule and decided to check it out.

On Saturday we watched the parade of ships from the bleachers in front of Ghirardelli Square.

The ships came into the bay under the Golden Gate Bridge. The fog was still hanging around so we could barely see the bridge.

There were helicopters all around escorting the ships while the announcers described each one.

There were some pretty impressive ships in the lineup. We got to see one closer up later on.

Sunday we had breakfast at the Ferry Building and walked South along the Embarcadero past the Bay Bridge. The fog was heavy that morning, but I got a cool shot of the whole bridge.

We were headed to the pier closest to our apartment where a large aircraft carrier was docked and free tours were offered. The ship was the USS Bonhomme Richard. It's homeport is San Diego, it holds 1,200 crewmembers, costs $1.1 billion and is 844 feet long.

The cool thing about Fleet Week was all of the service men (and women) in uniform there to share their everyday duties with anyone that was interested. Here the guy was showing us a grenade launcher.

He even trusted Joe enough to hold it. Watch out!

I looked through this scope that magnified some cars in the parking lot pretty well. I bet this thing could take a couple of them out.

This might be my favorite. Joe with the bullet proof vest (which he put on backwards at first, but I would have done the same thing) and helmet. Plus the city in the background and the very end of the Bay Bridge.

There were multiple helicopters on the ship deck.

And tanks below deck.

Don't forget about the jets. We didn't get to see the airshows this weekend, but we saw (and heard) the jets practicing on Thursday and Friday. It was pretty cool at work to hear them zip by and then see them in the distance over the bay.

Remember this picture from yesterday? I asked these Marines to take a picture with me. They were all so nice about it. I like how only one of them is smiling, the rest look pretty tough. Even though I posted this picture yesterday I had to post it again!

The security to get onto the ship was somewhat tight. It was like going through airport security. We showed our ID and emptied our pockets before going through the metal detector. There were also armed soldiers around so we asked one to take a picture with Joe. He was also pretty nice about it.

Fleet Week was a lot of fun, I'm glad we got the chance to check it out.