So we then had a wander through the rest of the mall. Ian and Vince went into K-B Toys, and next door was an "Everything a Dollar" shop, and so I went in there and there was some really cool stuff. I went and told Ian as he loves "Pound" shops, but again, it was still deserted and we felt really sorry for the shopkeeper, and Ian whispered, "you must buy something in here!" I said I was already going to, and so I bought a really cute Christmas Stocking, and I couldn’t believe it was only $1! I also bought some Wintergreen flavour Tic-Tacs, and when we tried them outside the shop, Ian was ecstatic - "wow, 'rootbeer' flavour!" We got a bumper pack of six packets for $1! Then we decided it was high time we got back on the road to San Francisco.
We drove the remaining thirty or so miles towards San Francisco, and as we approached the city, we drove up the Bay on the opposite side, through Oakland, the city across from San Francisco. We started seeing road signs saying "Bay Bridge", and the freeway had widened from three lanes to four or five. However, it was nowhere near as busy as the crazy L.A. freeways! We crossed the Bay Bridge, which was really impressive, and the views as we were coming into San Francisco itself were amazing - we could see the TransAmerica Pyramid, and all the other tall buildings. We didn’t go into San Francisco that first time, as our first priority was to find our place to stay for that night, and we had already decided to head straight for Pacifica, the place where Tony’s Mum and Dad live, and look for a hotel there. And so we followed the freeway and the signs to Pacifica, onto Highway One, and we stopped at the McDonalds, just as we were arriving in Pacifica, for a coffee and a rest.
We continued into Pacifica, keeping our eye out for an Inn or Motel/Hotel, and Pacifica itself seemed to consist of three settlements in three little coves on the coast, and we drove through all of it. We couldn’t really see any hotels, but we did see a parade of shops, including Denny’s, Safeway’s, and a Taco Bell across the road. Ian got really excited saying, "that must be the Safeway’s where Tony used to work!" We carried on driving along, out of Pacifica, and Ian said he thought we should keep going, as it was obviously a tourist area, and we must find some hotels before too long because it was on the coast. We drove about seven miles, through some really bendy and hilly roads, with rocky cliffs on either or both sides, and signs saying "beware, rockfalls", which was a bit of a worry. The one thing I did notice about these roads, however, was that whereas in England, these would be a national speed limit road, leaving it up to the driver to make the decision to slow down around the twists and turns, but in America, on this road in particular, there were speed limit signs to slow you down to 20 or 30 m.p.h. on these bends. And going up and down the steep hills there were signs advising you to use a low gear. So I was quite impressed with that. The next place we came to was another small village and we parked the car on a car park by General Stores and garage. Next door was a guesthouse and in front of it was a Tourist Information poster. On there, was advertised the "Days Inn", at Rockaway Beach, Pacifica, and I was sure we had passed this on the way in. So I said we should head back the way we had come, and Vince agreed, but Ian said we should carry on further down the coast, as there was sure to be some more hotels, as this was obviously a place where tourists would come to. But I pointed out that we were travelling further away all the time from what we had come to see, namely, San Francisco itself, and therefore, leaving ourselves less time to visit it, the further away we went (we were, after all, now at least 20 miles out the other side of it). So, rather than go any further away, we decided to head back and look for this Rockaway Beach place. So back we went, along all the bendy, windy, rocky roads, up and down the steep hills, and we reached the first of the coves, coming back. We had a really good look around, in and out of the car parks, and we couldn’t find a hotel anywhere, so I said, "it must be further on." So we carried on and arrived at the second cove, we pulled in the promenade bit, and again, we couldn’t see the way to any hotels. So, I went into the Tourist Information, with the booklet about cheap motels, and the lady in there was really nice and helpful. She showed me where the two hotels were in that cove, one right at the end on the sea front, and the other behind it, the Days Inn, and I said we would check those out, but I also asked about the one in the booklet, and she said maybe it was worth a try and so she gave me the directions anyway.
I went back to the car, and we drove to the seafront motel. Vince and I went in and asked about prices, and it would have been $80.00 a night, but in any case, they were full. They said, "try the Days Inn next door, or what used to be the Days Inn." Aah, this was what was confusing us. We couldn’t see where the Days Inn was, as there were no signs outside - they were in the middle of changing hands and names, and having renovations. Apparently you entered via a square courtyard. We went into the reception, and it looked reasonably nice, and did have rooms available. But, they too, were $80.00 a night! We were sure we could get something cheaper than that! So we decided to go and find the one that was $50.00 a night on production of the booklet. We followed the directions the lady in the Tourist Information had given us, and we drove back up Highway 1 towards San Francisco, and took a turn-off to a road called the "Skyline Boulevard", and this road literally seemed to go up into the sky! It was like a type of flyover thing, and with it disappearing ahead into the low hanging mist and clouds, it was quite unbelievable! The road then dipped down again, and we were travelling along the coast, and we could see the road where the hotels were, it was like the old road, and we were on a new road they had built alongside, and so we had to double back on ourselves to get onto the right road. In fact there were a couple of other hotels there as well, and so we went and asked them, but again the rooms were still too expensive, and still they didn’t have any left. Further down the road we found the adjoining street where the one we were looking for was. Vince and I went into the motel place that was advertised in the booklet, and the man on the desk was behind what looked like a bullet-proof screen! We asked about rooms, and he said $70.00, and we said, "but we’ve got this booklet, it says $45.00 with this booklet," and he said, "oh, I'm not doing the offer today." As we went out, we noticed all the windows had external bars on them! So we decided to give this one a miss!
We got back in the car, and by now we were quite fraught. It was now about 3.00 in the afternoon, we had traipsed around everywhere, and again, we were thinking, "we’re not going to find anywhere to stay for less than $80.00 a night!" However, we decided there was nothing else we could do but go back to Pacifica, to the Days Inn, and see if they still had those rooms they had earlier, and we’d just have to pay that price. So we went back along the coast, and luckily, they still had rooms left, although, by now they had only "smoking" rooms left, but we gratefully said we would take them. In fact, as we drew up inside the square courtyard, a party of bikers were just arriving too, and Ian said, "quick Jule, get inside and get the rooms before they take them all!" Now I noticed how nicely decorated, comfortable and welcoming the reception area was, nice carpet, nice wallpaper and everything. We took our key cards, and went back outside. The corridors of rooms surrounded the square courtyard on three sides, and we went up to the first floor in the lift, which was accessible straight from the courtyard. There was an open walkway or balcony all overlooking the courtyard, with all the rooms leading straight off this walkway. The opposite side was totally shut off, while they were renovating, with scaffolding all up the front, and it was already painted a different colour, two shades of blue, to the side where we were, which was a beige and brown colour, all cracked and peeling off the door frames and fascia boards. To be honest, at the sight of this, we were still wondering what the rooms inside would be like, where had we brought ourselves? But the key cards and locks were a sign of something newer, and literally, we opened the door, and from this façade of cracked and chipped paint, we stepped inside to a room that was exactly like a Holiday Inn! It was just amazing! It was beautifully decorated, spotlessly clean, lovely new furniture, T.V., exquisite ensuite bathroom, Vince even had a fridge in his room! It was such a relief! Although I wasn’t quite so keen on having the door open straight out onto the outside like that, to be honest, anyone could walk in off the street, come up in that lift, and walk along outside our rooms! Once inside the room, you were locked in, but outside was another story! But it was all we could find - another thing, by this time we still hadn’t eaten and we were starving hungry. We had intended to get to San Francisco, find somewhere to stay by lunchtime, have our lunch and spend the afternoon looking around San Francisco! Then we’d have another day tomorrow, so we would have had a day and a half to look around! But no, that wasn’t to be. Having at last solved the problem of where we were going to stay, we dumped our stuff in our rooms, and our next priority was getting something to eat!
We headed straight for Denny’s, just along the coast at the next cove - we were all totally in agreement that that was where we wanted to go and eat! Well, we stuffed ourselves, and it was the one time when we could manage a pudding! We were so hungry! I had a starter instead of a main, something I had wanted to try before - the chips and chilli with melted cheese on top, and even though it was a starter there was plenty, and then I had Key Lime Pie. Having well satisfied our hunger, we took a leisurely stroll around the parade of shops, including a Hallmark shop with cards and gifts - the Americans make a big thing about Christmas, and there were already Christmas decorations and trinkets in there, including some Collectible Christmas Baubles, in animal shapes, penguins and the like. There was even some Star Wars and Star Trek tree decorations. Then we had a wander around Safeway’s, especially since, having stuffed ourselves in the Denny’s, it was now about 5.00 p.m. and we didn’t expect to want another meal today, just some snacks and drinks later on, maybe. So we bought fruit, yogurts, crisps and drinks, to put in Vince’s fridge. Ian also found me a pumpkin carving kit, so that was nice to take home, and I found Ian some Rootbeer flavoured jelly beans, and this being the eve of his Birthday, I got those, to go with the other presents and cards I had hidden in the suitcase, including cards from his family and friends that I had brought with us from home!
Anyway, we got back to the hotel, put our snacks away in the fridge,
and Ian and I went to find the payphone to phone Tony’s Mum and Dad and
tell them we were here. Ian spoke to them for several minutes, while I
looked around at the shop windows nearby. We were back in Vince’s room
deciding what to do for the rest of the evening when the phone rang in
his room. It was Tony’s Mum, saying would we like to go over to their house
tonight, for a cup of tea, and then we would know where it was for our
dinner tomorrow. We thought that was really nice of them, and Tony’s Dad
said he would come to the Hotel and pick us up. We quickly had a wash and
freshened ourselves up, then locked up the rooms and went and waited outside.
A few moments later, Tony’s Dad turned up in this big, American saloon
car, and we could tell it was him, as he was looking at us. So we all introduced
ourselves, and he introduced himself as Joseph, and he said, "bring all
your maps and tourist guides, and we’ll go through them tonight." I thought
I had left them all in the room, so I said I wouldn’t be a minute, I’d
go back up and get them, and so I ran back up to the room, realised some
of them were in the car, went back down to our car, so I was gone for quite
a few minutes, and when I got back, they had been wondering if I was alright!
And so Joseph drove us all over to their house. It was a lovely house,
on top of a hill, and it was like, split level, with the front door being
in between the two floors, with stairs going up to the main living area,
all open plan, lounge, dining room and kitchen, and a hallway leading to
the bathroom and bedrooms, then down the stairs was "the den", and it was
a cosy basement-like room, with a bar in one corner, some comfy sofas,
and lots of photos on the walls. Tony’s Mum had lots of candles going,
and lots of feminine touches, pot pourri in the bathroom, and lacy doilies,
and other lovely things. And so we had a cup of tea, and chatted, and they
showed us around their house, and Joe told us all the best places to go
in San Francisco, and he said coming back, if we made sure we got onto
Van Ness Avenue, it would take us straight to the Freeway 101 entrance,
which led straight to Highway 1, back to Pacifica. And so we had a very
pleasant evening, and then Tony’s Dad dropped us back to the hotel, and
we thought it best to have an early night, as we were thinking we had only
one day, in which to cram as much as we could see of the whole of San Francisco.
We were asleep as soon as our heads hit the pillows!
We drove further into San Francisco, and for several minutes looked around for a reasonably-priced car park (Tony’s Mum and Dad had warned us to be wary of some charging up to $15.00 a day to park!). We found ourselves in the entrance to a multi-storey, and while it possibly wasn’t the cheapest deal we could have found, it seemed quite good compared to some we had already seen, at $5.00 an hour for the first two hours, with vouchers if we ate or shopped in a particular place, etc. We just thought it best not to waste any more of our precious time trying to park. We looked around the famous Fisherman’s Wharf, and on the harbour there was a big archway that had been damaged by fire, but there were notices everywhere saying it was about to be restored. By this time it was much warmer, and bright sunshine, and I took off my coat, thinking now how nice this was. We could see Alcatraz across the bay, from the other side this time. It is possible to get a ferry out there and have a tour, if you want to, as a lot of tourists do, but we didn’t think we’d have time for that today. However, one thing that Ian and Vince did want to do, was they saw this submarine, and you can go on it and have a tour around, and I said, "oh no, guys, you go on and I’ll wait outside, I really don’t think I’m interested in this." Ian said, "oh come on Jule, how many times in your life can you say you’ve walked around a submarine?" And I said, "well, never," and Ian said, "well, there you are, then, you should do it." I said, "yeah, yeah you’re right - then I can say I have been in a submarine!" And so we paid and we were given this earphone set, on a stalk, and you just put it to your ear, and you get a recorded commentary as you walk around. We were most impressed! The thing that struck us all about life on a submarine was how enclosed and compact everything is. The bunks where the submariners would sleep were stacked three high, one on top of another, and they must have lain there and the person above them would have only been a foot above them, no more. Or their bunk might have been above a warhead, or a rocket, or something like that, and we were thinking, "how on earth did they live like this?" This submarine must have held so many dozen men, and they showed us the Captain’s quarters, and even they were smaller than our bathroom, they were really tiny! The First Officer and the Navigator shared another cabin about the same size as the Captain had all to himself, and then everyone else just had these tiny bunks. We saw the "mess" area, and all this equipment, and the periscope, and it was all quite fascinating, really.
We came back out into the glorious sunshine, and walked back along to Fisherman’s Wharf, deciding it must be time for some lunch. There were lots of places to eat, especially fish restaurants, and Vince really wanted to eat some of the famous Clam Chowder, but Ian and I didn’t really fancy that. At the Boudin Sourdough Bakery, they were serving the Clam Chowder in a round loaf, in a hollow scooped out of the middle. You could also have a salad in a round loaf, with the rest of the bread on top as the "lid", and so Ian had a ham salad and I had a prawn salad in this French-style sourdough bread. We couldn’t eat anywhere near the whole loaf!
We spent the next hour or so wandering along Pier 39, and there were some lovely shops here, souvenir shops, there was a toy shop, and there was this beautiful craft shop, with a whole wall full up from floor to ceiling of cross stitch kits of San Francisco views. I really wish I had brought one of those! But it would have taken me ages to choose one! We walked along the rest of Pier 39, and at the end of it, we stopped and took more photographs of the bay, the marina, the Bay Bridge, the view back towards the city, including the Coit Tower, which we could see on the San Francisco skyline. Heading back, there was a shop entirely devoted to thousands of fridge magnets! I wanted to stop and buy one for Ian’s Mum, but he said, "oh no, we’ll get something when we get back to L.A." There was a Hollywood T- shirt shop, and inside were loads of the same Star Wars Episode One T-shirts that we had found in the Mervyns store at Livermore, priced at $18.99, and Ian and Vince had paid only $3.99 each! There had been boxer shorts as well, and between them, they had bought about ten T-shirts and pairs of boxer shorts of all the different designs! So now they were even more pleased with their bargains!
At the end of the Pier, there was a small kiosk, advertising open-top coach/cable car tours of the city, so we thought we’d ask, but it was $30.00 each, and the last one of the day had already left, so we thought never mind. In any case, the tour included places we had already seen, like the Palace of Fine Arts and the Golden Gate Bridge, so we decided to go back to the car and do our own tour of downtown San Francisco for the couple of hours we had left. We drove round and round and down and down in the multi-storey, and suddenly Ian said, "I know where we can get a really brilliant view over the city," and Vince and I both said, "where?" And Ian said, "the top of this car park!" I said, "ooh, yeah, let’s do it!" I turned the car around, and drove back up, all the way to the roof. I said, "wow, this was such a brilliant idea!" because it was true, there was loads of room up on the roof, there was only a few cars up there, and the view was just amazing! We could see right across the bay, and on the other side we could see the whole San Francisco skyline, with all the tower blocks, the TransAmerica Pyramid, the Coit Tower, all the "Financial District" buildings, it was just fantastic! We were so chuffed Ian had thought of it! However, we had to hurry, as we had only a few minutes left on our parking ticket, before we would get charged for another whole hour, so having got all our pictures, we bundled ourselves back in the car, and drove down to the bottom of the car park with just seconds to spare!
We drove out of the car park, and towards the Financial District, and
the next few minutes were a nightmare! We found where we wanted to go,
where all the tall buildings were, and we wanted to get out and look around,
and could we find somewhere to park??? There seemed to be nowhere that
wasn’t a red kerb, and there were "No Parking" under any circumstances
signs everywhere, and everywhere was a one-way street, so although we could
see parking places, we couldn’t get near them, or they were full. We saw
one road, going up a hill, it was opposite us at some traffic lights, but
we could only go right - straight ahead was a "No Entry" sign, and you
could see why! Even though there were houses up this hill, there was no
way you could drive a car up there! It was practically a shear climb, it
was so steep! We didn’t manage to visit Lombard Street, known as "the crookedest
street in the world" - I got postcards of it, but we never saw it. Anyway,
finally, we managed to find somewhere to park at long last.
We attempted to find our way out of the city. We got stuck on yet more one-way systems, driving around in circles, but eventually we found we were back on the coast road where we had been earlier. Ian suddenly spotted an entire film crew, and he could tell from their jackets they were filming Nash Bridges! Ian and Vince were saying, "oh wow, is anyone famous there, is Don Johnson there? Wicked!" They wanted me to stop the car there and then and get out, but we just wouldn’t have had time. I kept on driving, and shortly after, we found ourselves driving up and down the really steep San Francisco hills! Some of them were so steep, I was amazed the car would go up them! There was one hill start where the car did roll back! Ian was attempting to navigate us back to Van Ness, using the map, and between us, we found it and managed to approach it from a side road. We drove past the City Hall, and Ian and Vince were both going, "oh wow!" and taking photographs. Then, as Joseph had told us, we got straight onto the freeway further down, it was well signposted, and even though it was the busy, rush hour traffic, I got on with no problems.
Pacifica was some miles away from the centre of San Francisco, so it took us about half an hour to get back, and we were supposed to be at Tony’s Mum and Dad’s for half past six. We decided we had better call at Safeway’s on the way as well, to get some wine to take round, and so we quickly dived in there. Vince’s favourite wine and mine is Ernest and Julio Gallo’s Californian White Grenache (which is a Rose wine), and so we had both chosen this to take with us as we didn’t know whether Maryann (Tony’s Mum) and Joseph preferred white or red wine. We thought the Rose would be a good compromise. We arrived at their house, and after apologising profusely for being late, and explaining how we had got lost, we presented Maryann with the wine, and we had also bought some soft drink for Ian. She said, "how on earth did you know? This is my favourite! Look, we already have some on the table!" (It was in a decanter.) Vince and I replied, "ours too!" I had also brought over from England some candles with our fragrances in, and a traditional English cookbook, which Maryann was really pleased with. The dinner smelled wonderful! We sat down at the table, and Maryann served pasta, with Tony’s Grandmother’s famous home-made pasta sauce, and sausages and salad, a really wonderful dinner. We all had a really nice evening.
We all had lots to talk about. Then, because it was Ian’s Birthday, Maryann brought out this delicious chocolate cake, with icing on it, and it said on it, "Happy Birthday Ian". I rushed out to the car to fetch the camera, but when I got back, I was too late - the cake had already been cut and there was about a third left that hadn’t been shared out yet! After we had eaten the cake, Maryann and Joseph brought out these presents, and they said, "we’ve got Ian a present, but we’ve got Julie and Vince one as well!" And we were saying, "oh, you shouldn’t have, that’s so kind of you!" And they had bought us each a beautiful sweatshirt, all with "San Francisco" on them. We couldn’t thank Tony’s Mum and Dad enough - it was so kind of them to buy Ian a gift, but to have bought the same for Vince and I as well, it was so kind of them to buy us such beautiful gifts. The sweatshirts are so nice to have, and to keep, as a reminder of our visit.
We rounded off the evening with some coffee. Our English accents and Vince’s Scottish accent fascinated Joe and Maryann! Tony’s sister Danielle talked with us for a little while before going out for the evening. Finally, we took some photographs of Joe and Maryann with our camera, in front of their wall of photographs of their children, and Joe took some of all of us with his camera, using a tripod and a timer delay switch. Tony’s parents are so proud of their children and all that they have achieved, it shines through with all their photographs, and they also showed us, in the den, a framed newspaper cutting from their local newspaper, all about how Tony and Nick have moved to Los Angeles to work in the movie business - Nick as an actor, and Tony as a producer. In fact I had seen the same cutting on Tony’s bedroom wall back in Burbank. So, all in all, this was a really enjoyable evening.
Back at the hotel, we were again asleep as soon as our heads hit the pillows! However, I don’t know about the other two, but I was awoken in the middle of the night by very noisy, heavy footsteps on that external balcony outside, someone was running up and down and the footsteps were echoing all up and down the balcony! In the pitch dark, I was really scared, and had to keep telling myself to stay calm, it couldn’t be anything serious, but I was really relieved when all went quiet again.
