Training Log Archive: jennycas

Brain melted from too much conferencing, and legs still hammered, so walking to the Hyatt Regency and back was enough for today. I'd managed to find a tiny unbadged hotel about 15 min walk away, for less than $200 USD/night including tax (I booked about 4 months ago) and while it's not in a dodgy area, there are odd characters everywhere talking to themselves in downtown SF. When we headed out for dinner G & I were accosted by someone who possibly didn't have a home to go to and definitely didn't have access to a shower and probably didn't have complete sanity; he accompanied us for quite a few blocks rambling cheerfully and we really didn't know how to get rid of him. This reality contrasts with the affluence on display in the shops - it's Pride Month in the Rainbow City and every department store has a window tarted up with ROYGBV (they've all forgotten the indigo) but most doorways have people sleeping wrapped in cardboard/newspapers.

C • Housing in SF 7

Feeling a bit more encouraged by the fact that knees and hips handled all the stairs on the coastal trails yesterday (they'd been horrible ever since the plane flight), I'd planned a longer run this morning but slept through my alarm after the heffalump in a room upstairs had been active during the night. As a farewell to Land's End, ran down past the Cliff House to Ocean Beach, then explored Golden Gate Park a little; there are soooo many trails that if someone were to cover all of them then they would probably have run a marathon. I found the bison paddock (bison! in the middle of a city!) then headed back up the hill to Geary & 48th to pack my gear (G was of course already packed) and farewell the Seal Rock Inn, which is conveniently at the end of a bus line where buses come about every 5 min, and so it was easy to break our journey back into the city by stopping and detouring to Simple Pleasures Cafe on Balboa (between 35th & 36th) and then lugging our packs back up to Geary again.

Dropped packs at the hotel in the city then went in search of Mission Pie. The rhubarb was amazing but sadly the pie shop is closing at the end of summer due to unmanageable expenses - a studio apartment in the Bay Area costs up to $5000/month to rent.

Pretty much the same loop from Land's End as on Monday except in reverse, before a Grand Day Out with G which involved walking from the Seal Rock Inn to Golden Gate Bridge (we caught the bus back again though; public transport here is amazingly frequent). Through the affluent suburb of Sea Cliff we were able to admire some impressive houses and gardens - NZ pohutukawa is used as a street tree a lot here, and it is currently in bloom. Also eucalyptus is common in parks and reserves.

There were lovely views of the Marin Headlands on the north shore, with the hills shrouded by fog about their shoulders, and as we got closer to the GGB we were almost able to catch a glimpse of the top of the towers (746 ft high), but they stubbornly remained in fog until we were right underneath them - Geoff was keen to walk out upon the bridge, and I accompanied him to the first tower, but found even that rather vertiginous because the roadway is 200 feet above the water and the white noise of the traffic passing by didn't help. Amazing engineering though, and if anyone is interested, the official colour is International Orange. Golden Gate refers to the summertime colour of the headlands on either side of the entrance to San Francisco Bay.

Back on solid land, I was getting excited because unsurprisingly the GGB carpark is a numberplate-spotters' mecca and now I have seen plates from 15 different states apart from California, the most remote of them being from Connecticut. My spouse tolerated this behaviour with affectionate amusement, but his turn to get excited came when we got to the laundromat. I'd been a bit concerned about how we'd manage to scrounge up 19 quarters for a $3.75 load of washing, but there was a machine on the wall which gave change for a $20 note and so we received 80 quarters! Geoff spent the next 10 minutes sorting through them for ones which were different from each other and in the end it turned out that we had 40 distinct species of quarters from 30 different states :)

Just down to the beach & back up again, rather full of dinner, because it had been 7pm when we got home from a long day spent mainly at the Californian Academy of Sciences (because it was foggy, cold & windy outside - the staff taking tickets at the entrance were wearing beanies) and also wandering Golden Gate Park, which is huge; despite being less than 1km wide north-south it's about 5km long east-west and surprisingly easy to get disoriented in. We crossed Stow Lake & climbed Strawberry Hill but declined to pay $9 to visit any of the featured gardens.

Quote of the day from a staff member at the Academy of Sciences: "My name is ____ and I use she/her pronouns." Since when is gender-identity so fluid that someone who looks and sounds female needs to also specify that they identify as such?

C • Welcome to California 12

Conversation of the day...
Geoff: "Why are you so hungry and grumpy this morning?"
Jenny: "It's the after-effects of all the second-hand dope smoke I inhaled yesterday!"

Yeah, so there are billboards and websites dedicated to the sale and procurement of cannabinoids, even tours advertised. And we were both happy to get away from the "big smoke" by hopping on a bus to the edge of the world, I mean Land's End, where we are now comfortably ensconced in the Seal Rock Inn overlooking the Pacific Ocean and derelict Sutro Baths. Conveniently, this is right at the end of a bus route, although less conveniently the bus we caught stopped at 33rd St and in the end we walked all the way to 48th with our packs - at least it was mostly downhill and we passed plenty of caffeine sources. The 4 blocks up from Ocean Beach to Sutro Heights were rather a grind, though.

C • Second-hand smoke 5

Since our grocery-acquisition expedition (Safeway is somehow just not quite as exciting/interesting as European supermarkets) had involved ascending heavily-laden from Ocean Beach to Sutro Heights a second time, I decided on a flatter run and followed the coastal trail around to the northeast of Land's End, hoping for views of GGB but the sea fog had rolled in since we were at the lookouts earlier in the day and I couldn't even see Marin Headlands any more. At least it was actually sunny this afternoon! Still, it's a nice bit of coastline with songbirds (thrush maybe?) among the Monterey cypress (which I think of as macrocarpa) towering overhead and lots of nasturtiums flowering - their scent reminds me of my grandma's garden - and I am so much happier being out here on the west coast rather than stifled in the city.

Event: BAOC: Oyster Bay
 

I'd promised G this would be a non-orienteering holiday, but he didn't believe me. Probably just as well, because I'd discovered a local event on the east side of the bay (very close to Oakland Airport) being run by Bay Area Orienteering Club. Since it hadn't taken long for us to need an escape from the greyness (and homelessness!) of a big city, he was happy to come too, and conveniently I was able to arrange a lift for us from the train station in San Leandro with a fellow orienteer.

The 1:4 000 map of a reclaimed/rehabilitated area by the shoreline was very detailed, showing every bushy thicket hidden in the long grass, and it turned out that hunting for passages among the prickly acacia last Monday was actually good practice for this. The course, set by an M16 who'd put a lot of effort into updating the map, crisscrossed the area (with a map flip) and maintained interestingness until the end. So my brain very much enjoyed this even if my 13-hours-on-a-plane legs didn't. Running was quite painful and hamstring jarred on the undulations hidden in the long grass - I think all the little holes may have been due to moles or gophers?

Once back on the city side of the bay we spent the afternoon exploring the waterfront by the ferry building then made our way up the many steps of Filbert St to Coit Tower on Telegraph Hill, from whence we could see in all directions including the Golden Gate Bridge although its top was hidden in fog, which really truly is a phenomenon in San Francisco. Impossible to believe that they had a 38-degree heatwave here last week!

C • Golden Gate Bridge 7

Things I learned today:
a) San Francisco's cable cars are not in fact the ones with overhead cables (those are trolley-buses) but the cables which pull them up the hill are actually buried underground, between their tram tracks!
b) pants are optional here. As in, girls dressed in their finery for a big day/night out are happily wearing patterned see-through tights without any evidence of any pants, outer or under!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
(I should think their bottoms would be rather cold.)

C • See through tights 8

After dropping Toby's car off at the Cazzolatos. Then went home for some bag-stuffing and a flight to Sydney, where G & I had 4+ hours to wait until our SF flight and I wanted to get some fresh air so we decided to walk between domestic and international terminals...along the main arterial road, not sure I'd do it again!

C • Road 1

Flight to SFO was pretty straightforward and we landed at 2pm. Getting through immigration - well, I daresay it would be quicker if they didn't want to digitally finger-and-thumb-print* both hands of every one of the 1200 people queuing in front of them for nearly 2 hours...so we actually got on the train to the city at 5pm. The hostel's in Tenderloin, an area tactfully described by Lonely Planet as "gritty" and where the staff helpfully advised us which streets not to walk down (we didn't mention that we'd come there from the station via those streets already...) and has an elevator straight out of the 1930s. But I suspect that everywhere here does, along with the exterior fire escapes (and the fire engines look like they're from the 1930s too).

*I was left thinking that:
a) we didn't exactly consent to this;
b) do they ever alcohol-wipe the screen in between travellers? God only knows what sort of bacteria/viruses it might be possible to transmit this way!