An afternoon in San Francisco, by the Bay

As I mentioned in my previous post "Books, food and airplanes in Alameda" my eldest daughter who was in the area for business meetings visited my two grandsons - her nephews - and me during the week-end we were on Alameda Island.  On Friday evening we went to a Lithuanian restaurant in Alameda.  On Saturday my daughter and her fiance decided to take my two grandsons to the Exploratorium Museum near Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco.  The museum site indicates that "The Exploratorium is a museum of science, art, and human perception ... We create tools and experiences that help you to become an active explorer: hundreds of explore-for-yourself exhibits; a website with over 50,000 pages of content ... etc."  Their stated mission is to change the way the world learns.  The Exploratorium is the brainchild of Frank Oppenheimer (1912-1985,) an experimental physicist and university professor.  It is a huge museum.  Wikipedia has detailed information on this museum - click here to access it.   (Two photos of Exploratorium below courtesy Bruce Damonte.)

The Exploratorium is located at Pier 15 on the Embarcadero, along the San Francisco Bay (see map above.)  The distance from our lodging in Alameda to Pier 15 in San Francisco is only 14.4 miles (23 km.)  We did not think it would be a long trip.  Wrong!  We left around 11:20 am and arrived at the Embarcadero at 1:30 pm!  It took over two hours ... The reason being that vehicles have to pay a toll to cross over the Oakland-Bay Bridge to go into San Francisco.  During the week-ends the lines to get to the toll booths are very crowded.  Once on the bridge, it was bumper to bumper traffic all the way.  (Click on collage to enlarge.)

I did not remember the Oakland-Bay Bridge being that crowded when we drove on it back when I lived in San Francisco in the 1960s.  My husband's sister and her family lived in Oakland for a while.  Before we were married we would drive across the bridge to visit them.  My husband, a boy-friend then, had a 1955 MG TF-1500 green convertible and it was fun crossing the bridge with the top down - it was quite windy.  We wore WWI aviator leather helmets and I also tied a long white silk scarf around my neck - I wish I had taken pictures then.  Below is an MG TF-1500.

The construction of the Bay Bridge started in 1933.  The bridge opened in November 1936 (6 months before the Golden Gate Bridge.)  It was the longest bridge at the time.  The final cost came to approximately $77 million.  San Francisco celebrated for five days when the bridge opened with more than one million people taking part in parades, Navy air show, air parades, football games, etc.  Automobile traffic used the upper deck and the lower deck carried trucks and trains until this deck was converted in 1958.  The bridge was closed for a month in 1989 after an earthquake caused a section of the upper deck to crash into the lower deck.  Below are period photos of the Oakland-Bay Bridge, courtesy San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library.  In 2002 the eastern section of the bridge was rebuilt as a self-anchored suspension bridge.  It opened in September 2013.  The cost for this reconstruction was about $6.5 billion.

Below are some vintage postcards of the Oakland-Bay Bridge.

I opted out of visiting the museum and asked to be dropped off on the Embarcadero near Fisherman's Wharf.  I knew it is a very touristy sight but the view of the Bay is beautiful from there.  I also longed to eat some good San Francisco sourdough bread and knew the Boudin Bakery and Restaurant was near Pier 41.  San Francisco sourdough bread is very popular.  For many years Parisian Bakery in the Bay area, established in 1856, sold their fresh sourdough bread at the airport as well.  Many travelers bought bread to take home.  Unfortunately Parisian Bakery was sold to Interstate Brands Corporation of Kansas City.  They changed the recipe and accelerated the way the bread was made for added profit.  But the bread did not taste the same.  The corporation went bankrupt and shut down Parisian Bakery in 2005.

Fortunately the Boudin Bakery is still making their wonderful crusty bread with the chewy and sour taste inside.  In 1849, Isidore Boudin, son of French master bakers, had emigrated from Burgundy in France to San Francisco and established a bakery to serve the Gold Rush population.  The bread was delivered by horse-drawn wagons.  Isidore established his bakery in North Beach and baked bread the way he had done in France - a fermented technique.  He captured natural yeast found in the air for his "mother dough" (the leavening base.)  But, in San Francisco, the air was different because of the fog and the sea.  Isidore's wild yeast made his bread into a "sourdough" bread.  The Boudin Bakery declares that they continue to use the original 19th century sourdough starter till now.  There are several sourdough bakeries in the Bay area and all together they bake more than 3.5 million loaves of sourdough bread every week - bought by customers and delivered to local restaurants.  Photos below courtesy Boudin Bakery.

The Boudin Bakery near Fisherman's Wharf is a two-story building with a 30-foot observation window where one can see the baking process, from the original dough to finished loaves of bread.  On the ground floor is Baker's Hall - a market with an assortment of breads and baked goods as well as regional gourmet food and gifts.  There is also an espresso bar.  Upstairs is a full-service restaurant and a Bistro bar.

As I went to a small table in the Bistro, I passed by a wall full of vintage postcards of San Francisco - I took a quick photo of the wall but did not have time to stop longer.  There is also a bakery museum upstairs, but I did not take the tour.

I ordered the "Ceviche Trio,"  an appetizer, which is a sample of Alaskan Halibut, Gulf Shrimp and Calamari Ceviche with thin-cut fries and sourdough bread and butter - plus a cold local India Pale Ale beer.  The Ceviche was well presented and interesting.  The bread was delicious.

Then I walked back towards Fisherman's Wharf by Pier 39.  It was a lovely sunny day, warm and windy.  Many people were about.  Some were watching men playing and singing.

I remember Fisherman's Wharf from decades ago.  It was mostly popular for the seafood restaurants there.  I liked to go close by to the Buena Vista Cafe to drink one of their famous Irish coffees.  They claim to have invented it.  They also declare serving up to 2000 Irish coffees per day.

Nowadays there are more tourists, more fast food places and souvenir shops.  But now, also, the sidewalks are larger, benches are plentiful and the area is decorated with many lovely flowers as well - some professionally planted and some, like this small yellow flower below, just trying to find a spot to grow.

I spent most of my time people watching, or strolling along the railing near the water to take a look at the Bay, or the boats, or the seals.

I liked to stop and read the information panels,

then go back and watch the activity on the Bay.

I came by a gate standing above weathered wood and rails.  It looked like the gate shown on the top of the information panel above.  The area was empty of people.  As I walked around it, I could see some shiny items under the railing.  As I approached I realized they were the infamous "love locks" that vandalize public property now everywhere.  I am pleased to report that the City of Paris, in early June this year, removed all the love locks from the Pont des Arts - 45 tons of locks (although the 700,000 or more love lock keys are still rusting at the bottom of the Seine River.)  Now they will start removing the love locks from other Paris bridges.  See my post on Paris Love Locks here.

As I was watching a small boat full of people going on a bay trip, a large cruise ship slowly passed in front of me.  It was the Golden Princess on its voyage to Alaska.

Now it was time to take a last look at the Bay and Alcatraz Island in the distance before meeting my daughter, her fiance and the grandsons.

After another look at Coit Tower I entered the car.  We drove by all the new tall buildings in the area and re-entered the Oakland-Bay Bridge - no toll in that direction.  Traffic going the other direction though, towards San Francisco, was still bumper to bumper.  The trip back to Alameda Island was much faster.

The grandsons loved their afternoon at the Exploratorium museum - they said they could have stayed there much longer as there were so many fun interactive computer displays to play with - but it closed at 5:00 pm.  I, also, enjoyed my lunch and had a very pleasant afternoon by the San Francisco Bay.  I played with three of my photos - and could not decide which one to show.  Which one do you prefer?  (Click to enlarge.)

Fall color at Lake Allatoona

This has been a colorful week, or should I say, full of colors - fall colors that is.  I was going to look at my pictures of New Orleans for a post but, I did not.  Leaves on our trees started to change into their fall colors from light yellow to dark red and the colors entered our rooms.  We have so many trees around the house, some very close, that when the sun is shining through them it bathes the rooms in golden tones.  I started to take photos through our windows.  (Click on collages twice to enlarge.)

My cat Mitsuko also likes to look out of the window - but I think she is looking at squirrels.  I took my camera and went outside to catch the colors in nearby trees.

While I was taking these pictures a little bird was serenading me - very lustily.  I finally found out where he was perching and took its photo, too - but I don't know what type of bird he is.

Actually I started catching colors with my camera on Tuesday evening, November 5th.  This was the day we were supposed to vote.  So my husband and I went to our voting precinct - it was closed.  We were surprised but it is a church and they were having a musical meeting.  We drove around to see where we could vote.  Finally someone at the Marietta high school told us we were not eligible because we did not live within the "city limits" of any of the towns close to us - Marietta, Kennesaw and Acworth, GA, and these were municipal elections.  We live about 6 miles from each town but not inside any of them.  As we were driving back home we saw a beautiful sunset - something we cannot watch from home because of all our trees.  We stopped and I took several pictures.  The pictures are not very good but it is not the camera (the Lumix,) it is me - I focused the camera on the leaves of the trees, but the colors in the sky were splendid.

Atlanta is about 30 miles (48 km) southeast from our house, but if we drive in a northwestern direction we are close to a huge lake called Lake Allatoona.  On Wednesday afternoon we drove to a park within this lake that is located on a peninsula.  This 1,776-acre park is called Red Top Mountain and is about 8 miles (12 km) away from home.  We were hoping to see more fall colors.  There are more than 15 miles of trails through this park.  We hiked on Sweet Gum Nature Trail for a while.

We left the trail and came back.  I was pleased to sit on a bench to rest.  We then checked the maps to see where we would drive next.

The name of the park comes from the red color of the ground in Georgia, composed or red clay - Red Top Mountain. The soil gets this rich red color because of its high iron-ore content.  You can see the red clay on the banks of the photo on top of this post - I did not touch the color or Photoshop it.  In Georgia with so many pines, or even magnolia trees, there is this riot of colors in the fall - all the shades from the changing leaves, the red clay and the evergreen trees.

When I stopped to take more pictures a little bird was watching me.  He was so cute!  Do you know what type of bird he was?

We then drove down toward the lake.  There was hardly any people around since it was mid-week in November.  It was a warm day for November - about 71 F (21.5 C.)

We decided to go up a hill to have a panoramic view of part of the lake.  There was a cemented area with an historical marker.  This small area is on the hill on the left of the dam overlook in the picture below (the photo of the dam at the bottom of collage, under the postcard) at about 9 o'clock.  All the area around our home is rich in history and Civil War battles.  Last year at this time I wrote a post about Fall in Kennesaw National Battlefield Park which is about 4 miles down our road.  Click here to read it.

Lake Allatoona is a man-made lake.  In 1950 the US Army Corps of Engineers developed the Allatoona dam for flood control, hydroelectric power generation, fish and wildlife management, recreation and water supply.  They started blocking the Etowah River in 1949.  The lake is 11 miles long, is about 145 feet deep (44.19 meter) at its deepest point and has 270 miles of shoreline (454.5 km.)  When it is full the lake spans more than 12,000 acres (or approx 48.5 square km.)  There are 14 day-use parks, 8 marinas, 15 public boat ramps, 688 campsites, 435 picnic sites, restaurants, hiking trails, fishing, hunting, etc., for the yearly 7 million visitors.  But there were few visitors that day.  Below is a vintage postcard called Allatoona Lake as the Government calls it (but it is known as Lake Allatoona around here) and a Corps of Engineers' photo of the dam.

I walked to the side where stood another historical marker called "Etowah and the War" with the Etowah River in the background.

The view from the top of this hill was lovely from anywhere one looked.  I could see the whole dam structure, the power house (which produces more than 150,000 MWH at peak times) and the churning waters of the Etowah River coming out of the dam; I could also glimpse at the beautiful valley further away.

We drove closer to the shores of the lake, to a boat ramp.  There was a lonely fisherman on his boat.  We watched him for a while.  I hope he caught some fish - the species known to be in the lake are: bass (largemouth, hybrid, stripped spotted and white,) carp, crappie, bream (bluegill, redbreast and red ear sunfish,) gar and catfish.  You could see the red banks of the lake as the water level is down several feet.  A power boat went by - the only boat we saw that day.  It was getting late but the sun was setting on the other side of the hill.

We drove back toward the bridge.  We stopped for a few pictures then drove home.

We visit Lake Allatoona seldom, which is a shame since it is close to our house - many people drive hours to reach it.  So we decided to visit it again this week.  On Thursday, Nov. 7th we went back and hiked Lake Allatoona Pass, and on Friday Nov. 8th we visited Lake Acworth which is an outflow of Lake Allatoona and is even closer to our home - these outings will be in upcoming posts.  I'll end this post with Georgia O'Keeffe's painting of radiant autumn leaves.

Autumn Leaves painted by Georgia O'Keeffe, American- 1897-1986

Venice, on the 3rd Day (morning)

On our second day in Venice, last October, we leisurely walked around the city (see my post of January 26, 2013 here.)  For the third day we decided to see some of the famous sights.  We walked to the canal in front of Piazzale Roma, near the main train station, to board a "vaporetto" - the vaporetto is a water bus.  Several line of vaporetti travel on the canals and to nearby islands.  Each ticket costs 6 euros 50 ($8.70,) which is not cheap but cheaper than riding in a gondola or water taxi.  Tickets have to be bought and stamped before boarding.  It is more economical to buy a 12 hour card with unlimited trips for 18 euros ($24) or a 24, a 36 or a 72 hour card or even a 7 day card.

At the Paris airport before we boarded our flight for Venice I had bought a little Venice guide book which had the vaporetto map.  We took line #1, that goes up and down the Grand Canal, to travel toward San Marco Square.  We boarded our vaporetto at Piazzale Roma, the stop before "Ferrovia" at 10 o'clock on the map below and were to get off at the San Zaccaria stop, in the center of the map.  (Click on picture to enlarge.)

There are some open-air seats in the front area of the vaporetto - they are the best to get good views for picture taking.  It was a thrill really to look right and left and go by all the beautiful old buildings.  The Grand Canal goes through Venice in a S shape from the area where we boarded the water bus all the way to the Saint Mark Basin, or about 2.36 miles (3.8 kms.)  The width goes from 100 to 300 feet (30 to 90 meters) and a depth of 16 feet (5 meters.)  Most of the buildings are from the 13th to the 18th centuries. (Click on the collage twice to enlarge pictures.)

It was like an overload of sight and sound - should I snap a building on the right, or the left, down or up?  So many choices.  Can I get a picture of the Rialto Bridge and avoid the head of another passenger in front of me?  What about a gondola on the side, or the one passing us as we go under the bridge?

The vaporetto stopped along the way to let passengers off and on.  It had to maneuver among all the boats and gondolas on the canal to stop on the right or left bank - I was sure sometimes that we were going to hit another boat.  There are only four bridges that cross the canal but a ride across can be taken for 0.50 euro on a "traghetto" or gondola like rowboat.  Venetians stand on the side of the Grand Canal at certain points to wait for a crossing and then stay upright in the traghetto boat as you can see on the two bottom pictures below.  I think I would have fallen into the canal...

Our little vaporetto kept going - stopped at Ca' Rezzonico then passed under the Del Accademia Bridge.  I wished I knew more about all these gorgeous historic buildings.  This canal is an ancient waterway.  Merchants started building houses along it in the 10th century.  By the 12th and 13th centuries the houses became elaborate and often in a Byzantine style.  The 15th century saw more of the Venetian-Gothic style with brighter colors and pointed arches.  By the 16th and 17 centuries the style of the buildings was more Baroque.  Nowadays the largest ones have become museums or purchased by foundations that can afford their upkeep.

Our stop, San Zaccaria, was approaching and most of the passengers were walking toward the vaporetto exit.  We had enjoyed our slow cruise down the canal and hated to leave - so we agreed to miss our stop and we stayed on.  Next was the "Arsenale" stop but we would stay until the end of the line, at the Lido.

I remembered reading about the Arsenale.  This is where the warships were built and gave Venice his power and wealth.  It started in 1104 and by 1400 it employed 3000 specialized employees.  It is said that it was "one of the earliest large-scale industrial enterprise in history." Below are some Library of Congress photomechanical prints from the 1890-1900s; the Venice Arsenale is the bottom photo on the right hand side.

Then our almost empty vaporetto went on the open water of the lagoon toward the terminal at the Lido.  We went by the 17th century Punto della Dogana (Tip of the Customs House,) reopened to the public in 2009 by the Foundation Francois Pinault (owner of Gucci) as a Center for Contemporary Art.  I took a close-up of the top of the Tower of Fortune crowned with "Fortuna," a winged sphinx statue standing on a sphere - the Earth.  The Venice Lagoon is an enclosed bay of the Adriatic Sea with thousands of boats of all kinds such as vaporetti, motor boats, hydrofoils, ferries, cruise ships, sail boats, etc.  We even passed close to a Police boat.

 We arrived at the Lido island - a sandbar 6.83 miles long (11 kms) with hotels, summer villas and beaches where tourists gather in September for the Venice Film Festival.  We did not stay long as we exited our vaporetto and walked a few yards to the departure dock of the next vaporetto.  I only had time to take a picture of hundreds of bicycles.  (Map courtesy Wikimedia Commons.)

Back in another vaporetto going to Piazza San Marco we crossed the lagoon again and could see a large amount of trees ahead along the bank.  When the vaporetto stopped at the "Giardini" (gardens) stop, we decided to get off and take a look.

Later I read that these gardens were created when Napoleon Bonaparte, after he conquered Venice in 1797, had an area of marshland drained.  He then directed Eugene de Beauharnais to design a public garden.  In the 1890s several exhibition buildings were erected in these gardens to show international art.  Belgium was the first country to erect a pavilion in 1907.  There are 30 permanent pavilions where various nations display art or architecture during the "Venice Biennale."

 A Gondola at the Jardins Francais, Venice, by Felix Ziem, French 1821-1911

The gardens are also famous for the number of wild cats roaming the area.  As we disembarked the vaporetto, we saw more trees than we had seen in several days.  We walked around and I took the picture of a pretty black cat.  He was standing in front of an old Victorian building where plants were for sale.  Next to it was a small cafe.  We sat outside and ordered some little sandwiches for lunch.

 We ended our meal with a perfect cup of expresso coffee.

It was time to return to the vaporetto and finally go to the Piazza San Marco.  We passed the Arsenale stop again and approached our final stop.

Many gondolas were on the bank near our vaporetto stop.  Ahead we could see the Doge's Palace.

We were on the "Riva degli Schiavoni" near the Doge's Palace.  I had seen many famous paintings of this historic area.  Would it still look the same as in the paintings and old photographs? It was barely 1:00 pm so we had plenty of time to explore further.  More to come in the next post...