San Francisco, Day 3

The plan for the day was to include The Museum of Modern Art, SFMOMA. I had a great time there the last time I was in town. Back then there was a Keith Haring exhibit, as well as some really amazing art painted on acrylic involving alien abduction and inappropriate alien to human touching. Very cool.

This time it wasn’t quite as much fun, though always worth the trip. This time the most memorable exhibit was a Lee Friedlander retrospective. I wasn’t familiar with his work, so it was a good exhibit for me. Yes, to those of you very familiar with his work, I am a troglodyte when it comes to my art education. I’m lucky to be able to tell the difference between a Warhol and a Matisse. They were contemporaries, weren’t they? See what I mean?

The Daughter was feeling pretty run down fighting a cold, so I headed off on my own to the museum. Since both the hotel and SFMOMA were on major bus line (the number 30), I saved some money and took the bus. Very packed, especially through China Town. Standing room only, so I gave my seat over to someone who could use it more than me pretty quickly.

After the museum trip, the Daughter was feeling better, so I took the bus back to the hotel to pick her up and head back out for another trip to China Town.

This time we took the cable car, which was only a block or so from our hotel, back to near China Town. This time the Daughter chose to ride on the outside for that San Francisco experience. But, being the true child of the new millenium, she was texting someone up until the cable car took off. She didn’t fall off or lose her cell phone, but I certainly imagined it happening.

Just some more wandering around, along with some souvenir buying (tea). It’s clear that my knowledge of tea is right up there with my knowledge of wine. With wine, I know red and white, bottle and boxed, dry and … wet?

Tea appears to be much the same in that those who understand and appreciate it can tell much more about it than I can. They talk about it in much the same terms as oenophiles (didn’t think I’d know that one, did you?) talk about wine: Essence of blackberry, hints of oakiness. That kind of thing. Me, I could smell sweet and grassy, that was about it. But, I have four tastebuds, so I’m probably the wrong person to be anything other than jealous of people who can sense the world in ways that are closed off to me.

In any case, we purchased tea from a nice shop, based on recommendations and went on our way again.

We had lunch up in the Empress of China, on the top floor of a building on the northeast corner of China Town. I recommend it without reservation. Yum. Spendy, but a great view and the food was good. Worth a bit of extra money for the experience.

To really fill our day, we caught the cablecar back and got to the hotel at 3:45. I wanted to pack more stuff in so we rushed off to Pier 39 (for the third time, I think) to catch the Blue and Gray Cruise in the Bay. Out and under the Golden Gate Bridge, back behind Alcatraz and back to the pier in a hour. I had a great time, though the boat was filled. The Daughter was back to feeling low energy, so spent most of the trip inside watching stuff go by.

That was enough for that night, so we decided to call it good for Day Three.