My baby girl is almost 6 months old now and this trip to San Francisco occured while I was pregnant. Talk about posts that never got posted! In any case, here are a few photos and tips from our short little foray into #Sanfran.
Chinatown of San Francisco
First stop?
Chinatown.
We ARE tourists.
As much as I hate being a tourist, Chinatown was actually quite fun :) My hands down favorite shop was this one:
It was full to BUSTING with STUFF and it was all cool kitchen equipment.
I could have spent an hour or so just examining every little tool, but I made it a quick 5 minute stop, grabbed a couple spoons, chopsticks for the kids and such and vowed to come back some day. If you approach the Wok Shop from the street look for this sign:
The cool wooden sign is cool, yes, but difficult to see until you are right up on the shop.
Here were a few of my favorites inside:
718 Grant Avenue (between Sacramento & Clay St.) San Francisco CA 94108-2114
The next fun stop was the fortune cookie factory.
Yes, it is that easy to miss.
Look for Ross and then ask around (my best advice -- sorry it is shady)
The actual address is 56 Ross Alley, San Francisco, CA 94108
What is inside the fortune cookie factory? Well, they charged 50 cents to take a photo and like the cheapster I am, I couldn't cough it up. (What is wrong with me??) Instead of a "factory" of folks making fortune cookies, there was one lady, one machine and hundreds and hundreds of cookies. The cookies start out as two little rounds and are then bent together with the fortune inside. I never dreamed that the cookies were created out of two circles. I am not quite sure WHAT I thought the configuration was, but it is a far more simple process than I initially thought. You can buy the traditional cookies or the "rounds" that are cooked, but not bent. We bought some rounds for the heck of it and they tasted fine, but were still basic old fortune cookies. I am not going to lie and say they tasted good. I have yet to find an Asian dessert I actually like. (Sorry Asia) The experience of seeing this little factory was fun though. Definitely take a peek while you are there!
I also got a $6 haircut at this place. Why? Well, Alex always liked my hair when we lived in Thailand. I had it cut at the local places there and they always used a razor on the ends. I have heard this is not good for your hair, but it is kind of pretty. Who cares. It is hair -- it will grow back :) So, when the opportunity came to get shaved hair ends for 6 bucks, I jumped. Weird weird videos on the screen while I had my haircut, but otherwise a fine haircut.
153 Waverly Pl San Francisco, CA 94108
Last stop: Canton Bazaar. Typical tourist fodder, but interesting to take a peek into:
616 Grant Ave, San Francisco, CA 94108
The Meridian
We stayed at the Meridian, which was nice. Our view was of a darling little roof garden:
A few misses on our trip included:
A. The streetcars. We hoofed it from Chinatown up to Lombard St, the famous "crooked road". It was interesting, but as a 6 months pregnant chick, that was difficult. We were then going to hop on a streetcar, thinking the ride down the hill would be more fun than up, but the line was literally several trolley car turns long and it was HOT. We grabbed a taxi.
B. Dim Sum. Sorry dim sum, we wanted to like you. We went to three (THREE) places and bought samplings of dim sum and not one was delicious. I can't recommend a single one because they were AWFUL. I know it is hipster and cool to like dim sum and I should be all "it was soooooooo deeeevine" and I can't wait to go BACK, but no. It was gross. (Before you attack, let me remind you we lived in Thailand and ate street food all the time and while it was sometimes hit or miss, we are not food snobs or novices. Dim sum was GROSS.)
Overall, SanFran was fun and I would love to take more time to explore! We only had a day and a half and some of that was spent in business, so really only a day or so was spent exploring.
Want more from California?
CHEAP EATS in Los Angeles
Strawberry Fields and West Hollywood
Jimmy Kimmel LIVE
The Pacific Coast Highway | Highway 1
Monterey and Cannery Row
San Francisco, Chinatown and Dim Sum