Home, Part III -- San Francisco

As the kids and I discovered this summer, there's nothing like playing tourist to make you appreciate (and miss) your hometown.  And San Francisco is one of the best!

On one of our first days there, we drove all around the city and stopped to admire one of the beautiful bridges (San Francisco-Oakland Bay bridge),

I did have to angle the camera carefully to cut out the homeless people smoking joints.  Ahh, San Francisco...

Then we took a roller-coaster ride down Lombard Street:

Image from here

And then had a wonderful lunch by the beach.  But since it was August in San Francisco, instead of being able to see the ocean, literally across the street, we saw this:

I didn't take this photo.  It's from here

So a few days later, hoping for warmer weather, we headed south and spent a wonderful afternoon at Gilroy Gardens with friends:

In case you can't tell, this is Kate's "mean" face

The next day, back up to S.F. to play with the fascinating exhibits at the Exploratorium:

Again, he won't kiss his mother but he'll drink out of a toilet.  Hmmph.

And then we strolled around the Palace of Fine Arts:

While in CA, we ate a TON of Mexican food...

And, yes, she ate the entire plate of super nachos.

...and enjoyed really healthy hotel breakfast buffets.

Remember his vegetarian phase?  Clearly over.

We also revisited some of our favorite parks and playgrounds in the Bay Area:

Magic Mountain in San Mateo

And spent a nearly fog-free day at the beach by Crissy Field:

That's Alcatraz there behind the seagull.

The kids even found and "reassembled" this poor little crab.

They couldn't understand why I refused to let him come home with us.

Kate took home half the beach in her swimsuit anyway, so there was no room for dismembered crustaceans.

This is the Dahlia Garden near the Flower Conservatory in Golden Gate Park:

It blooms every August - October.  One of my favorite places in S.F.!

Then we headed over to Children's Playground to test out the amazing concrete slides.  These have been there for at least 30 years, I think.

You sit on a piece of cardboard so you really fly!

We were also fortunate enough to attend the wedding of some very good friends while we were in California.  The kids had a blast, and the setting -- spectacular!!!

Kate, with the fog rolling over the hills behind her.

There were so many beautiful photo opportunities that the kids (read: Will) got a little tired of posing for me. 

Just outside our hotel.  Poor Will.  Being photographed AND hugged.  The horror!

But he felt better after I let him take the next photo up a tree.

Next up, from damp, freezing fog to the scorching heat of Texas...