Marin Headlands

Last weekend, I escaped overcast San Francisco and headed to the Marin Headlands for some sun and gorgeous views.  The Marin Headlands are part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, just over the Golden Gate Bridge and a great place for a scenic drive or hiking.

From Hawk HillLooking toward Rodeo BeachA little picnic on lovely Black Sands BeachEven though it was a beautiful, warm day the beach was almost empty Perhaps because it is a ridiculously steep climb to the beach – this is just the start of the trek back up the hill!  It’s less than half a mile, but it feels a lot longer.  We lingered on the beach for a long time to avoid the walk back.  But it was worth it.

The Point Bonita Lighthouse was unfortunately already closed by the time we drove past, but I did get to see it in the distance from a viewpoint

And more views

Looking toward Rodeo Lagoon and the Headlands Institute Because of its military history, especially during WWII, there are batteries and forts scattered all over.  They don’t really fit in with the beauty of the headlands, but they’re still interesting to see. An obligatory picture of the Golden Gate Bridge from the car. There was bumper to bumper traffic on the way back out so there was plenty of time to take pictures. I had never noticed that one of the trailhead signs included MexicoAfter, we went to Presidio Social Club for dinner, which is in a former barracks building in the Presidio, an old Army base and now a national park.  I had been wanting to try it for a long time and I wasn’t disappointed.  The food was good and it had a nice atmosphere.

I hadn’t been to the Marin Headlands in a really long time and had never been through the part we visited.  Despite the huge summer crowds, it was a fantastic day and great reason to get out of the city.

Mosaic stairway in San Francisco

San Francisco has many famed stairways, like the Filbert Street steps, which is probably to be expected in a city this hilly.  In the Golden Gate Heights neighborhood on the west side of the city, there’s a beautiful mosaic stairway created as a community art project.  Located on 16th Avenue, the staircase has over 160 steps.

From the ocean to the sky…

Detail of a step

The sun and the moon sections at the top are my favorite parts.

As a reward for climbing up, at the top are beautiful views of the city.  On a clear day, you can see the Golden Gate Bridge to the north.

The big strip of trees in this photo is Golden Gate Park.

And you can see straight down to the ocean.  There are islands out there, believe it or not.  You just can’t see them very often.

Grand View Park is at the top and also offers amazing views of the city.

The stairway is in a residential area and along with the park, is a fun way to spend a couple of hours and watch the sunset.

San Francisco SPCA tour

I recently had the chance to get a behind the scenes tour at the San Francisco SPCA through a friend who works there.  I was able to learn about their amazing programs, like therapy dogs, the spay and neuter clinic to help reduce the number of kitties and doggies in shelters, and their vet hospital, which offers free and discounted care to people who need help getting medical treatments for their pets.

This is the animal care center.  All of the little red dots are heart-shaped pet tags!

I saw the adoption center and went into the hospital where some dogs were getting dental treatments. I also got to walk around the back halls of the animal care center, where cats and dogs are helped and treated while getting ready to be placed in the adoption center. 

And best of all, I got to hold a little kitten!

Soooo cute!  I wanted to take home all the animals I saw!  But, my friend said he didn't want to have to check me for kittens before leaving, so I cooperated.  I know they're all going to go to good homes.

I didn't get to see a lot of dogs because many were out on walks, or were barking so much the rooms were just too loud to go into.

I met this guy in my friend's office.  I would love to have an office with a built-in kitty (or dog)!  I don't know how I'd get any work done, though…

Great tour, great organization.  I got my own cat from here 14 long years ago.  It was interesting to see the behind the scenes and learn more about what they do. 

Magnolias in bloom

This weekend, I visited the San Francisco Botanical Garden to see the gorgeous magnolias in bloom. 

Magnolia loebneri, a hybrid of magnolia stellata (further below) and a Japanese magnolia.

I love the sort of stripes on the Magnolia soulangeana petals.  Like a natural ombre!  The common name is saucer magnolia.  It's also a hybrid. 

 Sprenger's magnolia, a native of China.  This was spectactular. 

The petals are huge!

Magnolia stellata, the star magnolia, native to Japan. 

 Zen magnolia, native to China.  These smell amazing!

Magnolia dawsonia, from Sichuan and Yunnan provinces in China.

Magnolia denudata, the Yulan magnolia, the official flower of Shanghai. 

Lovely!!

Castro hills and parks

A recent excursion to some of the parks and hills around the Castro area….

The Seward Street Slides

Corona Heights Park

Gorgeous views from everywhere!  Totally worth the all of the hills.

Playing with lomos

I've been into plastic toy cameras for years now.  I've had a Holga 120 forever.  I've always loved taking pictures and while I definitely can't myself a "photographer", I'll always love taking photos.  I got a Lomo fisheye camera for Christmas last year and recently bought myself a Lomo supersampler and have been playing around with both.

Last weekend, I went to the botanical gardens and took some pics.

Some of my fisheye pics

 

This is in the redwood section, one of my favorite areas in the gardens

 

I snapped this one of the Bay Bridge the other day

I've taken about five rolls with my fisheye so far and I'm still getting used to the field it captures, but it's so much fun to use!  Even the bad pictures are usually still interesting.

My supersampler was even more fun.  I took my first roll with it last week, so it was all an experiment.

In Chinatown…

Okay, this one didn't turn out great, but I still really like it.  It was in some back alley.  Maybe Waverly (of Joy Luck Club fame)?

A mural on Claude Lane, another alley in another part of downtown

In a park

I really love the look of the supersampler, but one thing I figured out really quickly after developing the roll is that it's best for capturing things moving, so that will be the next experiment.  I still love all the pics I took though!

Doors

The Noe Valley neighborhood here in San Francisco has some of the prettiest Victorian houses in the city.  I love their doors, entryways and bright colors.  Here's a few I recently spotted.

 

(Yes, they did have pumpkins out at Christmas time!)

 

Yes, I am still alive

Wow.  I can't believe it has been months since I posted anything, or have even really been online anywhere.  A few months back, around mid-October, my computer got some horrible, horrible viruses that progressively took down the machine to the point where it wouldn't even turn on anymore by December.  I had tried every antivirus software I could get my hands on but nothing helped, so I finally took it in to be wiped clean.  Luckily, they managed to save all my pictures and Office documents.  Unluckily, they didn't get the entire virus junk off of my computer.  And luckily again, I'm getting a new computer in a week and starting from scratch!  It has been a long, hard past few months, computer-wise and I completely missed out on all the yummy holiday blog posts that everyone must have been posting.  I did as much as I could through my phone, but there's only so much a Blackberry can do, so I gave up after awhile. 

Anyway, I am back and will do a quickie catch up post! 

Christmas was great!  I didn't get to make as much as I wanted to because I was distracted by computer problems and other issues, but at least I managed to get together with friends a lot during the holidays.  I also got some very cute presents.

A macaron shirt from my parents

And also from my parents – Weeds Season 1, which funnily enough, is the only season I didn't have.  Plus a Borders card and some candy (Irish Creme Cadburys!  Who knew!).  I also got an awesome fisheye Lomo camera which I am very excited about.  It's so funny to shoot with 35mm film again, but I took a first test roll which is being developed now and I will get the pictures back on Monday, crossing my fingers some turned out okay!  I've gotten really into the whole toy camera thing again.  I have a Holga – another plastic toy camera – but the film was too expensive to buy and process so I stopped for awhile.  But, now I have 35mm toy cameras to play with!

And I got this super awesome tv

 

It's a Sony Bravia flat screen.  I never really paid much attention to or cared about HD tv, but now that I have it – wow!  It's amazing! 

I also got some pretty gifts from my friend Clarissa.  What could be inside?

Beautiful dishes from Anthropologie!

 

Aren't they gorgeous?  I think I will hang them on the kitchen wall instead of using them. Knowing me, I'd break them right away!  She also gave me

Isn't Tokyo Milk packaging just gorgeous?  The Kiss me set also has Marie Antoinette on the side, I believe.

My friend Becky gave me yummy homemade jam

And Dana gave me vegan chocolate

A few of the gifts I gave out were

These cute 3 way chopsticks in pantone colors

To my parents – an excellent book for Foodies

This cute soy sauce jar for my mom.  It's way bigger than I thought it would be, but still cute.

I took pics of some of the other things, but they didn't come out very good, but oh well.

On Christmas Eve, my parents and I went to eat at the Grand Cafe, a really pretty French restaurant we all love.

(This is from their website and actually doesn't do the place justice – it's beautiful inside!)

On the way, we saw the giant tree in Union Square

(The hotel in the right side of the background is the St. Francis, with the famous glass elevators, Michael Mina's restaurant, and where the Fatty Arbuckle scandal happened back in the 20s.)

Whew!  Okay, I think I am pretty caught up on Christmas now.  I'll be back soon!

Weekend wrapup

My houseguest Kevin left this morning to go back to England and I'm already a little sad and nostalgic.  I hadn't seen him in years, but we had a good time catching up and he's been trying to convince me to meet him in Germany to show me around because he lived there for a couple of years. 

Anyway, yesterday we visited Cafe Vesuvio, City Lights bookstore and the Beat Museum.  The Beat Museum was disappointing because it was just a bunch of photocopied pictures (badly) glued to poster board and stuck on the wall crookedly.  Not worth a visit, but at least it was cheap.  We then got some cannoli and went to Washington Square to sit and people watch before heading back to take a nap.  He really wanted to get good Mexican food since in England he can't find any so we went by the taqueria by my house and luckily he really liked it.  He had never really seen much of San Francisco except the North Beach (Little Italy) area so he was happy he got to see more of "my" San Francisco and areas he hadn't seen before.  He's hoping to come back for Christmas and to visit here again then, but I'm not holding my breath since it's pretty pricey.

Happy Labor Day!

I hope you all have a fun and wonderful Labor Day weekend!

I started my festivities yesterday with my friend who is visiting from England. Yesterday I took him all over Golden Gate Park and then Japantown.  Today we'll be going to Chinatown and North Beach, the Italian neighborhood, and visiting City Lights bookstore, home of the beat generation, because my friend is a huge Kerouac fan.  Last night we stayed up til about 4 am watching the Lord of the Rings movies because he had never seen them and I haven't had any sleep, so excuse me if this isn't making much sense!  We both are trying to pretend we're still in college and can live off of beer and no sleep.

I am a little bit busier than I had expected with my visiting friend, so later on in the weekend I'll give some exciting news.  And hopefully have some pictures too!