10 miles and Golden Gate Park.

San Francisco was a blast. Holy-amazing-crap! How do I explain how extraordinary a feeling one becomes enveloped by when passing through the treacherous Oregon-California Pass with a 2x rear-wheel drive Nissan Xterra unscathed in December? It is truly an amazing feat. I have some pictures.

The pass I am referring to is the area above 4000 feet altitude that straddles the Oregon-California border. Through the pass you are constantly fearing for your life. The speed limit is as fast as your car can travel with chains on. You are constantly passing 60 foot semi-truck tractor trailers and/or being honked at by heavy-duty 4x4 trucks with rubber nobbies the size of my right foot on every tire. The latter of these monsters humming their way by at sixty mph. There is so much snow and mist in the air that there is no sky, only grey everywhere you look, but after a hundred miles of this shit, the first thing that happens is the clouds break. Sun blankets the winter wonderland that surrounds you, and it illuminates all of the beautiful, high-altitude Alpine wilderness. Then the snow packed roads turn to slush and gravel. This section is still a dangerous area because the rubbish that coats your windshield is essentially mud, and if you run out of wiper fluid, like I did, it becomes quite tricky. My recommended strategy is to tailgate the semis and use the water kicked up from their tires to cleanse the windshield. So life is still very difficult at this point, but fear not because soon the slush just turns to water. Here the altitude is only about 2500 feet, and from here the going gets easier because it is not long until the roads start to become more dry than anything. This area is around Mount Shasta and south. Needless to say, from here to San Francisco is an easy 250 mile trek of flat ground and many gas stations and rest areas.

Maia, Reilly and I arrive in San Francisco at around 9:35 pm. My old friend, Kelly, comes out to greet us at Pier 39 on the corner of The Embarcadero and North Point. He then takes us to his boathouse, and I can already tell it may not turn out to be so great. I have slept on a boat before, and Kelly lives on it so I know we are not going to be the ones making late night trips to the head, but Maia and Reilly are my main worries. No big deal either way though. Kelly's lodging is very appreciated after spending a couple nights on the road. None of us became sick that night, which is surprising because we ate at Joe's Crab Shack. Anyway, the next day we have all day and the forecast is sunny and sixty-five.

Start the morning at a nice cafe. I had the Huevos rancheros. It was delicious! The salsa left me a little disenchanted, but that's all. The highlight of this anecdote is the beautiful, sunny 10 mile walk through San Francisco's wealthier districts all the way to Golden Gate Park. There. I said it. Briefly now: We bought a frisbee on haight & ashbury, played with it on hippy hill and then a pit-bull ate it. With no more frisbee we took a seat and had a smoke on the hill. Yaiee! After that we headed to the museum. Then we used what was left of our energy to hail a bus, and a train, and finally ended up back at the boat at like 10 at night.

That was the highlighted section. The rest of San Francisco was kind of mundane. This blog has already taken up too much time! I have a plane to catch tomorrow. Back to Portland! So wish me safe travels and check back later to see if i made it home safe.