stripethree

For the long weekend and in celebration of me getting that much closer to ‘old’, which according to my 11 year old cousin hits at precisely 30 (thanks Alyssa), Summer and I spent the weekend in Pinetop, about 4 hours northeast of Tucson. It rained a bit over the weekend, but we got in some hiking and generally had a relaxing time. The place was nice, built on the outside to look like a log cabin but well furnished inside. The balcony even had a gas grill, which we certainly made good use of. Summer described it as, ‘This is camping for people like you, the people that don’t actually want to go camping’. I think she got it about right; I do like pools, hot tubs, grills, and real beds and roofs where I choose to ‘camp’.

Summer and I flew off to San Fran for the long Independence Day weekend where we did a lot of walking and I took a lot of pictures.

We did a lot of the touristy stuff I didn’t do when I was in town last March like ride the trolley cars and we spent a lot of time down in the Fisherman’s Wharf area including Ghirardelli Square. Thursday evening we did a boat cruise to Alcatraz Island which included a walking and audio tour (which was much better than it might sound) of portions of the prison. It was foggy, which certainly contributed to the already creepy atmosphere created by the slowly decaying structures.

Walking around the inside was pretty intense.

Friday we walked around to sight see, including walking through Chinatown, hiking up to Lombard Street then down to Ghirardelli Square for ice cream.

We also went to Olivia’s for a BBQ on the 4th, which was great since I haven’t seen her since last March and because Summer had never met her. After that we got on a boat again for another cruise, this one went down to the Bay Bridge, around Angel Island, over to the Bay Bridge, and finally settled in with other boats for us to watch the fireworks.

Saturday we walked around more, I swear we walked 5 miles last weekend, and met up with Rebecca and Chuck who drove down from Sacramento, where they just moved about a week prior. It was great to see them because I don’t think I had since their wedding two years ago! We got food, walked through Chinatown and back down to Fisherman’s Wharf, then got more food. =)

It was an excellent weekend and we came back with sore legs, good chocolate, and lots of pictures. Part of this visit was to see if we were interested in moving to San Fran, and I think we are pretty sure the answer is no. The expense and the weather, and, well, another city we have in mind play a role in that.