San Francisco...here we come!

In an effort to continue celebrating my birthday Jason wanted to take me to San Francisco for a night, and since we have great friends who offered to watch Riley, we were off to San Francisco last night and we had a blast!

We stayed at The Marine Memorial Club which is a hotel that offers room to active duty military for a non-crazy amount...it was a nice hotel and we were right near Union Square so we were able to walk around and do lots of sightseeing.

We drove to dinner last night and it was more like a roller coaster ride than a ride in the car! The city is SO hilly and there were several intersections we encountered where you really couldn't see a thing until the car finally leveled off...don't worry we managed to not run over any pedestrians and we considered that a success! Here's an example of just one of the hills we climbed!We did manage to get some great pics on the way to the restaurant...this is a view of the Bay Bridge.
We ate at a FANTASTIC seafood restaurant in Fisherman's Wharf that had been recommended to use by several people...it was called Scoma's!
We feasted on all kinds of FRESH seafood and it was all delicious! The highlight of the meal was a smoked salmon appetizer we had...words just can't do it justice! Of course we had coffee and dessert too and were in so much pain from how much food we ate...why do we always do that?

We could have used the 1.8 mile walk back to the hotel but instead we braved the roads again and once again made it back without injuring ourselves or anyone else!
We enjoyed sleeping in this morning and had a quick breakfast at the hotel and then we set foot to check out this city! We started out in Union Square where there are lots of restaurants and shopping!
Our next adventure was China Town...those of you that know Jason well know his amazing love for Chinese/Japanese food so I took my China man and we made our way through the streets of China Town!
There were all kinds of shops and restaurants but Jason wanted to eat something as authentic as possible so we did what we know best and asked one of the shop owners where we should eat. She recommended a place several blocks down but that's where we headed. We quickly found out that there was the "tourist" China Town and the "local" China Town!

When we discovered the "local" China Town" we came across all kinds of markets with fresh food and fish...
and windows and windows of fully cooked chicken, duck, and goose hanging up! Yum!


Unfortunately Jason had a slight confrontation with this statue...he claims he didn't like the way this dude was staring at him!

We made our way to Gold Mountain and it was packed with locals so we knew we were in the right spot. It was a true dining experience where you are seated family style with people you don't know and carts are wheeled around with all kinds of dim sum dishes and you just pick what you want and eat away...my favorite was the BBQ pork dim sum! Hot tea was our only beverage option and chopsticks were our only utensil...it was the real deal! We had so much fun!

We walked back to the car and headed back home, but first we took a drive down Lombard Street...the "crookedest street in the world" with 8 switchbacks within one block...there are houses on each side of the street and beautiful hydrangeas planted all along the street! It was pretty cool! This was the view before we took the steep drive down...

and this is the view looking back after we drove down...

We were blessed with great weather...sun without a cloud in the sky...and that is not normal for San Francisco. We went home over the Golden Gate Bridge since Jason had never been over it and I was able to get a picture of the bridge without the tops being covered by clouds!

We had a great time being tourists but were anxious to get home to Riley! She had a slumber party with Jen and Cooper...painting, dancing, and cinnamon rolls...what more could a girl want? Thanks Jen for watching Riley so we could have a night on the town!