Bay City Rollers - San Francisco on Wheels
Written: Jul 28 '04 (Updated Jul 28 '04)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Beautiful City, good transit, good food, walkable, fun
Cons: Rudest transit workers anywhere!
The Bottom Line: San Francisco is a great place to visit. Highly recommended.
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| heckonwheels's Full Review: San Francisco |
We decided this summer’s trip would be to Northern California. The first half of the trip would be to the Bay Area over the Independence Day weekend and then we’d spend the remainder in the Sacramento area (to be covered in another Epinion).
The drive up from Los Angeles was about six hours along the coast on Highway 101. Technically, you can get there a bit faster using Interstate 5 but in our trip to Monterey last year, this proved to save us only fifteen minutes and the drive up I-5 is intensely boring.
Our hotel would be the Homewood Suites along the waterfront near Oakland’s Jack London Square. You can get the details of that hotel in the separate Epinion I wrote about our lodging.
Day One – Sunday (July 4th)
After breakfast, we drive over the hills east of Oakland and visit the town of Pleasanton to take in the Alameda County Fair. On arrival I must admit, this is the shadiest fairgrounds I’ve ever seen in my life! It must be an assortment of old groves (the parking lot is filled with walnut trees) as there are trees everywhere. It’s very pleasant on a hot summer day like today.
This fair, as all do, has buildings, streets, and many lawns devoted to vendors trying to separate you from your money but it also has a great model train display and some good old fashioned country contests sprinkled liberally throughout.
Near the farm animal exhibit (separate from the great building that holds the livestock that is competitively displayed) is a contest over who has dressed up there bunny the best. Corny, but still kinda fun to watch as kids have their bunnies dressed like golfers, Uncle Sam, etc.
We make our way over to a garlic fries stand and pay $3.75 for a rather small order. After that, we immediately find another stand that sells a huge platter of them for $3.25…
The wine garden has tastes of the award winning wines ranging from $3.00 to $20 a taste. No thanks…this is much more expensive than the dollar a taste wine competitions I’ve seen at many other fairs.
Horse racing is going on in the grandstand so we put a few dollars down and have a ball, but we’re not going to win today.
Lunch is Thai food, Italian Sausage, and a Polish sausage. All good, in that fair-food kind of way.
We watch a country and western duo perform. She was mediocre but he was an outstanding singer. A few more strolls down the exhibitor halls and we call it a day and head back over to Oakland.
Dinner tonight would be a Pizzeria Uno in Jack London Square. Dinner there was very good and inexpensive, although the waitress chased me down afterward and said I didn’t leave the credit slip. Turns out, she dropped it by the cash register.
The square was extremely crowded due to the holiday so we went over to Trader Joe’s in nearby Alameda and bought some wine, cheese, and bread to watch the fireworks from our hotel with.
By the time the fireworks started, traffic anywhere within a couple of miles was gridlocked and people were parking in the middle of the street, leaving their cars, and watching the show. Luckily, we’d gotten back early enough to park in the hotel lot and avoid the jam. The fireworks were great, although some locals were a little over exuberant…we were startled out of our sleep at 2:15am when some kids set off an M-80 right outside our hotel window.
Monday
Tickets in hand and breakfast in belly, we head over to the nearest BART (the Bay Area Rapid Transit system – one of the local subways) at the Lake Merritt Station.
Being a holiday, downtown Oakland around the Lake Merritt station is a sleepy place. I park in the BART lot (25 cents per day, what a bargain) and we head over to the elevator. We descend into the station and try to figure out the fares on the machines. I ask the woman manning the booth about fares, especially disabled fares, since I’m not from around there and not sure what to do. She assures me that we need to pay full fare for everybody because there are no offices open today to process the disabled fare.
Doesn’t sound completely kosher to me but OK, I just want to get going.
I purchase three full fares and find we need to walk to the end of the station…about 300 yards away…to take an elevator down to the platform.
We get to the elevator and are about to go on when the lady from the booth calls us via an intercom and asks us if we’ve validated our tickets. No, we didn’t know we had to we reply. She says we must return to the booth to validate them.
Upon returning, my wife asks her why she didn’t tell us when we were there. This instantly sends the lady into a rage saying she didn’t know we didn’t know the system (see above when I asked her about the fares because “I’m not from around here”), it’s our responsibility to know (and that’s why I asked her, to acquire such information), and that…and this is a direct quote…”people will make up any excuse to complain.”
So I just want to leave and she finally tells us how to validate the tickets…by putting them through the turnstiles and exiting the station. We do it and head back to the elevator and descend to the platform having survived our encounter with our first rude Bay area transit worker…it won’t be our last.
Checking the Giants web site before we left, I learned that upon reaching the Embarcadero station in San Francisco, I need to get a free transfer to the MUNI system (which would take us the rest of the way to the stadium) at tables set up for that purpose before I left the BART station.
Upon arrival, I cannot find any such tables. I see a gentleman with an orange vest, obviously a worker, sitting in a chair next to the station attendant booth and decide to ask him how to get this transfer. You’ll have to take my word for it that I asked as politely as possible, “excuse me, but could you tell me where I can get the transfer to MUNI for SBC Park?”
His response was “all BART passengers must ask the BART personnel if they have questions.” Which wouldn’t be bad except he screamed this at the top of his lungs. Literally. No exaggeration. I was standing 2 feet away and could hear him if he talked in a normal tone but, no, he had to scream as is someone had just stuck something blunt and painful up his nether regions. Second extremely rude transit worker in less than an hour.
I went to the BART booth about fifty feet away and asked there. A number of ball park passengers seeing what had just happened followed along, avoiding the screaming MUNI worker from Hell. At the BART booth, the gentleman there said they would not distribute MUNI transfers for another few minutes, then changed his mind and started handing them out. To his credit, he was professional and polite. I made it a point to let him know how much I appreciated his professional demeanor.
We descended to the MUNI platform (the station has three levels – the concourse just below the street, the MUNI platform one level below that, and the BART platform below MUNI), boarded the trolley, and went to the stadium with no further incident. The stadium was beautiful and the staff professional and very friendly – you can see details of it in my Epinion of SBC Park.
After the game, we caught a MUNI bus nearby and went over to have dinner at Village Pizza on Van Ness. Years ago, we had dinner here and really enjoyed it. Tonight, my wife orders penne pasta with basil and olive oil while Tim and I share a pepperoni and sausage pizza. It’s good (the pasta very good) but not quite as good as the pizza we had the night before at Pizzeria Uno.
We head back to the hotel (via BART of course), enjoy the swimming pool & spa, have a few drinks at the hotel’s happy hour, and call it a day.
Tuesday
Back on BART we go, this time to spend the day exploring San Francisco. We have been here many times and have seen most of the main sights (like Alcatraz, the Golden Gate Bridge, etc). Today we just want to walk through the neighborhoods around North Beach and Chinatown to snack away and do some shopping. We plan to start at Fisherman’s Wharf and slowly make our way south along Columbus and Stockton where we’ll end up our day back at the BART station on Market Street.
Today, it’s back to the Great Bay Transit Follies. We disembark the BART train again at Embarcadero station and head up to the street level where we’ll catch the historic trolley (F Line) to Fisherman’s Wharf. (accessibility side note – almost all of the MUNI system is wheelchair accessible, including these old trolleys, but the famous cable cars are not so we cannot take them to the wharf).
Tim goes to the designated wheelchair area and upon arrival of the beautifully restored 1940’s vintage Italian trolley from Milan, the driver activates the lift and puts him on board. I go in via the front door and immediately find the driver and my son arguing about something.
I ask the driver what’s going on and he tells me he needs to know where we’re getting off at. Tim told him Fisherman’s Wharf but I guess there’s a few stations in that area and the driver wanted a more precise location. I told him that I don’t know the streets of the area but we wanted to get off at the main area of Fisherman’s Wharf where the big round sign shaped like a ship’s wheel is located.
His answer to me was “there are lot’s of signs in Fisherman’s Wharf. I don’t know which one you’re talking about.” So I ask him if he can just drop us off wherever he thinks is the most central part of Fisherman’s Wharf and that I’ll trust his judgment. He again, and not in a nice tone of voice, says he needs an exact location because not all stations are accessible. We’re both getting exasperated when a nearby passenger suggests telling him to drop us off at Pier 39. I tell him to do this and he ignores me. I ask him if he heard me and he still ignores me. (I’m standing right next to him) Fine. I deposit my fare and my wife deposits hers and I ask him for transfers. He gives me one. I tell him we paid two fares and he says he didn’t see it. I tell him it’s not my fault he’s not looking at the fare box (which shows the two fares paid) and he silently gives me one more transfer.
We take our seats and a number of passengers remark to us about how rude the driver was. I tell them not to worry…we’re getting used to it (but I do take his number, the trolley number, and note the time so I can file a complaint – this is getting ridiculous).
The driver drops us off at Pier 39…about a block away from the accessible station right next to the big Fisherman’s Wharf sign (only one of it’s kind I see all day) shaped like a ship’s wheel….without any more incident.
Third rude transit employee…luckily, he’s to be our last. I have to note that these three employees have been, by far, the rudest transit workers I have encountered in my life and that includes major transit systems in the U.S. and Europe that have major reputations for rudeness. MUNI, BART…it’s just not necessary to treat customers this way. I’m not taking away a star for it because the rest of the time everything was fine but this really does mar what otherwise is a great and extensive accessible public transit system.
Over at the wharf, we walk along the many seafood stands until one gentleman with a great sales pitch catches our ear. With lines like (directed at people lining up at the next stand over) “don’t stand in line over there, we’ve got better food and no waiting” and “a two dollar tip! People, they wouldn’t leave a tip if they didn’t love our food! Have a free sample!.” You really had to see this guy in action to appreciate his infectious enthusiasm. We try a sample of the chowder – which is really good – and take an order to go.
The shops along here are of the tacky touristy style and we head over the nearby Ghirardelli Square where there are even more. Free samples of chocolate temp us and we buy some chocolate to go and snack at the beautiful park across the street where gorgeous views of the bay compete with the colorful cable car turntable.
Afterward, we catch a North Beach bound MUNI bus and head over to this Italian-American enclave. For me, this was the best part of our short time in San Francisco. We’d wander along and find an Italian bakery. After having a delicious dessert, we’d find an Italian coffee shop and have some deliciously strong coffee. An Italian deli provide some prosciutto, cheese, and wine to be savored later back at the hotel and Tim’s eyes pop out at the adult cabarets that sit on the south end of this area. Easy there son, you’re still a few years away from being able to get in those places!
Dinner was to be at one of the many wonderful Italian restaurants that line the streets here but I was outvoted by my wife and Tim who wanted to try the Stinking Rose where, not exactly Italian, everything is heavily dosed with garlic.
We have the 40 clove chicken and pasta and, while good, it wasn’t quite as tasty as I thought it should be. I had imagined a place so dedicated to garlic would be able to produce tastier fare. In past trips, we have enjoyed other places nearby such as Capp’s Corner and Figaro which I highly recommend - at least for my taste - over the Stinking Rose.
After dinner, we went through Chinatown and then ended up at Union Square window shopping at the high-end shops there that sit adjacent to the large homeless population of the square itself. As the sun set, we went back underground to the BART and returned to the hotel to enjoy our wine and Italian delicacies.
Wednesday
After breakfast, we load our luggage into the van (we’re checking out) and head north on a bearing that will lead us to the town of Napa. Today, we’re going to spend a couple of hours in Napa Valley before the conclusion of this part of our trip.
Expecting the bucolic vistas of endless vineyards and rolling hills, the town of Napa destroys this expectation immediately. Instead, we arrive in a generic suburb lined with industrial parks and mini (plus a couple of mega) malls.
Fortunately, the Napa Valley does indeed feature the longed for stunning vistas as soon as you leave the town of Napa.
Heading up Highway 29…the “wine trail…we pass many wineries. Stop at just about any (look for the “tasting today” or “tasting room open” signs) and pick up a free map to the areas wineries. The map also has many coupons in it for discounts at the wineries.
Our first stop is the V. Sattui winery just south of Saint Helena. The wine here is very good, our favorites being the chardonnay and the Grenache rose. Their wines are mid-priced running for the most part between $12 - $20 per bottle.
Next, we stop at the Sutter Home winery just up the road. They’re know for the bargain priced wine they produce but also have a proprietor’s reserve and Trinchero labels of premium wines (we also get a coupon for a free reserve tasting for two – regularly $14 – on the wine map). They are very tasty, especially the proprietor’s merlot and pinot gregio and the Trinchero barbera.
We now have a quandary…neither one of us like to go wine tasting and not buy at least a sample bottle of wine. But, with just two wineries under out belt, I’ve just spent $200 on a few cases of wine…I’m not buying any more.
Outside is a beautiful garden so we sip a little of our bounty while watching the Napa Valley Wine Train amble by. Deciding to save another day for wine touring, we head back to the town of Rutherford for lunch before leaving the Bay Area portion of our vacation.
Recommended:
Yes
Best Suited For: Families
Best Time to Travel Here: Anytime
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Epinions.com ID:
heckonwheels
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Location: Los Angeles, CA USA
Reviews written: 77
Trusted by: 14 members
About Me:
Southern California native who travels around the country a lot.
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