Our Time in San Francisco
Posted by Ryan | Filed under California, People
We arrived in San Francisco after a day of grueling hills and what seemed like a thousands turns. Crossing the Golden Gate bridge reminded us both of the time we had crossed it going the opposite away on the Journey of Hope (Ryan in ‘02, Alex in ‘06). The winds were stiff, the views magnificent, and the cars just as noisy as before. More importantly, the crossing meant that we were finally in San Francisco and that meant three days off and visiting lots of friends.
Adam had flown in from Denver and was waiting for us over at Josh & Mike’s place on Russian Hill. We showered quickly and headed out to Pizza Za where we met up with Mike Barnes, a SF resident and a team member on my 2002 Journey of Hope team. And so the standard was set for what turned out to be a whirlwind weekend. We went to local pubs, donut shops, to Chinatown, to museums, to local markets, and of course – Trader Joes.
After the first night Adam, Alex, and I transplanted ourselves from Josh’s place over to another friends home: Jacob Howell. He and his new wife Brianne, treated us like kings. They made us the tastiest of burritos that first night followed by chocolate and fruit pancakes the next morning. We all did some serious catching up with each other as Alex hadn’t seen Jacob in a few years and no one had seen the two of us since we started our journey.
In SF Alex and I began to realize that we can relate almost every situation we encounter to something that has happened on our trip. That makes it fun for us to recall those recent memories and hopefully fun for people who are hearing our sometimes outlandish stories.
The next night we took the BART to Berkeley to go check out the Cal game on tightwad hill. First we stopped by the local Pi Kapp house to meet up with Mike and a number of guys from Cal who had done the Journey of Hope before. The atmosphere on the street was electric as music poured out of houses and every person seemed to be covered in Cal gear. Maryland was the opponent that night and it the game was supposed to be good. As Alex, Adam, and Mike headed to the game, I took off for a coffee shop to work on a few applications.
Adam was the official photographer for the weekend and I unfortunately neglected to grab photos from him before he took off for the airport. Thus, we barely have any photos of the antics that happened in SF. I’ll work on getting those soon.
The next morning Natalie met up with us as we headed out to meet Ryan Mayo (another former Journey of Hoper) for lunch. Not only did he treat the four of us to a fantastic lunch but he brought Alex and I boxes of Clif products that will easily last for the rest of our U.S. journey. We are now proudly sponsored by Clif Bar! Woop!
SF was a real treat. It was nice to get off the bike and to walk up hills rather than ride them. It was refreshing to see familiar faces and to hear stories of home and of new homes. And we’re truly thankful for the people who housed us and who made both long and short trips to visit us. Thank you Ben, Josh, Mike (x2), Jacob, and Brianne, Adam, and Natalie. You made our visit to SF one that we’ll remember for the rest of our lives.