Now for a second late update...it's actually July 22 and I'm on board a whale watching tour near Port Townsend, WA. Cost me a bit more than expected but I'm so far from home at this point that budgeting is pretty much out of the window...anyway, on to other things.

Friday night, I arrived in San Francisco and within an hour, my host and I made unicorn horns for a unicorn themed CS party on Saturday. Only through CS...hotels are for the birds, I'd much rather do what a local typically does. The rest of the night was spent going over girl drama and figuring out an itinerary for the rest of my drive north. A few words about my host Rachelina...

She's your typical San Fran resident...anything goes, do pretty much whatever you feel like. Hiedi warned me this place would be a mind expanding experience and I think I can handle this for a few days, we will see. The main thing my conservative mind won't accept is the free way they talk about sex...I remind my host of the girl she used to be when she lived in Seattle, and I still hold firm to my opinion that she needs to un-Frisco herself and move away from this Sodom & Gomorrah like place.

Other than that, it's actually nice here. Cute guys are more than willing to tell drivers behind me to go f*** themselves because of their apparent lack of ability to change lanes while they direct me to nearby legal parking, the slightly suicidal will let you who they are by jumping into traffic when you drive by and a local , MJ, made a bunch of us feel like tourists by walking us across the Golden Gate Bridge, into downtown Sausalito, and back via the ferry.

Walking the bridge is something I wanted to do since planning this trip so having a local offer a tour was the icing on the cake. Not many really understand why he volunteers to do that twice a month but most locals are tired of dealing with the typical tourist that has no clue how to navigate a large city. While I understand that viewpoint I also understand that the tourists are putting a huge amount of money into this local economy and without that..well, you get the idea. The ferry ride back was the highlight. The guy giving boarding directions was hilarious...straight southern ghetto. Imagine an African American with long dreads, a typical ferry uniform addressing a multicultural crowd of pedestrians and over protective cyclists. Some quotes I remember...

This ferry is going to the Golden Gate building...not Pier 39...not Pier 1...not Fisherman's Wharf! If you want to go to Fisherman's Wharf, once you get off take the F1 trolley...that's f...as in foxtrot!

I see there may be a language barrier here. Yeah, welcome to America!...the Promised Land, the sunshine state!

For those of you with bikes, no one is going to take yo bike. No one is going to swim off this ferry with yo bike.

There is a bar on board for you afternoon drinkers still waking up...this got an applause from the CS crowd only.

This vessel can hold 622 people comfortably so relax and exhale already!

Later on about ten minutes before docking...

If you have a bike downstairs, you need to be with it. Put yo hand on it, feel it, rub on it, grab ahold of it!

Taking a bus back to my car unnoticed one thing I never see back home: unfriendly people, lots of them. Not one person made any form of eye contact let alone smiled or even said hi...this is not a place I void live in, and I appreciate the southern hospitality that much more. The only thing left was to hut the CS unicorn party...I didn't stay long and wasn't too impressed. People were very friendly, maybe even too friendly due yo the drugs some of them were likely on. I just didn't care to take part in the many games planned for the night, no telling what's involved. I left at the right time, 3 guys were checking out my car then me when I walked towards it. So for the second time, I acted like a local, told them all to f*** off, got in my car and sped off as fast as possible. Let me reiterate what I said earlier: San Francisco is not for me, I don't feel safe here but rest assured, no harm was actually done.

Sunday, after sleeping in late, I wandered around north downtown. I found a relatively cheap garage right next to the police station and later next to a bank for free. Jack Kerouac alley isn't all that, just a couple non-related wall murals next to a bookshop. Most of my time was spent wandering through Chinatown, in and out of various shops and tea tasting! Yep, you can taste all kinds of tea for a small fee or buy a bag to take with you. I opted for a to-go cup of Coffee Tea...I can get tea leaves back home. That part of San Fran did grow on me; and dinner was the best slice of veggie pizza I've ever had for less than $5...mmm!

I made it to the Sunday potluck just in time, they were packing up and heading to a local bar for some drinks. I met some more locals and helped to further litter the bar with peanut shells while enjoying a Stella. That's where this blog entry's cover image came from...completely random shot but it's up for a caption contest so email those to me.

Monday morning, I took off for Fort Bragg to visit Richard & Carolyn Weiss...more to come!