Well its been a good last few days in San Fran, the weather has been absoultely fabulous the whole time much to everyones suprise!

So after finishing the trek I treated myself to a long lie in on Sunday before meeting the others who were left for lunch at the wharf. We decided on Starbucks and spent most of the afternoon sat chatting and enjoying the sunshine before walking up to Lombard street (the very bendy one). It was a very steep climb, made easier by it not being the heat of the day anymore. After Lombard street we headed back via little Italy where we had some lovely pizza....made a change from the burgers and milkshakes! We then walked back across town to our respective hostels and went to bed.

Monday started in a similar manner to Sunday, lie in, walk to wharf and meet for lunch, only this time we went to the famous boudin sour dough bread shop/restaurant. We had delicious and altogether rather ginormous sandwiches before waving Hajni off on her Alcatraz trip. While she was off exploring Alcatraz we did a bit of souvenir shopping and had a smoothie in the sunshine. We were feeling rather tired when Hajni made it back so she and I headed back to our hostels but got distracted en route by a H&M shop so just had to pop in. After our spontaneous shop we went to our hostels for a rest as we had an early start on Tuesday.

We had decided to hire a car so we set off at 7.30 for Santa Cruz. We hoped that an early start would mean we avoided the traffic and for the most part it worked. We made it to Santa Cruz for 9ish by which time we were all starving! After a lovely breakfast in a cute little cafe we headed out on to the beach for our day in the sun. It was rather windy so we all ate a few mouthfuls of sand but otherwise it was very enjoyable. We had a late lunch in the fast food place on the front and watched people having a go at the pirate themed crazy golf next door before having one more last toast in the sun before we headed home. We had to drop the car at the airport and the get the BART back into town and walk back. On getting back to my hostel there was quite a bit of commotion slightly further up the road as there was a fire in one of the buildings and 4 fire engines and a few police were at the scene. All seemed to get sorted quite quickly and after about an hour it was all calm and quiet again.

Wednesday was good, again it started slowly...i was quite enjoying my lie ins! And after lunch I headed to Alcatraz with Martin. On the ferry over we were watching the America's cup race and couldnt have been in a better position to watch them crossing the finish line. Once we got to ALcatraz, we headed up to the cell block and began an audio tourof the building. It was really well done and made it come to life alot more having the voices of actual prison guards and prisoners. Once back we met up with Hajni and went for dinner at Applebees. It was a lovely last meal, made even more special when the suprised me with a little desert that I hadnt ordered and a rendition of Happy Birthday. That night was spent doing the boring 'getting ready to go home' stuff.

Thursday morning I finished packing before checking out and dumping my bags in the luggage room. I then headed into union square for some last minute souvenir shopping. I met Martin there for a last lunch before heading back to the hostel in time for my shuttle. I got to the airport no problems and got through security quickly as well. I then had 2 hours to kill before my flight. The plane was a bit old so the entertainment system was rather rubbish, and the food wasnt great (back to bullets for bread rolls) but with a few hours dozing, th 10 hours passed reasonably quickly. On arriving at Heathrow we were held up a touch but it wasnt long before I was through passport control, had my bag and was met by M&D with a beautiful if not rather large welcome home poster! It definitely made me smile and was a lovely end to an amazing trip.