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Hi Everyone. Well, we have now moved on from San Francisco,but we will update you on our last few days there. We started off the weekend with a 'little' walk. Over the Golden Gate Bridge no less. The day started off chilly and with a bit of fog,which made us think we wouldn't see much more than with did on the boat ride. But it eventually lifted,though not entirely, so when we arrived at the start of the bridge we could see the majority of the bridge,but with the fog just covering the very tip.That's more like it!
As we arrived,we asked a kind fellow tourist to take our photo,and discovered he was British and from Stafford. We chatted to him for a bit,and discovered he had just come from New Zealand,and he gave us a few good tips. We carried on,and started the 1.7 mile walk. It was windy and cold, and took about 40 minutes. The views were good,though we didn't hang around too long. Seriously,it was cold! It made us realise that what the guide books say about the changing weather in San Francisco is right - two days earlier we were boiling! The bridge had quite a few pedestrians on it, mainly tourists, and there's not much separating you from the busy traffic. It was a good experience.
We felt tired and hungry on the other side,but we continued on,and walked another mile to the little seaside town of Sausalito. It was lovely and very classy and quaint,with art galleries, expensive houseboats and posh restaurants. We stayed for a bite to eat and an ice cream, and then got the ferry back to San Fran, feeling tired and hungry,again!
We took it a bit easier on Sunday,though the weather was awful. It didn't stop raining. We took a streetcar to the Castro,the predominantly gay district of San Francisco,and had a wander on the high street passing the shop where Harvey Milk, a former city supervisor and openly gay politician, first started campaigning for gay rights. He was assassinated in 1978, by another city supervisor. San Francisco's reputation as being a tolerant city does come across through its relaxed atmosphere,though it has a bad problem with homelessness.
We finished off our last day with a look at the Haight Ashbury district. This is the area that was at the centre of the hippy movement in the 60's and 70's ,and it doesn't appear to have changed much! It's very colourful and slightly run-down with lots of shops selling baggy clothes, bongs, antiques and old records. We noticed a lot of old hippy looking people giving high fives to other hippy looking older people. Perhaps they have lived there since the 60's. That sums up our time in San Francisco. It's been fun!
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