We house and dog-sat in San Francisco in December for our friends Matt & Galina who took advantage of some work travel to Sydney to explore Australia and New Zealand. We lived in San Francisco for a year (and lived in Oakland as well) and fell in love with the city. It was so much fun to spend a month there. We caught up with lots of old friends – Mark and Leslie, Shannon and Damon, Kenny and Evelyn. We even saw Kathleen and Kelly, Portland friends who moved to Ohio who came to town over Christmas to visit their daughter. Sometimes social media is great for helping find those connections. And we had many visitors. Alex came down from Portland for a few days, then Aaron also came down from Portland. My (step) brother Steve and his partner Kate came through town and we headed over to his cousin Brett’s place for dinner. His parents Dave & Kathy drove in from Ripon to join us. My aunt and uncle, Anne and Brian, drove up from Carmel for a weekend and took us to see A Christmas Carol at the theater. (Thanks!) We were joined by my cousin Katie (their daughter) and her partner Cameron who live in Oakland. Travel is great and rewarding, but it was really nice to spend time with so many good friends and family.
Matt & Galina’s place is near AT&T Park (home of the SF Giants) is on the 16th (and top) floor of the building. It includes a deck and amazing views of the city. Like this:
Turning west for the sunset.
The deck even had a fire pit.
“Our” place was across the street from Mission Creek Park along Mission Bay. We walked the dogs here daily.
We should introduce the dogs! We dog-sat the odd couple of Dexter, an 11 year old Yellow Lab, and Sterling, a 7 year old Toy Poodle. We took them to Baker Beach a few times where they endlessly chased tennis balls up and down the beach.
We set out on a long walk along the bay towards our old North Beach neighborhood passing under the Bay Bridge along the way.
We lived a block from Coit Tower for a year. It’s at the top of Telegraph Hill in the northeast corner of the city. We climbed the steps from the Embarcadero.
Alcatraz.
A view of the Golden Gate Bridge.
A view of the Bay Bridge.
We stopped by Greens Sports bar one day but unfortunately it was closed. We watched a bunch of March Madness games here and made some lifelong friends.
And here’s one of them, Kenny, along with his wife Evelyn. We got together for dinner in North Beach one night and later visited them for lunch in Moss Beach, just south of the city.
Seals on Moss Beach:
I planned ahead and shipped my clubs to Matt & Galina (thanks for storing them!) before we departed for Europe and Africa in September. I used to play a lot at Harding Park when we lived there. It was cheap for residents, though often in fairly rough shape. Since we left, it’s become TPC Harding Park and underwent a massive renovation that primarily removed trees from the property. The course has since hosted a Presidents Cup, one of the WGC Match Plays, and will host the PGA Championship in 2020. I got in a round there as well as several rounds at the renovated Corice Park South Course in Alameda and a round at Wente in Livermore with my friend Wally. Here’s a look across the 18th fairway at Harding Park.
This is San Francisco’s version of a “white” Christmas. (This was actually Christmas Eve.)
And here’s a few more shots from the deck. You can tell I loved the view!
