Running through town.

Day 143 - San Francisco, CA - Mostly Sunny Low 60's:

Today we got up bright and early to make our way to the Japanese Tea Garden by 10am for free Wednesday. The gardens are beautiful which you can tell from the pictures. We spent about an hour walking around looking at all of the statues and buildings within the garden. We left the gardens and made our way to Twin Peaks. These are two hills at the top of a big hill. They are the highest points in San Francisco and offer the most beautiful 360˚ views of the city. If only it had been as clear today as it was yesterday!

We left the peaks and made our way toward Union Square and Chinatown. Union Square is known for it's shopping...think high end...and theaters. It was a nice area but we didn't really spend much time there...it's like torture to me because I can't shop! We wandered through Chinatown for quite some time where Ben got a t-shirt. It's such an interesting place to visit. We've now been to the one here and the one in NYC and I can't say that one is any different than the other. Lots of culture and lots of tourist souvenirs.

After leaving Chinatown we made our way back to Kathy and Pierre's. Much to our surprise and Ben's sheer delight they have a HOT TUB. We took a nice dip in the hot tub before making our way to Trader Joe's to pick up dessert for dinner. Ben had never really spent time walking through a Trader Joe's...he'd been in one but never really looked around so we spent some time poking before heading out.

Once back I took care of the laundry while Ben prepared our brownie dessert. We are now both working on the blog and watching a little Wheel Of Fortune. We are FINALLY caught up YAHOOO!!!

Day 142 - San Francisco, CA - Sunny Mid 70's:

Today we woke up and made our way down to Crissy Field which has a path that leads to the FAMED Golden Gate Bridge. We walked up and started our run at the official gate. Over and back is 3.4 miles up hill both ways!! The way over was good but the way back was a little tough with the very strong winds in our face. While the scenery was beautiful I can't say that I would do it again simply because of the car fumes. I felt like I was breathing in exhaust the entire way. Ben naturally was a bit ahead of me and ran back to the car to get the camera while I was finishing. We had decided on a meeting spot before the run and I only had to wait a few minutes before he came over the hill camera in tow! We took some post run photos in front of the bridge and then made our way back to the car.

Our next stop was at Ben and Jerry's for FREE CONE DAY! We figured that at least we had run it off and hey it was FREE. From there we made our way to Golden Gate Park to enjoy a nice picnic lunch. It was an absolutely beautiful day. The park is enormous...20% larger than Central Park! After lunch we headed over to the Japanese Tea Gardens. We were planning on going in until we saw that Wednesday mornings we could get in for FREE and we love FREE. So instead we made our way to the Botanical Garden. It was so beautiful to see flowers in bloom and we took lots of pictures. As we were getting ready to head out I look up and low and behold who do I see but Jesse's (Ben's cousin) good friend Spike. I knew he was in the city but he was only there for a couple of days and we had no way to contact him. Our second BIZARRE run in on our trip. Unfortunately we forgot to take a picture...oh well...we know it happened.

After leaving the gardens we made our way back to Kathy and Pierre's for much needed showering. After getting cleaned up we made Mexican Roll-Ups for a little family dinner. We figured it was the least that we could do considering they were letting us stay in their house for so long. It was DELICIOUS! After that I watched my first American Idol of the season. So much fun!