California & Las Vegas Road Trip Aug/Sep 15! Day 2 - HOHO Bus Tour & Biking the Golden Gate Bridge

[Lolly90]

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Saturday 29th August 2015

I only woke up once through the night which was at about 1:30 and it felt like I should have been getting up. I managed to get back to sleep and got up at 6:30. We slept well considering how hot the room was. We finished unpacking, got ready and left the room at 8:00. We walked across from our hotel to Van Ness Avenue to get the bus to the Hollywood Cafe. We got on the no. 47 and bought 2 adult tickets, which were $2.25 each. It was a few minutes before we realised we were going in the wrong direction, oops. We got off near City Hall and got the bus back the other way to Jones St. We bought another 2 tickets, as we didn’t realise at the time we could have reused the other tickets we’d bought After all that, we finally arrived at a busy Hollywood Cafe at 9:00.

There was only a small queue outside, which was good; I’d been expecting a longer wait. The weather wasn’t great this morning; it was misty and quite chilly. We only ended up queuing for about 10 mins before we were seated. There was a lot of choice on the menu; I ended up going for vanilla French toast with a latte and Mark had classic French toast with a cappuccino. Both came with lots of fresh fruit around the sides, which I loved. Breakfast was really nice and we could see why it gets so busy here. Total cost was $28.82 plus tip.

We weren’t sure what to do next, we had planned to bike the bridge first but I was hoping to do it when it wasn’t so misty. So we decided to do the Hop on Hop off bus tour first, hoping the mist would clear later on. We were right near the Gray Line visitor centre, so we went in here to exchange our voucher for tickets and got given a map of the bus route. We got on at stop 2 and were taken through the Marina district, passing the Palace of Fine Arts.

Next up was the Golden Gate Bridge. I loved this part, even though it was so windy and cold going over. The mist had started to clear, so we got some great views.

We came back over the bridge and down towards Golden Gate Park, which was lovely, through to Haight-Ashbury and on to Alamo Square and City Hall.

We got off at the next stop, which was Union Square and made our way back to the hotel. I was loving the bus tour so far and thought it gave us a good overview of the city. We had a little rest in the room, with a drink and some snacks before heading back out.

We got back on the bus at Alamo Square and headed through Chinatown and caught a glimpse of the Transamerica Pyramid and Coit Tower.

We got off at stop 1, at Fisherman’s Wharf and as it was now 13:00 we decided to attempt our bike ride. We walked over to Blazing Saddles, which took about 10 minutes and handed in our Groupon and got our ferry tickets for the way back.

Soon enough we were on our way, I was a little rusty at first having not ridden a bike for years. We headed down the hill and then followed the bike path the rest of the way. There were plenty of other bikes around, so it was easy to see where to go.

It was a lovely ride with a few steeper parts along the way and although it was difficult to spot the bridge, as the mist still hadn’t cleared, we still enjoyed ourselves. We stopped for a while at Crissy Field trying to get some pictures of the bridge as the mist moved. We continued down to Fort Point and then headed back to join the bridge.

Bikes were on the left hand side of the bridge and pedestrians on the right. This made it much easier to make our way over and we were able to stop several times along the way. A lot of professional bikers whizzed past us and one got angry as Mark accidently strayed from his path just a little.

The ride over was amazing and the views are great. It was a really good experience and we were glad we got to take our time with it.

Once at the other side we sailed down to Sausalito, which is a lovely little town. It was now about 15:30, so it had taken us 2 hours to get here with lots of stops on the way. We were starting to get tired, so just got a drink each and waited for the ferry back.

Getting on was easy and we placed our bikes opposite each other and took a seat. The ferry ride back was nice; you get some good views of the bridge and Alcatraz. Getting off was easy too, we remembered where we’d put our bikes and were one of the first off the boat. Although another girl was convinced my bike was hers, but it was definitely not.

We walked our bikes back to Blazing Saddles and got the bus back to our hotel. We chilled out for a little, got ready and were back out for dinner by about 19:30. We headed to Union Square, in the direction of Cheesecake Factory, having not made it here last night. We got the elevator up and were given a wait time of an hour. This was fine with us, so we headed to the bar. I got a JW’s Pink Lemonade, which was so lovely and Mark had a couple of beers.

By the time we were seated we were really tired, we still hadn’t gotten used to the time difference yet. We’d only had cheesecake from here before and didn’t realise how much choice there was on the food menu. I ordered the Americana Cheese burger and Mark had the Smokehouse BBQ burger. Both were really good and this was one of Mark’s favourites of the holiday.

We couldn’t manage any cheesecake, so got a slice of Lemon Raspberry to take away. Total cost was $47.30 plus tip.

We went straight back to the hotel after this and were asleep by 22:00.

Next: Day 3 - Lombard St, Pier 39 & Alcatraz Night Tour

[anji]

Great start! Looking forward to the rest

[abiknox]

Ooh its taking me back, Hollywood cafe, biking the bridge and the cheesecake factory... all fabulous.

Lemon raspberry cheesecake is also the best!

[Lolly90]

Originally Posted by anji

Great start! Looking forward to the rest

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Thank you for reading

Originally Posted by abiknox

Ooh its taking me back, Hollywood cafe, biking the bridge and the cheesecake factory... all fabulous.

Lemon raspberry cheesecake is also the best!

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It was a great first day! It was my first trying the lemon raspberry, definitely a favourite now

[lovedisney89]

Fab first day, the bus tour looked good. We loved biking the bridge too

[Enchanted]

Great day - those photos with the mist around the bridge are fabulous! I won't be getting on a bike but do you think a walk across the bridge and visit to Sausalito are worth it...or will we get just as good views on this side?
Hollywood cafe looks gorgeous for breakfast and CF is our favourite so we'll definitely be heading there!

[k4ti3-x]

We sadly never made it to the Hollywood cafe - looks amazing though! You got some great pictures of the bridge glad the mist cleared up for you both

[Ariel's Mum]

Fab photos of the bridge. The bike tour sounds fun

[Lolly90]

Originally Posted by lovedisney89

Fab first day, the bus tour looked good. We loved biking the bridge too

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I'm not always a fan of bus tours but loved this one

Originally Posted by Enchanted

Great day - those photos with the mist around the bridge are fabulous! I won't be getting on a bike but do you think a walk across the bridge and visit to Sausalito are worth it...or will we get just as good views on this side?
Hollywood cafe looks gorgeous for breakfast and CF is our favourite so we'll definitely be heading there!

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You'll definitely get amazing views from the San Fran side but I do think a walk or drive across the bridge is worth it for the experience. Sausalito was lovely, if you have the time I'd say go for it, it may be a bit far to walk to though

Originally Posted by k4ti3-x

We sadly never made it to the Hollywood cafe - looks amazing though! You got some great pictures of the bridge glad the mist cleared up for you both

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The pics with the mist look good but I'm glad it cleared so we could see the bridge in all its glory

Originally Posted by Ariel's Mum

Fab photos of the bridge. The bike tour sounds fun

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I wasn't sure how good the bike tour would be, having not been on a bike for years but we loved it

[mrmoo123]

Bit late to this but love thebike trip over the bridge... what a great idea! Thanks for sharing