Mike & Sam Go West - Day 17 - Muir Woods, Disney Family Museum, Mrs Doubtfire & The Traffic Jam

[soarinfan]

Mike and Sam Go West!

A Holiday Extravaganza

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Day 17! Today we were renting a car and had a lot to tick off of the to do list. We could have done the majority of today with tour companies, but I thought it would be quite cool to rent a car and actually drive across the Golden Gate Bridge ourselves, so thats what we went for. We headed to Hertz where we had a simple basic car booked for us, but then the nice guy in the shop offered me a very very nice car for only an extra $10...! He also offered to us to park the car back in the parking lot for free overnight, saving us $50 on parking at the hotel! Bargain.

After we managed to get the sat nav on my phone sorted out (although this Feel @ Home with Three is useful where you can use your data abroad, for sat nav it can be very very slow to get going sometimes depending on the app!) we headed out on the road. Driving across the Golden Gate Bridge was pretty cool even though it was a bit murky. There are no toll booths now and the toll is done through number plate recognition - so we had to remember to pay that when we dropped off the car in the morning.

We were heading to Muir Woods today, a national monument about 45 minutes drive north of San Francisco.

I visited here again on my last trip to San Francisco and really enjoyed it - something totally different. It is a Redwood forest and has some amazing nature and wildlife to see - feels like the forest you walk through in ET during the queue! Plus it was nice to see some wild chipmunks scampering around.

Lunch was next after a few hours at Muir Woods - and we took a 25 minute or so drive down to Sausalito which is a little coastal town looking back over at San Francisco across the bay. Last time we had stopped here on the tour and went to this awesome sandwich shop along the water front, so we went back there and I grabbed the same sandwich as before - tasted awesome! It was roast beef, cheese, salad etc...

Next up was a huge entry onto the to-do list - The Walt Disney Family Museum! I was gutted I didn't get to see this last time around as I didn't have a car so it was challenging to get to - but glad to visit this time around. I think for me it does contain a lot of semi-interesting but equally useless facts - it really depends on what you want to know about Walt Disney. Personally, I'm interested in Walt and how he developed Disney as a brand and amusement park, and the stories and ideas behind it - where as there was a section on his Grandmothers Chicken Farm - no word of a lie! Either way - definitely worth a visit.

There is this awesome model of Disneyland which is towards the end of the exhibition which I spent a lot of time admiring and reading about. It even comes alive as the light dim to simulate night time!

After leaving the Walt Disney Family Museum, we were going to visit a couple of movie locations (which is mainly the deciding factor as to why we hired the car! ). I know that Sam is a big fan of a film called "The Rock" from the mid 90s, which was filmed in San Francisco as it was about Alcatraz. There was a scene in the movie at the Palace of Fine Arts and as it was fairly nearby I surprised her by taking her there. Of course that was easier said than done, as they are doing a LOT of road works around the area to do with the Golden Gate Bridge, so I ended up going around in circles for a good 20 minutes all because I wasn't allowed to turn left anymore - nightmare!

Unfortunately Sam couldn't remember the exact area that the scene was filmed in, but we roughly got it right! There was a mysterious bench which was in the film which was now missing - I suggested it was probably a prop!

This was the pinnacle of the trip for me - this is what I had REALLY been looking forward to see. A filming location from my favourite film of ALL TIME - Mrs Doubtfire! It was the Mrs Doubtfire house! So pleased we managed to visit it. You can't go inside obviously as its a private residence but it was amazing to see from the outside and spend some time there. Before people say it was creepy - the owner obviously invites it because the house has been kept nigh on identical to how it was in the film over 20 years ago, plus there were tributes left outside the house to the late Robin Williams which was a nice touch. There were several other tourists there having a nosey too so I didn't feel as bad. Bucket list tick!

Our Mrs Doubtfire plans didn't end there - oh no! I had booked a table at the restaurant in the film - Bridges! "Friday Night - 7 O'Clock! " - it didn't matter it was Thursday - we were still going to go! I was looking forward to ordering the "HOT JAMBALAYA" even though it wasn't on the menu!

We headed down towards the Embarcadero to cross over for the hour long drive to Danville, and on the way of course had to have a cheeky drive down Lombard Street. We had to queue for about 20 minutes to wait our turn, as there were clearly other people from out of town wanting to do this too. I can't imagine ANY locals ever use it merely from a practicality and time sensitive point of view!

After we joined the Embarcadero - we stopped. Literally. Stopped. For the first 30 minutes we probably crawled about 100 yards, and it didnt get much better than that.

I think our reservation was for 19:30, and we should have arrived at about 18:30. By 19:20 we were STILL in the traffic jam - and even if there was no traffic, it still would have taken about 55 minutes to get there as it was - but it was just solid. I don't think I have ever seen anything quite like it and I have driven through LA rush hour traffic! I think over the 2.5 or so hours we were in the traffic jam, we had driven 1.5 miles.

I was so disappointed but we had to abandon the trip to Bridges. It closed at something ridiculous like 21:30. And even if the traffic had let up we wouldn't have gotten there until at LEAST 20:30, and that was with no hold ups, and that was far from going to happen.

With a sad look on my face, and Sam trying to sing to alleviate the mood, we headed back towards the hotel, parked up for the night, and went back to the hotel to dump our stuff. We were now stuffed with somewhere to eat for dinner - everything was looking fairly busy with the impending 4th July celebrations around the corner - so we chose Applebees - a first for both of us!

We shared a Quesadilla for a starter. For mains, Sam had shrimp and fries, and I had the Honey Chicken with Pasta. It was fairly tasty and fairly reasonably priced - and we did kind of enjoy it even though I was still a bit miffed we had missed out on Bridges - I had been looking forward to it for months!

Sam treated me to a Ben & Jerrys shake to cheer me up after dinner which was lovely and really put a smile on my face - who can't smile after ice cream?!? It was getting a bit nippy and it had been a very long day - so we headed back to the hotel after that and chilled out. Our final full day of the vacation was tomorrow - sad times! But again - we had a lot planned!


Thanks all for watching and reading Day 17 folks. Be sure to visit and subscribe to my YouTube channel (SoarinFanProductions) for lots of videos, and you'll be able to enjoy all of the vlogs for this holiday and more Day 18 coming soon!

[carolynne67]

Another fantastic day but what a shame you never made it to your restaurant, the traffic looks horrendous.
My hubby reckons he's driving down the crooked street as there is no way he's walking up that hill to get to it! I'll show him your video and he might change his mind.
Great day and Sam is so sweet.
Carolynne

[soarinfan]

Tell you what that hill walking up to Lombard Street is something else - I did it on my 2012 trip and I was dead to the world when I got to the top!

Thank you for your lovely comments. I'm glad you're enjoying them!

[Floridafan]

Love your trip reports. We were latecomers to Applebees too. Shame about Bridges - will keep an eye out for the house.

[soarinfan]

Thank you! The house was awesome, a must visit. Yeah a really big shame about Bridges, I was really looking forward to that! Next time will have to leave at breakfast time!

[tocpe321]

Thanks for posting. We have booked a tour to include Muir Woods and Sausalito. Sorry you missed out on the restaurant. BTW the attached video doesn't seem to work.