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Old 4 Mar 19, 09:56 PM  
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oh_darling
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Livin’ it up at the Hotel California (October '18) 3 - Walt Disney Family Museum and Alcatraz!

Livin’ it up at the Hotel California (October ‘18)

‘You can check out any time you like,
But you can never leave!'


Day 3 - Walt Disney Family Museum, picnic by the Bridge, and Alcatraz night tour!

We were up a bit later this morning, I woke up at 4.30am which wasn’t ideal but I made myself go back to sleep and miraculously we woke up at 8am! Fabulous!

We were all ready to go about 9 am. It was warmer today so we decided to get all our stuff ready, eat breakfast outside by the pool and then head off to the Presidio.

I ditched the jumper today and wore my Mickey head shirt and denim jacket



Breakfast was loooooovely once again and we made sure we filled up as we’d be having a later lunch. For lunch, we’d planned to grab something at the little cafe at the museum but it was quite pricey and not super exciting. Ben had the super cute idea to go to the amazing grocery store we’d spotted the day before and get some picnic supplies, and then take them down to Crissy Fields to enjoy I was super up for this and very excited at the prospect of shopping in a real San Francisco grocery store and pretending we were locals!

We started walking to the Presidio using Google Maps to guide us, stopping at the grocery store en route for supplies. It was pricey but it was lovely stuff and all freshly made! We got a sandwich to share, some pita chips and avocado dip, chocolate covered almonds, and a 4 pack of San Francisco cider and it came to about $30, which is what we would have spent in the cafe and we wouldn’t have got 4 ciders haha! We piled it all into Ben’s rucksack bless him and then continued on our way.

It was an absolutely gorgeous day and the walk to the Presidio was soooooooo nice. It took about 25 minutes and there was lots to look at along the way



We saw these super cool drawings on the pavement at one bit which was awesome! Not sure what they were but they were so fun to look at!







We arrived at the museum at about 10.30. There were loads of people outside on the grass, loads of families sat on picnic blankets and throwing balls around and there was such a lovely atmosphere



We headed on in and popped downstairs to check Ben’s bag in, and I nipped to the loo. And then we were into the museum! We’d pre-booked our tickets so just had to exchange our vouchers. There was a list of talks and times at the entry and we saw that there was a talk Disneyland at 11.45 so we decided we’d like to go to that but other than that we just moved really slowly through the museum looking at all the exhibitions and really just taking our time. There was so so much to see and if you’re a Disney fan I can’t recommend this enough. We know a lot about the history of Walt and the parks because it’s a huge passion of ours, but there was sooooooo much new information and we were just in our element. It’s all about him and the man behind the magic. I won’t go into detail because I don’t want to spoil anything but I’ll just say if you’re in SF, go! You won’t regret it! Here are some pics of my highlights











This is a menu from the cafe at the Disney Studios! So interesting!





THE bench! This was the original bench from the Griffith Park carousel that Walt used to sit on while his daughters rode the carousel, and it may have been THE bench where he had the idea for Disneyland!









Selfie



At 11.45 we scooted through to the big model of Disneyland where a lady gave us (just us, there was no one else there!) a talk about Disneyland’s opening day. We knew lots of the information but it was still really interesting to hear and obviously I was just staring at the model too which was amazing! Knowing we’d be there in just over a week was just the best feeling! We chatted to the lady and another guy for a while afterwards as they were asking all about our trip

The amazing model!



Original autopia car eeekk!




We just loved this whole area!





We then doubled back and carried on going through the exhibitions (the Disneyland section is towards the end).





The end bit was just an absolute killer and I full cried







We were finally done at about 1.45 so we’d been in there over 3 hours haha! It was so incredible though and we both agreed it was already one of our fave activities of the hols.

Also, how amazing is the Mickey mirror in the bathroom!?



We were both really hungry by this point (I was actually full hangry if I’m honest) and we walked to find a spot at Crissy Fields to have lunch. It was a bit further than we’d anticipated though and super hot, and I had to crack open the pita chips as I was walking as the hunger was honestly getting too much! We eventually decided we couldn’t be bothered to walk all the way to Crissy Fields so we just stopped at a sandy beach bit and set up camp for lunch.

It was at this moment that we realised just how insanely jammy we’d been. Obviously there were people all around us, but we just assumed they were out for Saturday afternoon picnics with their families. We then then realised, once we were sat down and all settled, that there were Blue Angels up in the sky flying around! And then we realised it was a whole afternoon of airshow stunts and acrobatic displays to celebrate Fleet Week! And here we were with the best view haha, the Golden Gate Bridge to our left, the bay stretching out in front of us, and some truly incredible plane displays up in the air!

(As I’m typing this, Ben typed in Fleet Week 2018 on YouTube and found video of the exact displays we watched, so feel free to do the same if you’d like to fully immerse yourself in the experience we had! )

We enjoyed the nicest picnic with our selection of snacks and the local cider was so good too!









It was honestly so lovely to be sat on the sand in the sunshine (it was really warm! ) with a cider, watching dogs running around and enjoying the airshow The food was all lush, especially the avocado heavy sandwich! And the chocolate covered almonds mmmmmmm.

Once we’d finished our lunch we reluctantly packed up our stuff, threw away our rubbish and walked away from Crissy Fields and towards a bonus stop that we’d decided to visit before heading back to our hotel, the Palace of Fine Arts! This was absolutely astounding and we spent a good 20 minutes here walking around just taking it all in. I hadn’t had a chance to Google much about this before we left so I made a beeline for the information plaques to try and figure out what the heck these beautiful structures were doing in San Francisco! Basically they were built for an exposition in 1915 and a petition was started to keep them up and preserve them! They’re really really cool and made us feel like we were in Rome again! We went to Rome and Sorrento in 2017 and it honestly transported us back! So surreal to just be in SF haha! We saw two weddings taking place and lots of photoshoots too which was really interesting!









We then Uber’ed back to our hotel and chilled in our room for a little while...enjoying some freshly baked cookies from reception!



After this freshened up and got an Uber to Pier 33 for our Alcatraz night tour. Our tour was booked for 5.55 and we left plenty of time but there was insane amounts of traffic on the (short!) journey and the guy’s Uber system kept restarting and wouldn’t connect so he couldn’t actually tell us where we were supposed to be going! Traffic was so bad that we just had to hop out while we were stationary and basically run in the direction we thought the Alcatraz ferry was! Luckily there were a few other couples who had clearly done the same thing so we took a chance and followed them, and then we were there. We ran up and they were just starting to board but luckily there was a big queue so we were fine. We had pre-booked our tickets so were straight through into the queue after showing our tickets; luckily, because a sign outside said the next available tickets were for Wednesday! We’d be in LA by then haha!

I had time to nip to the loo while we were in the queue; an activity I was slightly apprehensive about, but which was actually totes fine as the toilet was very clean. In no time at all we were stepping onto the ferry and heading upstairs to get a good spot to see us pull up to the island. The ferry tour was a really nice way to get there and it was like an added bonus on top of the tour itself to sail across the Bay and get some amazing views; the sun was setting too so it was beautiful! Perfect timing!

And then there we were! We queued to get off the ferry and were then shephered into a group and a guy started telling us all about the history of Alzatraz and explaining about the night tour. With the night tour you get optional extra mini tours on top of the main audio tour, and you can choose to meet at the prison at the end and walk back to the ferry with a guide who tells stories about prison escapes! We were super up for this and made a mental note to make sure we were done in time to walk back down with him. We got onto the island about 6.15 and the tour back down was at 8 so I was a bit worried we wouldn’t have enough time and I feel like we JUST had enough time, but we wanted to explore loads! It was fine though, we saw everything, I just wanted to spend more time on the island haha!



We walked up in a big group towards the prison with our guide talking to us all the way which was awesome. When we got into the prison itself we got given our audio equipment; mine didn’t work and I had to duck back and get it changed but it was sorted quickly. We thought the audio tour was incredible! It was super super busy so it was a bit stressful when you needed to stop and look at certain cells etc as obviously the 12 other people who started at the exact moment you did also stopped at the exact moment, so there were lots of bottlenecks! I also wanted to like pause it and just take in the moment for a bit as the audio moved quickly, but I didn’t realise you could pause it until near the end! Me and Benj also synchronised our audio to start at the same time so I wouldn’t have wanted to keep asking him to pause and rewind his. But yeah these were only minor issues and the audio itself makes the tour so atmospheric and almost eerie, it was so so well done. You have both ex prisoners and ex guards talking so it painted a really vivid picture of what life would have been like. We loved it!



















As I said, we wrapped up in time for the 8pm tour back to the ferry as we wanted to do the tour and we didn’t want to wait for the last ferry back which I think was 9pm. We could have probably spent a bit longer exploring but we did have about 20 minutes after the audio finished when we went back to our favourite bits to read the plaques and look in a bit more detail. I was happy with the time we had, overall The tour back down to the ferry was spooky but really interesting, all about weird happenings and escape attempts over the years. Would definitely recommend doing this if you do the night tour! Our guide was awesome too!

We then got on the ferry at 8.40 and headed back to mainland, both thoroughly impressed by our Alcatraz visit and I think also a little freaked out haah! It’s hard to describe how it feels to actually be on the island, at night, but it was definitely unnerving. We’re both horror nuts though so we were in our element!

On the ferry back our thoughts turned to food as naturally we were peckish. Our conversation ended in Ben promising me we could get Uber Eats which I was insanely excited about as that just seemed like such an American thing to do (We don’t get it where we live hahahah) I was also mega up for getting back and getting into bed so ordering food seemed like the best plan, although as it was SPRUNG on me I obviously hadn’t had a chance to peruse menus so I had to make a split decision and look at only 3 pages of reviews compared to my usual 20+. I was obsessed with the Yelp app on this trip and looked at it for all the places we eat at! It seems to attract a younger demographic of users than TripAdvisor, highly recommend if you want some restaurant recommendations in the US because it’s so popular! I decided on pizza and because I wasn’t super hungry, we decided to just share (!) a veggie loaded pizza from a place just on Lombard St that had great reviews. It was approx. $20, and we were able to track it and see exactly when it arrived.



The guy came right up to our room too, and Benj just opened the door, tipped him and took the pizza! We paid on our Uber account and the whole process literally could not have been easier! God bless Uber and all of its side hustles. We enjoyed our veggie pizza in bed, naturally, watching Friends, naturally. Honestly my perfect ending to any evening.



We were asleep by 10.30! What a fun filled, busy day!
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Old 5 Mar 19, 12:52 PM  
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Mamie Baldwin
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Another fab day, did you get some cool souvenirs at Walt’s museum?
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Old 5 Mar 19, 09:53 PM  
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Amazing day! The museum sounds sooooo good, particularly the little tours.

And your picnic sounds perfect, watching the air stunts - what a great day.

Then to end it with the prison & pizza in bed! This is surely the definition of #goals xx
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Old 25 Mar 19, 09:17 PM  
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oh_darling
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Originally Posted by Mamie Baldwin View Post
Another fab day, did you get some cool souvenirs at Walt’s museum?
Thank you so much! Benj bought a super cool t-shirt but I couldn't find anything I liked really So decided to save my pennies for Disneyland! xxx
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Old 25 Mar 19, 09:19 PM  
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Originally Posted by sheluk View Post
Amazing day! The museum sounds sooooo good, particularly the little tours.

And your picnic sounds perfect, watching the air stunts - what a great day.

Then to end it with the prison & pizza in bed! This is surely the definition of #goals xx
Thanks so much lovely! The whole day was honestly pretty perfect, one of our faves! We just fell in love with San Francisco and this day featured so many awesome things Thank you for commenting, I'm glad you're enjoying! xxx
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Old 27 Mar 19, 09:13 PM  
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What a perfect day ! Alcatraz sounds super interesting, such a great idea to go at night too. I love a pizza in bed dinner after a busy day exploring, Uber eats sounds very convenient haha! Thank you for sharing, loving reading along x
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Old 12 Apr 19, 07:58 PM  
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Another perfect day! The Museum sounds so interesting and how lovely to have a picnic in the sunshine.
We can’t wait to do the evening Alcatraz tour, it’s the one thing I’m most looking forward to in SF!
Great idea about Uber Eats. With having teenagers with us it may stop any potential strops from them 😂
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Old 11 Jun 19, 10:26 PM  
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Another fantastic day. Looks like you had a wonderful time.
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