Final day in San Francisco

Monday was my final day in San Francisco, but I'd chosen the latest flight that I could for my onward journey to New York: 11.25pm!

The hotel has a large luggage storage area, so I was able to leave my main bag there and kept my backpack with me all day, although I wished afterwards that I'd left that there too as it was fairly heavy.

I had decided to go across to Sausalito to wander around there for a bit - I've been before, but it's a lot quieter over there and nicer to walk around.

The ferry only costs $8.25 and leaves from the main Ferry Building which is at the end of Market Street in the main port.

However, since I went on the Muni metro up to the ferry building, I got a further 50 cent discount as it counted as a transfer - I had to pay the full fare on the way back!

Unlike Sunday evening, today was a glorious day and much warmer.  I'd decided to keep the bag so that I could carry my coat with me as I expected it to be cold on the ferries, but in the end, it wasn't cold at all - in fact, the cool breeze was a relief from the heat.

The boardwalk next to Sausalito's main marina

There are ferries to all sorts of places, and the ferry building is a lovely place full of lunchtime eateries and with an old-style departure boards showing which gate of the 7 each departure was using.

I was quite intrigued to see some departures marked as "Alameda Seaplane" as I didn't think that seaplanes were all that common any more, particularly in built-up areas, and I hadn't noticed any seaplanes.

It was disappointing: that's just the name of the lagoon in Alameda where the ferry, a normal catamaran, sails to.

 

I walked up and down the main seafront road which had quite a few ice cream shops and souvenir shops.

I had dinner booked for EPIC Steak back in San Francisco, just down from the ferry building, and so I only wanted a light lunch, somewhere cool to sit out of the sun for a bit as it was so hot and a loo.  So I had a salad at a bar, and even that salad was the size of a main course so I didn't want to eat it all.

It was nice enough to sit and look out over the bay for a while until the return sailing was due, as they are not all that frequent.

The sailing back gives you the best way of taking photos of the San Francisco skyline.

I had plenty of time once I got back to San Francisco to sit in the shade and wait for my dinner reservation, which wasn't until 5.30pm.  I had wondered about just going down there a little early, but when I did eventually go down there, it was packed, so it wouldn't have been any use,