Day 1 - Monday 5 June

We had to fly to Sydney for our flight to San Francisco. We are travelling on a Finnair round the world ticket as it was cheaper than the Qantas return fare to London. This is hard to understand when several legs of our trip are with Qantas. 

The flight to San Francisco was uneventful - the food was good and there was very little turbulence but there was also very little sleep! When we arrived at San Francisco we had to queue for about an hour and 20 minutes to go through passport control. We kept getting conflicting information about using the automated service but were ultimately forced to stand in line. This is no way to welcome tired visitors!

We left on Monday 5 June about 11am and arrived in San Francisco about 9am on the same date as we had crossed the international date line - that gets a bit confusing.

We had booked a room at the Marines' Memorial Club & Hotel and were very lucky to be given access to our room as soon as we arrived and could have a shower and unpack. We were both feeling jet lagged. This hotel is run as a non profit business supporting the familes of marines who have been killed or injured. There are hundreds of photos of marines with citations concerning their acts of bravery. 

The Marines' mascot is an English Bulldog and there is at least one such dog residing in the hotel reception area, and lots and lots of photos and paintings of said mascot! We even found a dog's ball under the chest of drawers in our room - a great reminder that Americans allow dogs to stay in hotels, travel on public transport, and go into shopping malls!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Drive Napier to Whanganui

Image
Our first stop was at the Hastings Farmers' Market, which is so popular it is held every Sunday - sun, rain or hail. The queues for coffee were too long for us to wait, but we bought two lovely croissants from a French baker's stall. We picked up coffees in town at the cinema cafe. Something we don't see at home is milk being sold in reusable bottles. It is decanted from a bulk container so is labour intensive. We stopped for lunch at Palmerston North. There are several wall murals in the city but none were very good. The art deco style "Ladies Rest" was built in 1937. Inside there are arm chairs in a lounge area, original tiles and some original plumbing. When first built it was just rendered, but the current colours work really well.
Read more

Fingal Bay

Image
I scootered 4kms along the bike path to Fingal Bay. This bay is outside Port Stephens but I was surprised to see a Surf Life Saving Club because the sea was absolutely flat. The sand spit can wash away during high tides stranding people on Mount Stephens.
Read more

Wanganui

Image
The town's name is spelt without an h, but the river is Whanganui. There have even been referenda about the spelling, with or without the h. Finally the powers that govern such things decreed either is acceptable for the name of the town. This must be a challenge for computer mapping programs and manufacturers of GPS guidance technology. These wonderful old buildings are in Victoria Avenue, down near the river. They date from the mid 1800s and have been well preserved. Earthquakes caused significant damage in 1843 and 1897, but not to the same extent as the destruction of much of Napier. In the past month there have been dozens of earthquakes rated weak to moderate in New Zealand and nearby waters, including a magnitude 4.1 quake 30 kms south of Wanganui (in the Cook Strait between the north and south islands). Fingers crossed there won't be another disastrous event.
Read more