San Francisco ft. Atlas Obscura, Part I

Atlas Obscura is a "guidebook and friendly tour-guide to the world's most wondrous places." In other words, it is a list of interesting places that one might want to visit. I learned about Atlas Obscura from a Meetup group that organized an event targeting some of these places of attraction. San Francisco was my first destination.

Early in the morning around 7AM, I left Fresno to head to the Lawrence Caltrain Station about 2.5 hrs away. The group was meeting at 9.45AM. I initially parked near Cosco and walked to the train station (less than 0.1 miles away), but then decided to park on the street nearby because of the organizer's advice. Lot's of street parking on the weekend. I was also considering just driving to San Francisco, but decided to experience Caltrain.

An hour and a half later, we arrived to San Francisco's 22nd Street Station. The first destination was The Tiled Staircase aka The 16th Avenue Tiled Steps Project. The staircase itself was interesting, but the views it offered were truly incredible.

The most diverse group of people :)

This woman was really trying to get out of my way... No luck...

We then stopped at Crepevine Restaurant for a quick brunch. I could not resist having a hot apple cider and smoked salmon with spinach crepes called "San Francisco". I must say that hot cider was amazing and crepes were ok just because of the amount of oil that spinach was cooked in. Overall, a 3.5 star experience.

Our next destination was San Francisco Botanical Gardens. For $8 entrance fee you get access to hundreds of different species represented in one area. I have to say this was not my favorite botanical garden, Chicago was much more spectacular, but still I saw cool plants.

Oh, and I am getting pretty good at photographing some things, just saying ;)

The next stop was the Conservatory of Flowers, a pretty interesting, but a bit small place that outside looked grand.

Inside it had a few rooms...

There was a whole section of the room filled with carnivorous plants. I feel bad for any insects that decide to stop by there...

and a pretty pond...

Finally, there was a butterfly room, probably the most interesting part of the conservatory.

We went to a few other smaller sites, such as the Shakespeare Garden (filled with prom teenagers), Lily Pond, and Mescaline Grove, but I was not really impressed.

Beautiful Yosemite National Park

This weekend I decided to go to Yosemite National Park, despite predicted rain and 45 degree Fahrenheit weather hoping that the weather guy was wrong again. I was partially correct. While it sprinkled on the drive there in the morning, the weather held up during the afternoon when I did most of hiking.

Yosemite is a unique place. The park is extremely popular, and many people come here from not only all over the country, but from the world. You can hear different languages and see license plates from many states. At the same time, if you know where to go, you can feel completely alone and isolated from civilization to the point where you feel eerie.

Some places in Yosemite attract lots of tourists. One of them is Bridalveil Falls. Since it has been so rainy in California this year, the falls were overflowing with water spilling it over everywhere, flooding the trails.

It was almost impossible to actually get to the falls because of spillage. But the experience of getting soaked through was unbelievable.

Trying to warm up in the car afterwards, we headed to the Mirror Lake trail, or so we thought...

Mirror Lake is a small body of water and is surrounded by a nice trail with beautiful views of the lake and surrounding nature. This is the hike my friend and I were hoping to go on. Instead of beginning at the Mirror Lake trailhead, as the instructions on the Yosemite NP website advise, we decided to park at Yosemite Valley. It was not the best choice, as we learned later because everyone else decided to park there as well.

The idea was to just hike 2 miles from the trailhead and come right back, but since we parked so far away and did not want to take the shuttle (bad idea), we hiked over 10 miles round trip. It was completely worth it though.

We were so tired that as soon as we got back home, we went to sleep. Actually, I snagged a nap in the car, while my friend was driving ;)

Gray Whale Cove in Half Moon Bay, CA

Usually I go hiking with a smaller group of people as part of Meetup, but some groups do not limit how many people can come on a hike, hence hundreds of people sign up. This weekend it was the first time I experienced hiking with a hundred and something people. I didn't like it, so together with my friend, we branched out pretty much at the very beginning to go a different route.

Instead of hiking up the mountain, we chose the easy route of going straight to the Gray Whale Cove Trail, which a relatively easy and short. It stretches right along the ocean beside Highway 1. Traffic and cars make the search for peaceful and relaxing atmosphere a challenge, but the views are still amazing.

To get to the trail, you can park along Highway 1, which is what I would have done if I didn't come with a group. Instead, we parked at the Farallone View Elementary School about a mile and a half inland and then hiked to the trail. Unfortunately, one section of the trail had mud, serious mud. My sneakers were very unhappy, but eventually they did get a nice bath when I got home.

After the hike we were starving and decided to check out the nearest seafood restaurant that turned out to be great! Barbara's Fishtrap is a cash only restaurant right on the beach with amazing views of the harbor, quick service and excellent food!

Finally, before heading back to Fresno, we decided to stop by the beach, just to check in. I even took my shoes off and tested the water out. Cold!

McKenzie Table Mountain Preserve - Discovery Hike

McKenzie Table Mountain Preserve is located north-east of Fresno, about 30-40 minutes. It is privately owned and only allows guided hikes to the public for a fee. Today the Open Preserve Day was sponsored by REI and was absolutely free.

My friend and I decided to sign up for a Discovery Hike, a docent-led 4 mile round trip hike. It is very easy and pretty much flat along the way. The views are not as great as you could get if you went on a Table Top Hike, but is still very peaceful.

Wildflowers were not at the peak of their bloom, but still there were plenty there!

Our docent turned out to be a biologist who was truly interested in her field, so very often she would spot a little frog or a millipede that would draw her attention and show it to us. Among a few finds was a western spadefoot toad (no, I would not have remembered the name if I did not write it down ;), some sort of weird cricket (gosh, I love crickets! #justkidding), a tadpole, a western toad, milkweed, more tadpoles, a white cow and a big fat tadpole.

Western Spadefoot Toad

Big fat cricket!

Tadpole

Baby Western Toad

Milkweed

Tadpole heaven

Super little baby toad

White cow!

Big fat tadpole

I don't think I have had a hike where I learned so much!

We also decided to go to watch the Bird of Prey presentation, but I was hugely disappointed. Those poor birds were captured from the wild to be shown to the public. The woman presenting the birds kept saying that she had a falconry license and was allowed to capture only 2 birds a year. Are you kidding me??? Why would any reasonable person decide to capture an animal from the wild to keep it in the cage? Why not rescue them from a rehab facility? Why would California even allow this kind of thing? Another disappointment in humanity. I get that these birds are used for educational purposes, but I am also certain that there are enough of them injured that cannot be released and need help (to the woman's credit, one of the owls was a rescue). 

Wild animals should remain in the wild.

Here is a decent article showing what can happen if you interfere with nature. And another article to consider when getting an exotic pet. I understand that many animals live longer lives in the captivity, but do you think it is worth it for them? Would you want to live a long life in prison? I wouldn't.