Westside Story

What better way to shake off the last, desperate gasps of a particularly brutal northeast winter than with a quick weekend jaunt to California? Actually, on second thought there are quite a few better ways; for example choosing somewhere that’s actually warm would be a good start. Nonetheless, the rather soggy start to Team J00ster’s San Francisco experience takes a turn for the better as soon as Mama’s is in sight. Or rather, as soon as the 45min line is in sight. Funny how a New Yorker gets happier as the line gets longer. Must be an Ippudo thing.

Worth the wait? Too early to tell seeing as the rather Byzantine ordering system sees one line up for half an hour just to get in the door, only to discover as one crosses that hallowed threshold the rather dubious prize is the right to line up all over again inside to get a table. But hey, it’s a holiday so who’s complaining? Uhm, Mei is.

Mei puts on a brave face, which is harder than it sounds when the tantalizing scent of eggs benedict infused with dungess crab is wafting past. Guantanamo Bay take note, forcing hungry patrons to line up in front of an open kitchen is a… uhm… motivational technique that should more than compensate for that pesky ban on waterboarding.

Mei does a good job of snapping the shutter in the instant before the piranhas descend on their prey. Two seconds later and even the plates are lucky to still be intact after the feeding frenzy.

Forget the discrete black town cars whisking bankers between the towering bastions of world finance in Midtown, forget the ubiquitous yellow cabs careening past throngs of gawking tourists in Times Square; out here transportation is a little more… alternative. And we’re not talking ion-lithium batteries here folks.

First sighting of the Bay Bridge. It’s misty enough that we can probably just say this is the Golden Gate Bridge and call it mission accomplished.

Needless to say, Rock’s parking skills - which where feeble enough to start with even before they atrophied away on the R train to South Ferry – are sorely tested. Almost as sorely tested as Mei’s patience as one perfectly valid spot after another is dismissed as too small, too steep, or too similar to a certain pillar at the Bondi Junction parking garage…

For those who come from a city where the biggest climb is out of the bowels of the 53rd and Lexington station, Lombard Street is proving quite a challenge.

What’s harder, walking up this street, or watching Rock trying to drive up it? Even IBM’s Watson, fresh from crushing the puny humans at their own game of Jeopardy, is lost for an answer on that one.

Mei does her best to model the most important San Franciscan fashion accessory of them all.

The view from the top of Lombard Street. In fine Renaissance art the use of a hazy background to convey the distance of the horizon is called sfumato; in San Francisco photography it’s called rain.

The Lombard Street finale is this ridiculously curvy street. Seriously, if the hill is really so steep that it necessitates five hairpins in the space of 300 feet then you’ve got no business building a road up it in the first place.

The biggest Chinatown in North America does not disappoint the biggest dim sum fans in North America.

The good thing about a blog is you can jump from the cacophony of Chinatown to the measured discourse of academia without the traffic jam in between. The next stop is the tree lined streets surrounding the pleasant UC at Berkeley campus. When you only work 35 hour weeks there is plenty of time to enjoy the finer things in life, witness this fine cheese shop for example.

Globalization is so commoditized these days that the CBOT might as well launch a futures contract over it. And yet it is remarkable that even in an age where crossing time zones is as common as crossing the street, there can exist such a gaping divide in coffee standards between the coasts. The ultimate proof that markets are not quite as efficient as Professor Fama would have you believe lies not in the seven figure bonuses of Wall Street arbitrageurs, no the proof lies in the difference between a rich, foamy, freshly ground San Franciscan latte and the day-old drip brew that seems to fuel New Yorkers. The rest of America may Run on Dunkin, but out here they know how to do things right.

Check out these quaint houses just off the Berkeley campus. This is where you dorm if your thesis is all titled “Harry Potter: A postmodern interpretation of cross-cultural myth and legend”.

Actually, seeing as this is Berkeley it’s more likely the coveted quarters of the freshman Dungeons and Dragons Guild.

Rock is wondering why his student flat didn’t include a broom locker instead of a garage.

If you look very carefully, you can see a scruffy compsci student in there playing World of Warcraft, when he should be attending his discrete mathematics 2 lecture.

Next stop, Mountain View, a quiet neighborhood which Rock’s aunts and uncles share with a young upstart named Google.

And just like that, the whirlwind tour continues. Now it’s back to the city to see friends and from the other land of the long white cloud. It’s all fun and games Mei, until it’s diaper changing time.

The old Ferry Terminal in SF has been converted into a buzzing gourmet marketplace, complete with some crispy porchetta sandwiches. Nothing like porchetta to get those stingy J00ster reviewers to dish out an extra star.

Before or after the portchetta sandwich? Before answering that one, you’d be advised to consult Rock regarding the consequences of an incorrect response.

Here is a cool shop where you can buy cooking stuff. Needless to say, Mei walked right by.

A useful transparent ceiling, just in case one wants to check whether it is pouring, or merely drizzling.

Anyone recognize this? If you don’t, then you clearly haven’t enjoyed a tray of the world’s greatest fried rice at Fishtown, Palmerston North. Actually, you could also study the finer points of the New Zealand snapper whilst enjoying the world’s greatest chicken wings at Manawatu Street.

Here is a cool stall where you can buy ingredients. You know, for cooking. Yeah you know, that activity where you use a recipe instead of a menu? Not ringing any bells?

That’s more up Mei’s alley, a place where you pay people to give you stuff that doesn’t require a pot or a pan or some snazzy bottle of organic olive oil.

The sights and sounds of the Ferry Terminal. Actually, screw the sights and sounds, we all know that this blog is all about the tastes.

One of the upsides of rain is it makes for artsy reflections. Actually, that’s the only upside.

The locals love it when yet another tourist fails to polish off the bread bowl that their signature clam chowder comes packaged up in.

A bit of rain for a bunch of kiwis is like a bit of unrest for your local middle eastern dictator – par for the course.

Back to Palo Alto for a quick tour of the Stanford campus. Somehow I don’t think their cafeteria stocks soggy, cold meat pies

But even the rocket scientists can’t make it stop raining.

Team dinner at the local buffet. Rock proves that just because portions at Nobu require a microscope to be fully enjoyed, he hasn’t completely forgotten his former abilities.

Time to set sail, or rather watch Rock struggle to set the GPS. Next stop the towering peaks of Yosemite National Park.

Hmph, so much for the dire warnings about snow chains being required.

Isn’t it supposed to be winter? Looks more like a Windows desktop than a winter wonderland.

Hang on, that’s more like it. Funny how they seem so excited to see yet more snow. Go figure.

One word: wow. Actually, two more words: watch out! Turns out those snow chains might be a bit more useful that first expected.

Stunning. That’s a good thing seeing as the next hundred or so photos are going to be of the same thing.

Amazing, the road is actually plowed. In New York such basic public services are optional.

Funny how all these West Coasters show up in eight layers of North Face and, so me what bizarrely, a set of snow shoes. The latter accessory must look snazzy on the Perspex ice mountains in the local outdoor shop, but out here in the real powder they seem to be more of a hindrance than anything else. Oh well, perhaps they could prove useful to fend of a marauding black bear, if not the pointed comments from Team Jooster as they moter on by in good old fashioned boots.

Winter the way it’s meant to be. Spectacular and not really that cold, witness Rock’s choice of leg wear.

Actually the whole shorts thing proved to be a bit of false advertising, or as some (namely Mei) would say, a bit of false bravado. Guess surviving the Great Winter of 2010/11 doesn’t give one superpowers after all.

Signs that spring isn’t too far off. In the lower meadows, the veil of white is starting to give way to patches of verdant green. Don’t assume that this means the end of this blog isn’t too far off, because it isn’t.

Apparently it never gets quite cold enough to freeze the waterfall. Which proves a good thing for Rock given the lack of backcountry outhouses.

You call this winter? Is that the best you’ve got? Central Park is colder than this! Mei shows her disdain for the whole West Coast concept of “winter”.

A unique cross between a polar bear and a black bear… with the temper of a grizzly bear.

Unlike summer, the park isn’t overrun with revving SUVs and trundling RVs. Just nature the way it was meant to be enjoyed, i.e. on the pages of someone else’s blog from the comfort of one’s own home. Or office. Let’s face it, who are we kidding, you’re only reading this because it’s better than working.

Apparently the bears hear don’t hibernate all that much, and are quite active during winter. Which is a bit of a problem seeing as Rock insisted on hauling a whole bag of smelly cheeses up to the park and back. Every bear from hear to the Rockies is probably making a beeline this way right about now.

For once Mei stumbles across a Rock that isn’t a complete pushover. Now there’s a novel concept.

Speaking of rocks, here as some finer specimens than what you will find elsewhere on this blog. You won’t catch these guys waltzing around in shorts in the middle of winter.

Sick of scenery yet? Guess you had to be there.

A local mountain main gets ready to set out into the wilderness to check his bear traps. Hopefully they prove more successful than his cunning attempts to lure chicks with a Toyota Corolla.

All this melting snow is making me thirsty for an ice cold coke. Unfortunately it appears Pepsi has an exclusive contract to be the official supplier of teeth-rotting goodness to the National Park service.

Mei pauses to reflect in the satisfaction of blazing past another group of hapless snowshow wearers who were trudging upwards in a rather painstaking fashion, determined to prove their investment in the latest carbon fiber snow stability system was worth the money.

Snowshoes are for wimps. Rock may have discarded the shorts, but he’s still powering up the mountain in a pair of glorified jandals.

The Cali sun is rapidly turning the winter wonderland into a slush pit. Which means now is the time to shoot off even more photos before there’s nothing left. Buckle up folks, there’s plenty more where these came from.

The bridge to nowhere, literally. Due to heavy snowfall, the trail beyond is shut down for the season. Which of course doesn’t stop Rock from bulldozing ahead in his quest for the perfect waterfall photo.

Turns out the trail was closed for a reason. Funny that. After slogging through knee high drifts, this is about as close as things got. Thank goodness for zoom lenses.

Luckily the photo is cropped at the knees, so you can’t see the net result of Rock’s little off road escapade.

It may not be the fabled waterfall, but even the downstream segment is picturesque enough to warrant a quick stop, or a rather longer stop once you factor into account getting stuck in another snow drift.

Hallelujah, there she is! Got the photo, now if we can just get back without losing more than a few digits to frostbite we can call this another epic success.

Mei is making fantastic time on the way down. Either there’s a black bear hot on the trail, or the woodfired pizza oven in the cozy lodge is about to do some roaring business.

Haven’t seen a sunset like this since Everest Base Camp. Don’t you hate people who boast about past travel experiences?

Home on the range. Nothing like a certified bear-proof cabin to keep out the evening chill.

Time moves slower out in these parts. Kind of like when you’re waiting for this blog to finally finish.

Morning in the mountains dawns clear and crisp. The perfect day to hit the road for the long trip back to civilization.

Frosty the Snowman are slightly less impressed with this whole sun thing.

Despite the icicles on every tree, this place is ironically warmer than New York.

Without a doubt, winter is a great time to visit Yosemite. Heck, even the bears skip hibernation to enjoy the scenery.

One for the road.

And just like that, it’s back to the comforts of civilization. If you can call yet another fast food franchise civilization.

Rock gets ready for the much hyped first bite of the legendary In-N-Out burgers. For some reason the place has a cult following that rivals Shake Shack. Unfortunately in both cases the final verdict is a little short of the lofty expectations.

Back in San Fran to take in some of the cheesiest tourist attractions in all of America.

The top of Union Street is one of the poshest neighborhoods in the city, with prices to rival Manhattan. Mei wastes no time in deciding where she will live, should she ever decide that drizzle and fog beat ice and snow.

A VW Beatle? Guess if you have a house like this there’s not much left over for the car.

Victorian splendor from a time long ago. You know, like before the state was bankrupt.

There’s something cool about a form of transport where hanging off the side is allowed and even encouraged. Try doing that in New York, if the fine doesn’t bankrupt you the hospital bill certainly will after a maniacal cabbie sideswipes you.

Union Square district, one of the main shopping streets in SF. Mei seems to look right at home, funny that.

The hilly streets of SF offer glimpses of the harbor below as the trolley rattles its way down streets that were clearly designed for an age when everything didn’t have to come in Venti/Supersized/XXL size.

Another day on the rails in picturesque downtown SF.

The legendary Fishermans Wharf is unfortunately legendary in all the wrong ways. Tacky souvenir stalls and generic chowder-in-a-bread-bowl vendors clamber for their cut of the fistful of tourist dollars waddling past. The best thing one can say is that at least it’s not as bad as Coney Island. Which, as those unfortunate enough to visit the latter know, is faint praise indeed.

Despite Rock’s lofty claims to the contrary, he’s really no better than the rest of them. You can blather on about Momofuku all you want but your words ring hollow when you’re slurping down your chowder with the rest of them.

Supposedly this chocolate is famous, or so the sign says. Like any dutiful travel reported, such a lofty claim requires a thorough and extensive investigation.

So far the evidence is pointing in the right direction.

The hot fudge sundae is the signature item on the menu, and it doesn’t disappoint. Case closed.

It’s hard to argue otherwise; even a New Yorker has to grudgingly admit that SF has what it takes in the food department. And shockingly, accessing said food does not require a 2 hour wait in a blizzard. Is this paradise of what?

Back at the Ferry Terminal for one final meal, at the funky Slanted Door – a Vietnamese/American fusion spot that seems to be drawing rave reviews.

A fitting finale. There’s nothing like braised short ribs to steel oneself for a red eye home. Although one more of those creamy SF lattes could also do the trick.