We had a great time in San Francisco although things didn’t always go according to plan – at times it seemed like everything we wanted to do was canceled or closed. Still days were spent exploring the various neighbourhoods and by night we visited a cross spectrum of San Fran’s ‘dive bars’ – it seems no bar is complete without a neon cocktail sign outside in this city.

We divided most of our time between the Haight (above) – the nexus of of the flower generation and the summer of love, now somewhat resembling the hippes from that era – a bit burnt out, still clinging to old values despite having sold out to the man and the rest in the Mission (below) – the more down at heel latino district now home to hipsters, cool graphic design shops and groovy bars as the gentrification begins.

Still San Fran still contains good sized chunks of seediness often squeezed in between the posher areas so that one minute you are swishing past Barney’s and the swanky Apple Store before only a block or two away hotel rooms are rented by the hour and the crack dealers are out in force. It was quite refreshing after the santised streets of NY.

We did attempt a couple of touristy things – drinking coffee in North Beach (above), riding a cable car and catching the ferry to Alcatraz – although our attempt to cross the Golden Gate bridge on a 50′s era fire truck was sadly thwarted by their schedule. We also visited the new Herzog & de Meuron – De Young Museum in the Golden Gate Park – an intriguing gallery which I’ll devote a separate post to with an excellent though esoteric collection (below).