The hills of San Francisco

It seems California's drought has broken and we've had two days of torrential rain. A good time to update you with what I've been up to. I've been in San Francisco for a week now and I feel as though I've got the lay of the land. I spent my first three days here averaging 5-6 hours of walking a day, exploring all of the suburbs and orienting myself around the city. I thought Sydney was hilly: I take it all back! These hills defy gravity, but no matter how hard on your calves and buns they are, it's always worth it for the view when you reach the top. Even when the city is shrouded in mist the view is incredible. And every suburb is architecturally fascinating.

Towards Coit Tower

Scotland: One Way

Steep!

I've explored the dingy red-light streets of North Beach, the eclectic gay village Castro, the bars of Newtown/Stokey-esque Mission District, the vintage stores of Camden-ite Haight-Ashbury, the swanky vistas of Russian Hill and Telegraph Hill. I've trodden in the footsteps of the Beats, the characters of Tales of the City, and Harvey Milk on the steps of City Hall.

Rainbow flag in the Castro

One of SF's many vintage trams

The streets of San Francisco

Ornate doorways

Haight-Ashbury

One of the (many) things I love about this city is the plethora of inner-city parks and tranquil areas. Those early American settlers sure were visionary in reserving public parklands for future generations. The views from Buena Vista Park are exactly as implied and you can hike in the Presidio for hours, occasionally catching glimpses of the famous Golden Gate Bridge through the trees. There's also the magnificent Golden Gate Park, within which I spent some time reflecting in the serenity of the AIDS memorial grove. A truly magical place.

Steps in Buena Vista Park

View from Buena Vista Park

AIDS memorial

Tribute on bench

View of Golden Gate Bridge from Presidio Park

Presidio cemetary

SF when the mist comes in

My friend Kathleen recommended that I grab a sammich from a specific deli and go picnic in Alamo Square, to see the Painted Ladies. As uninitiated as I was, I (strangely) assumed the 'painted ladies' were a group of drag queens who preened themselves in the park each day. Alas, no, they are a row of pretty pastel townhouses! Still, another great city view.

Kathleen's Deli

The Painted Ladies

While here, I reconnected with my friend Viniita with whom I worked at the BFI in London. She runs a bookstore called Owl Cave Books and lives here with her husband Brian. The intervening 10 years have not lessened our capacity for conversation! It was lovely to catch up. Neet also works at SFMOMA which is sadly closed for renovation, but I have enjoyed checking out other galleries and museums while here, including Yerba Buena Arts Centre, the artwork in City Hall and the amazing Cartoon Art Museum. There, I enjoyed a superbly-curated exhibition marking 25 years since the first edition of Sandman, which included many original drawings of the series, and even the original pitch letter from Neil Gaiman to DC Comics. I also geeked out at the original Peanuts and Calvin & Hobbes strips. One of the most fascinating museums I went to explored the history of the vibrator, which has been around much longer than I realised! Original vibrators from the early 1900s were on display, right to the present day. The GLBT Museum is a well-curated, moving testament to those who have furthered the cause and fought against oppression, based primarily around San Francisco and featuring some fascinating artefacts.

GLBT museum

American Splendor covers

Calvin & Hobbes!

Sandman artwork

Martin Luther King Jr memorial

City Hall

1904 vibrator made in Leeds

 'For disease of the mid quarters'

I'm also thoroughly enjoying hostel life, which is a relief, as I'll be spending a lot of my time in hostels over the next year. Perhaps I just lucked out here at the Green Tortoise in San Fran, but it's a lovely bunch of people and feels like home from home. I've made some great friends here already. Stefan the Kiwi, a seasoned traveller of 18 months; Danish theatremaker Nyonne who is madly trying to finish a draft of a play for a submission deadline; Welsh clown Lindsey who makes balloons for the kids and sells weed in the hostel; Aussie Paul who quit his successful property development career to travel and write children's books. I could go on. We join each other for free breakfast each morning, and we cook for each other in the evenings. It's sure saving me heaps of money!

Weird trees

Inside City Hall: Asian Bride Central!

Even on my meagre budget I've managed to enjoy a few foodie experiences to keep things interesting. I've discovered an amazing breakfast place called Plow, had a perfect burger at Moe's, enjoyed cheap Pho in North Beach and a Rueben at Orphan Andy's Diner. I've expanded my USA beer sampling with a few splendid IPAs, stumbled upon a punk gig in a dodgy pub in the Tenderloin, continued my unsuccessful quest for decent coffee.

Orphan Andy's

The divine menu at Plow

The local theatre company, San Francisco Playhouse, was presenting a production of Jez Butterworth's Jerusalem, so I had to check it out. It's a fantastic play but very culturally specific to 90s-UK, so I was interested both in how the production was staged and how the audience responded. It was a well-staged production with some good performances, pretty dodgy West Country accents and a 4-page glossary of terms included in the program. Unfortunately most of it went right over the audience's head, and at the post-show Q&A the lead actor confessed that they have experienced a high rate of walk-outs. Those who remained, however, were highly engaged.

Explaining British terms to the yanks

I decided to escape the SuperBowl hysteria by attending a Noir Film Festival and the Castro Theatre. A stunning picture palace in the Castro district, it featured an original Whurlitzer player and a well-dressed film festival crowd. I felt right at home and chuckled to myself with glee that film festivals are pretty much the same the world over. Robert Mitchum and Jane Russell chewed up the scenery in the baffling but brilliant Macao and we were then treated to a screening of The Shanghai Gesture. As the film festival programmer explained in his intro, they really wanted to screen this film but knew that the only existing print was a really old, badly-worn one. They decided to program it anyway, but then two weeks before the screening they'd found out that Martin Scorcese actually owned a print of the film which was in really good condition. Some well-placed phonecalls and wrangling later, and here we were watching Scorcese's own personal print of the movie! Amazing.

Original Wurlitzer organ between films

So in a few minutes I'm setting off on the BART to pick my ma up from the airport for our California road trip adventure. Eddie and Saffy on the loose!