Our Married Adventure: "Welcome to THE ROCK"

Dad flew in on Wednesday to originally spend some time in the "City of Angels" with me and B. However, as a work opportunity arose, he and I headed out on a little research trip to San Francisco! The company gives employees a lump sum of money each year to better themselves as an artist and Imagineer. Since San Fran was so close, I made an itinerary of the Walt Disney Family Museum, California Academy of Sciences, and Alcatraz (somewhere I've ALWAYS wanted to visit ever since I was little!!!) Unfortunately, B had work and school but that was okay - Dad and I got some great quality time in together :)

Dad arrived at our apartment about noon and we were on the road up Interstate 5 for our 6.5 hour road trip to San Francisco!

Hi Daddy-O!!

On our way!

We passed this guy and his six Harleys like six times....

And TONS upon TONS of these types of trees - we think either pistachio or almond....

We also passed a lot of vegetable trucks loaded with tomatoes and garlic! The garlic was my favorite because it smelled so good! But we really needed it when we passed an extremely large cow farm.....

Pretty scenery :)

But this was about the only view the entire way, not too much to see....

We did get to see all the water canals used for irrigation of all those trees and other farms along the way....

Then we made it! On the Oakland Bridge crossing over the Bay!

Our first day in San Fran we headed to my one requirement of the day: The Walt Disney Family Museum. It was FABULOUS! And I'm not just saying that because the mouse gives me a paycheck either. It was very focused on the man, his family, and his love for cartoons and animation. How he started the company and all the successes and failures. In the lobby of the museum were all of his awards including the Oscars. My favorite was the Oscar for 'Snow White and the Seven Dwarves' because they put seven small Oscars next to the main one :)

No pictures are allowed in the museum so we took some outside. Located in The Presidio, the location is just at fabulous!

Dad wanted to roll around in the new grass!

Yay Disney!!!

Take one.

Take two. Almost go the Disney sign!

Presidio of San Francisco.

This was a lot of troops last stop before heading overseas for WWI and WWII.

The rule was no pictures. I get it. BUT...inside and downstairs by the restrooms was Mary Blair's desk, art supplies, and hardhat!!! EEEKKKK!!!! Mary Blair is my favorite artist, her styling is just unbelievable!! So, well, I had to sneak a pic!

AMAZING!!!!!

Next we headed for some true San Francisco sites!

Like driving down Lombard Street!!

Driving down the crazy, winding street!

You know those houses are worth some major $$$$!!!

Next we headed on to Coit Tower - the tallest spot in San Fran with some great views!

That's Christopher Columbus in the center - the statue, not the person... :)

And some pretty wonderful murals inside depicting working life in the Bay area.

I really liked them :)

Next stop of the day was Fisherman's Wharf - great people watching and seafood!

Crab stands along the whole wharf!

Amazing! Great area :)

Cable cars!!!

Notice Alcatraz in the background!!! But more on that later.....

"Rice-A-Roni, the San Francisco treat!"

And the final stop of the day, the 'Painted Ladies'!

Full House anyone??

On the second day of our trip we went to the next required location: California Academy of Sciences in the Golden Gate State Park. It's an amazing center with an indoor rainforest, aquarium, planetarium, and a living roof - the reason I wanted to go.

We had breakfast in the cafe then went to the first planetarium show of the day. Upon exiting, the fire alarms began going off and all doors began closing off. We had to use the emergency exits and stairs and evacuate to the middle of the park. The fire department was called and in about 20 minutes we were able to re-enter. Thank heavens because I hadn't even seen the living roof yet!

In case of any more emergencies, we headed right to the living roof!

So neat!

They used 50,000 of those coconut squares to cover the roof - the plants were laid inside of the squares then installed on the roof.

Then we headed inside to discover the rainforest; Dad found a butterfly friend :)

It landed on his head several times, I just wasn't fast enough!

Beautiful!

If you look really close on the middle plant on the log, you can see two teeny tiny red and blue frogs - smaller than a quarter! They were cute but probably deadly!

And this is Claude - an albino alligator.

Next we headed over the Golden Gate Bridge to Sausalito for lunch. Unfortunately the bridge was all fogged in so I couldn't see much of her that day. I was able to look back and see the tip of the bridge peaking out of the clouds after we crossed, that was neat!

Found a quaint restaurant for a yummy lunch and great view!

We could definitely live there! Loved it! But I'm guessing it's pretty pricey.....

For our last stop of the day, we drove to Muir Woods to see the majestic Redwoods - it was so neat and beautiful! Those trees are HUGE! Dad and I were teeny next to them :)

See Dad!??

Inside a base of a tree!

Some were really knotty....

I was most excited about our last big event for our last day of the trip: ALCATRAZ!!! I have wanted to go to that island since I was little - and that always freaked Mom out a little bit ;) It just has a mysterious presence sitting in the middle of the bay but only 1.25 miles from the city....

But before catching the ferry, I had to visit the world famous San Franciso Sea Lions!!!

Happy Anniversary, Sea Lions!

We made it!

Notice the door in the middle that leads to no where....

The warden's home.

Before we even went inside the prison, we headed to the Golden Gate Bridge viewing area to strike a pose from the movie "The Rock". You might recognize the scene from the beginning of the post but I had some fun in photoshop with those since the bay was all fogged in again. Here are our actual shots - Dad brought the glow sticks!!

We actually got a little nervous as Dad was unwrapping the glow sticks - they had strings attached to them and Dad says, "oh geez, it probably looks like we have a bomb or something!"

AAHHHH!!! Needless to say, we took the pictures quickly then promptly discarded the sticks.