Run Out of Road...

Returning our car to the Hertz people at San Francisco wasn't easy. We'd both grown attached to 'Petey', our little Nissan Sentra - he'd been our home for the last four weeks and had taken us 6147 miles from New York to San Francisco.

It was the most incredible adventure, travelling way way west across America and we'll never forget all the amazing things we done and seen along the way. I think it might take a while to sink in that we actually did it - it still feels quite surreal.

I'm already day-dreaming about the next road-trip, maybe the next one could be a bit closer to home... Land's End to John O'Groats or something?

But before then, it's just going to be so fantastic to be home.

Fog On The Water...

On our second day in San Francisco, and the last day of our amazing trip - we took a boat ride out on the bay to have a look at Alcatraz, the Sea Lions, the sailing boats and to get a different view of the amazing Golden Gate Bridge.

There was a thick band of fog lingering right around the bottom of the bridge, that mixed with the beautiful sunshine gave us some pretty amazing views...

 It was such an amazing way to see San Francisco and hear all about the bridge and the Rock from the audio tour thing - it was a great little boat trip and a perfect way to spend our last morning.

A Bit Wonky...

 Some of the buildings in San Francisco were super wonky!

To The Bridge...

Later than afternoon we took a drive over the Golden Gate Bridge over to one of the view points on top of a hill to take it all in...

 It was an amazing feeling, to have started our journey driving over the Manhattan Bridge in New York, and now we were driving over the Golden Gate Bridge at the end of our adventure, on the opposite side of the country!!!

3 Fish Studio...

In the afternoon, we drove over to find Mollusk surf shop which was a bit out of town in a nice area by the beach...

We found Mollusk and parked outside a lovely looking studio/shop called the 3 Fish Studio, the stuff in the window looked so nice we decided to pop in for a look around...

 After a bit of looking around we got talking to Eric, one of the artists working in the studio - he was so friendly and showed us how he produces his lino-cut prints...

He showed us the whole process, from the linos, to applying the ink, to placing them in the press and then rolling the press - which he let me do and printed a couple of pieces...

Eric then introduced us to his wife Annie who does paintings (she did the California Bear one), and we had a couple of beers and talked about our road-trip and how they got started being artists and stuff. 

They were both so warm and friendly and made us feel so welcome - it was great to meet them and see their work and go away with a couple of momento's of our trip and of meeting them. It such an unexpected little bonus to our stay in San Francisco.

After we finished our beers we popped across the road to have a look in Mollusk which was full of lovely crafty things too...

Steep Francisco...

The San Francisco Pirate Store...

Amongst all the independent shops in the Mission District, there was on very special shop selling some very unique items. It was the San Francisco Pirate Store...

It's run by the same charity who created the Brooklyn Superhero Store, theWashington Museum of Unnatural History and the Hoxton Monster Supply Shop. It worked in the same way as the other shops, there was the shop in the front selling all sorts of amazing things (with all the money going to support the charity) and then in the back was a classroom area where local children go for the writing workshops etc.

The whole shop was set up just like a pirate ship or a shop you'd find in the middle of Pirates of the Caribbean, everywhere you looked there was something funny, some clever item for sale or some brilliant bit of copy on the walls...

It was all so clever and such a brilliant way of raising money for a charity. Every one of the 826 shops are as amazing as the next and all for such a great cause. I wonder what kind of store they'll open next?!

Moochy Morning...

We had a great morning mooching around the Mission District, looking at the brilliant independent hops and having coffee's at the cafés...

then we drove over to browse the records at Amoeba Music and have some lunch in Haight & Ashbury...

 It was great to find some new places to visit, and lovely to be able to go back to areas that I'd been to before and see how they'd changed.