Stow Lake: Won’t You Try Saturday Afternoon

Stow Lake is frequented more by residents than tourists who are rather drawn to the heavily promoted, and undeniably impressive, adjacent attractions of the de Young Museum, California Academy of Sciences and Japanese Tea Garden. Yet it is only a few minutes walk away.

We stumbled upon it purely by accident on our second trip to the city fourteen years ago. Venturing west from those headliner venues, you quickly come across a pathway and 26 steps that lead to the south side of the lake. In the dense trees on the island opposite you soon encounter the charming Chinese Pavilion, a gift from the people of Taipei, shipped in 6,000 pieces and reassembled in 1981.

As you stroll along the path that encircles the lake you gain an immediate impression of both serenity and bustle. Young families, pushing strollers and trying to contain excited children, compete with joggers, dog walkers, cyclists and elderly immigrant couples reliving their first date 50 years ago for the narrow path. Ducks, gulls and other bird life glide along the placid surface, scanning for potential feeding stations wherever humans congregate by the water.

For now, pass the rustic stone bridge on your right and continue along the path  that leads to the boathouse (new photo) where you will be able to rent paddle boats, row boats – new, I believe, this year – bicycles, and in-line skates. Restrooms, picnic tables and a surprisingly well stocked snack bar greet you here also. Indeed, it has the distinction of being the first place in the U.S. where I tasted a vegetarian hot dog (whilst Janet ate ice cream!).

On a bright day you may be lucky enough to observe a row of turtles sunbathing on the rocks and logs alongside the boathouse.

For the more adventurous there is the short but relatively steep hike up to Strawberry Hill, the 430 foot high artificial island in the middle of the lake, which rewards you with fine, slightly tree obscured views across the western part of the city, and even as far as the Farallone Islands 26 miles out to sea.

You can either retrace your steps from the boathouse and access the island across the stone bridge (new photo), or you can approach it by crossing the second “Roman” bridge which appears shortly in the opposite direction. Be sure not to miss Huntington Falls which cascade down into the lake close to the Chinese Pavilion.

Encircling the entire lake and climbing Strawberry Hill amounts to around two and a half miles.

So if you want a few hours respite from the frenetic environs of Fisherman’s Wharf, Chinatown or Union Square, take a bus out to Golden Gate Park and visit Stow Lake, grab an ice cream and paddle gently for an hour in the civilising company of ducks and turtles.

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What No Golden Gate Bridge or Cable Car?

Only after we returned from our latest trip to San Francisco did it occur to me that, during the ten night stay, we had neither visited such perennial favourites as the Golden Gate Bridge, the Palace of Fine Arts or Alamo Square, nor taken a single ride on a cable car.

How can you travel nearly 6,000 miles to one of the most popular cities on earth and not take in its most iconic locations I hear you say? Surely, you are missing out on the greatest experiences it has to offer?

That is not, however, the way I see it. Rather than accept that this represents poor planning and an opportunity missed, I rather view it as a sign of our growing maturity as visitors to San Francisco. The fact is that we no longer feel the need to tick off as many of the guidebook recommendations as possible, tiring us out unnecessarily in the process.

The nature of our time spent there is increasingly taking on a different, more relaxed, you might even call it ordinary, tenor, one that more closely mirrors that of how we live at home.   Being in San Francisco has become such a familiar and regular part of our lives, somewhere we visit more often even than the places we love in our own country, that it has assumed that status of our second home, and, therefore, somewhere we neither  have to pretend to be what we are not, nor have to do what we feel we ought to do.

Choosing to stay some distance from the tourist enclaves of Union Square or Fisherman’s Wharf, as we did in Noe Valley this year, allows us to do as much, or as little, as we feel on any given day.

If all we want to do is to hang out at the apartment in the morning, watching the Bay Area news on TV whilst catching up on household chores, before strolling out to a neighbourhood café for lunch, followed by gift and food shopping and then returning to the apartment for a glass or two of wine on the outside private deck whilst watching the world go by, then so be it. We then might eat in in the evening – or we might try out one of the local restaurants. Or we might decide to take the metro downtown and eat in Chinatown or North Beach.

The point is that we are at liberty to do as we wish, not as we feel we ought to do to make the most of the trip and the not inconsiderable expense. Of course, it has been the happy conversion from hotel to apartment living over the past three years that has enabled us to do this.

And if it sounds to you that living in San Francisco has become less exciting for us, even routine, even a chore, then you could not be further from the truth. Whilst I can comfortably claim that we now feel at home in the city and, for myself in particular, probably did so before I ever visited it, I am tempted to suggest even that we have become, in a small way, San Franciscans, interested in its politics (with a small “p”), culture and, undeniably, its sport – just as we do at home.

And remember – those wonderful attractions are still a short drive or a bus or taxi ride away.

Nor is it the case that we no longer go sightseeing – far from it. On our recent trip we may have bypassed some of the more renowned locations, but we made a conscious effort to sample new, and nearly new, experiences, some of which were long overdue. These included a tour of City Hall, exploring Nob Hill, the Castro and Hyde Street Pier in depth, reliving the Summer of Love on the Flower Power Walking Tour, sunbathing in Dolores Park, and spending an afternoon in the excellent California Palace of the Legion of Honour.

Attending two Giants games at AT & T Park and a thrilling Elvis Costello concert at the Warfield, as well as eating out at more traditional restaurants such as John’s Grill (in the Maltese Falcon room) and the Daily Grill (Lefty O’Doul’s was too busy) added real richness to our stay.

And we still found time to take in several of our favourite spots – Golden Gate Park, including the Japanese Tea Garden and Stow Lake, Sunday brunch at the Cliff House, dinner at the North Beach Restaurant, Beach Blanket Babylon, Haight-Ashbury, the Ferry Building and the depressingly under threat Gold Dust Lounge.  And, of course, a spot of DSW shoe shopping for my wife in Union Square – now, heretically, resident in the former Border’s bookstore (the shoe shop, that is, not my wife – though she might like to be).

Having read the above, perhaps the vacation wasn’t quite as relaxing as I first thought!

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Sunbathing Turtles, Paddle Boats and Veggie Hot Dogs

There are few more relaxing spots in which to while away an afternoon in San Francisco than the man-made Stow Lake in the centre of Golden Gate Park.

It’s frequented more by residents than tourists who are rather drawn to the heavily promoted, and undeniably impressive, adjacent attractions of the de Young Museum, California Academy of Sciences and Japanese Tea Garden. Yet it is only a few minutes walk away.

We stumbled upon it purely by accident on our second trip to the city thirteen years ago. Venturing west from those headliner venues, you quickly come across a pathway and stairs that lead to the south side of the lake. In the dense trees on the island opposite you soon encounter the charming Chinese Pavilion, a gift from the people of Taipei, shipped in 6,000 pieces and reassembled in 1981.

As you stroll along the path that encircles the lake you gain an immediate impression of both serenity and bustle. Young families, pushing strollers and trying to contain excited children, compete with joggers, dog walkers and cyclists for the narrow path. Ducks, gulls and other bird life glide along the placid surface, scanning for potential feeding stations wherever humans congregate by the water.

For now, pass the rustic stone bridge on your right and continue along the path  that leads to the boathouse where you will be able to rent paddle boats, row boats – new, I believe, this year – bicycles, and in-line skates. Restrooms, picnic tables and a surprisingly well stocked snack bar greet you here also. Indeed, it has the distinction of being the first place in the U.S. where I tasted a vegetarian hot dog (whilst Janet ate ice cream!).

On a bright day you may be lucky enough to observe a row of turtles sunbathing on the rocks and logs alongside the boathouse.

For the more adventurous there is the short but relatively steep hike up to Strawberry Hill, the 430 foot high artificial island in the middle of the lake, which rewards you with fine, slightly tree obscured views across the western part of the city, and even as far as the Farallone Islands 26 miles out to sea.

You can either retrace your steps from the boathouse and access the island across the stone bridge, or you can approach it by crossing the second “Roman” bridge which appears shortly in the opposite direction. Be sure not to miss Huntington Falls which cascade down into the lake close to the Chinese Pavilion.

Encircling the entire lake and climbing Strawberry Hill amounts to around two and a half miles.

So if you want a few hours respite from the frenetic environs of Fisherman’s Wharf, Chinatown or Union Square, take a bus out to Golden Gate Park and visit Stow Lake, grab an ice cream and paddle gently for an hour in the civilising company of ducks and turtles.

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Western Diary Day 19: Perfect Sunday Afternoon

This will be an unusually short entry (hoorah I hear you cry), due in part to the fact that, in keeping with our plan to “live like locals” as much as we could whilst in San Francisco, we spent a relaxing Sunday afternoon just walking around Golden Gate Park in the warm sunshine, taking in the sights and sounds of the City at play.

Walkers, dogs, walkers with dogs,dogs with walkers,  joggers, dogs, joggers with dogs, dogs with joggers, cyclists, dogs, cyclists with dogs, dogs with cyclists, skateboarders, dogs, skateboarders with dogs, dogs with skateboarders, roller skaters, dogs, rollerskaters with dogs, dogs with rollerskaters, football games, soccer games, baseball games, kite flying, boating, rowing…………the list goes on of activities. 

The most extrordinary sight was the high intensity roller disco where roller skaters and bladers hurtled round a self-imposed rink to loud disco music.  Some of the moves were amazing and it was a wonder nobody crashed into each other.  And dogs, of course, got into the action too! 

We strolled around the open air art gallery, visited the steamy Conservatory of Flowers, and climbed to the top of Strawberry Hill on Stow Lake for tantalising glimpses of the City and Golden Gate Bridge.  We would normally visit the Japanese Tea Garden but it was extremely busy at the time, so we gave it a miss.  And besides, I’d just had another hot dog!

The lazy Sunday was completed by a bit of food shopping and dinner at the apartment, followed by America’s Next Great Restaurant and Celebrity Apprentice on TV (how will we keep up with those when we return home?).

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