Travel to San Francisco – Amateur Traveler Episode 159 Transcript

page 8 of 15 of Travel to San Francisco – Amateur Traveler Episode 159 Transcript

Richard: Mm hmm, ok, that makes sense. I think I know – maybe you can confirm this – that I don’t think that the guns were ever fired in anger from that site.

Chris: Not to the best of my knowledge.

Richard: Well, they have docent tours that they lead, and if you go inside, they have some nice little exhibits set up, and you can walk up on the roof, and actually get an excellent view of the reconstruction work that they’re doing on the Golden Gate Bridge.

Chris: You’re actually under the Bridge at this point, looking up at it, so, yeah.

Richard: That’s right. I think it’s almost as interesting as the Fort, to see what they’re doing to that bridge. They’re essentially rebuilding the thing, almost completely as people are continuing to drive over it, and retrofitting it and making it as earthquake safe as it can possibly be.

Chris: So I notice you had us cross it before we look under and see what they’re doing to it, so I think that’s probably a wise move!

Richard: Right. How about this – why don’t we park in the parking lot down at Fort Point? I guess we would have had to do that in order to visit the Fort – but leave the car there, and start walking along the shoreline, heading east.

Chris: Ok.

Richard: This is all part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. Crissy Field is what you’re heading towards. We’re still in the Presidio, so this is was all once Army territory. There were landing strips and who knows what all they had going on down there, but it is now a visitors center, marine sanctuary, nature preserve. Part of it is in fact a wetland, and there are some beautiful paths that, kind of, just winding paths, and wooden bridges and piers for people to fish off of, and on a sunny morning this is a fabulous place to take a walk just to people watch, to get a look at the Bay, dramatic views of the bridge. Some of the most beautiful photographs of the Golden Gate Bridge that you’ve seen have been taken from this vantage point. It’s just a great spot. I believe you can walk continuously from this point, along the coast, pretty much all the way to Fisherman’s Wharf, which is about half way across town. It’s probably, what, two miles or so? Two and a half miles? Not a bad walk – as long as we’re packed full of food from our two breakfasts! Let’s walk some of that off and just walk along this beautiful waterfront, until we get to – you’re going to be seeing it at this point – is the Palace of Fine Arts. This is a beautiful domed structure again a beaux arts style building. The dome is the thing you’ll recognize first; there’s an artificial pond out front, with swans swimming in it. Columns everywhere, it’s left over from the 1915 World’s Fair that was built here in the Marina District, which is unfortunately famous from the 1989 earthquake, where all the dramatic footage of burning buildings and scariness was taken from the air. But we’ll keep our fingers crossed, and walk through this neighborhood, enjoy the Palace of Fine Arts. It’s the one remnant of this whole neighborhood from all the way up, what is it, about six or seven blocks, up to about Lombard Street and east to Fort Mason, I guess, where the ground starts to go up. This was all filled in, this was all artificial land that was created especially for this Fair. It was covered with buildings like the one that you’re standing in front of now, so it’s kind of fun to stand there and imagine what it must have looked like back in the day.

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