Today I wanted to check out the shops at Union Square so I decided to buy myself an all day pass for the Rail system. The San Francisco cable car system is the world's last manually operated cable car system. It is an icon of San Francisco and of the twenty-three lines that existed between 1873 and 1890 only three remain. Two routes run from Fisherman's Wharf to downtown Union Square and a third one operates along California St. While the cable cars are used to a certain extent by commuters, their small service area and premium fare for a single ride makes them more of a tourist attraction. I took all three routes throughout the day and buying the all day pass at $14 was far better than the $6 single ride. The first cable car ride I took however stopped along the route and it was going to take a while for it to get a push to start up again. As it had stopped fairly close to Chinatown I decided to walk the rest of the way up to Union Square. Chinatown was quite pretty as the Main Street was filled with red lanterns and it had all the familiar smells that I associate with Chinatown. I made it up to Unioin Square and had a look through Saks Fifth Avenue, Williams & Sonoma and I bought some Peppermint bark...not sure what it is but it looked popular...and then headed across to Macy's. I wound my way upstairs to where the Christmas decorations were and before you know it I was in the line to walk through Santa Land! What a great thing for kids...and big kids! Then I had my photo taken with Santa and while they did the professional one where they charge you at the end, they will also take your photo with ou own camera and phone as well. while my phone and camera pics weren't great, they were better than the way I loked on the professional ones so i didn't buy one. I also checked out their big Westfield as well as Bloomingdales, Barney's and Nordstrom. Then I headed back to the cable car because I wanted to see Lombard St before it got dark. It was also intersting watching them turn the cable car manually on the turning circle too. Lombard St is best known for the one-way section on Russian Hill between Hyde and Leavenworth Strrets. The roadway has eight sharp turns or switchbacks that have earned the street the distinction of being the crookedest (most winding) street in the world. The switchback's design was born out of necessity in order to reduce the hill's natural 27% grade, which was too steep for most vehicles. The crooked section of the street is about 400m long is reserved for one-way traffic travelling east downhill with a speed limit of 8km/h and is paved with red bricks. I got off the tram at Lombard St and walked down the hill...with many other tourists! The street is lined with manicured hedges and flowers, it's really very pretty. After a short rest at the hotel I walked down to Pier 39 and took some photos as the sun was setting over the bay. I then took one of the ...rail cars around to where the California cable car begins from and caught that up to Taylor St and then changed to the other cable car back to Union Square to take some photos of Union Square at night. There was a guy busking and playing the bagpipes, among other buskers. The Christmas lights and windows were all very beautiful. I then caught the cable car back to Fishermans Wharf to pack my bags because tomorrow I am off to Vegas! Oh...and last night at Ghirardelli they gave me a free sample to try and tonight when I looked at it, it is peppermint bark, so I tried it...OMG!!!!! Now I am fussy with my chococlate but OMG!!!! this stuff is beautiful. It has a milk chocolate layer with a white chocolate layer on top sprinkled with peppermint rock sprinkled on top...if they have this at the airport tomorrow I am getting some more!!!!
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