What impressed me most about San Francisco
was the abundance of natural beauty in a city of about a million people (over 7
million in the greater San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland area).
I was in San Francisco for a conference,
and was fortunate to meet with friends a day before the conference began.
Together we enjoyed a marvelous trip to beautiful natural areas in Marin County
just across the Golden Gate Bridge from the city.
Golden Gate Bridge
The drive across the iconic bridge offered stunning
views of the Bay (including Alcatraz), the city, and the surrounding hills.
Amazingly, right by the highway, along the salt marches of Richardson Bay, were
small flocks of avocets and other shorebirds.
Our first stop was Muir Woods National
Monument, one of the world’s last stands of old-growth redwood forest. There we
hiked through Cathedral Grove and along the Bootjack trail and Redwood creek.
The trees in the valley were enormous! Their size rivals the Sitka Spruce and
Douglas Fir I have seen in Vancouver and on the Olympic Peninsula. The woods
were lovely and as we hiked we saw ravens, ruby-crowned kinglets, winter wrens,
dark-eyed juncos and, impressively, a varied thrush (of course we saw that in
the parking lot on the way out).
Towering Redwoods
Next stop was the top of Hawk Hill in the Golden
Gate National Recreation area. There we were rewarded with stunning views of
the Golden Gate Bridge and the city gleaming white behind it. All around us as
we walked were very tame white crowned sparrows, juncos, ruby crowned kinglets and
harriers soaring overhead. From Hawk Hill we drove around Bonita Cove towards
the Point Bonita lighthouse. To my delight, along the short path to the
lighthouse we saw harbor seals, gray pelicans, black oystercatchers, many
gulls, double-crested cormorants and even loons. The waves of the Pacific
crashed against the rocks as the sun began sinking into the horizon. It was
awe-inspiring.
View over the Pacific near Bonita Cove
In the evening, we headed back across the
Golden Gate Bridge and to the west end of the city where we parked near Ocean
Beach to view the ruins of the Sutro baths. Though the building housing the
baths burned down in 1966, the foundations and a small lagoon remain. Within
the lagoon we saw a river otter! Wildlife just appears at every turn in this
city!
***********************************
Throughout the rest of my stay,
sight-seeing was squeezed into a busy conference schedule. I walked much of the
city and have posted some photos below.
Sunset in the Golden Gate Park
Grove of trees in the Golden Gate Park, like something straight out of Tolkien’s Shire.
China Town
Murals on the Woman’s Building
in the Mission District
