San Francisco Zoo | Laura's Adventures After 50!

Getting to San Francisco took a lot longer than planned because our flight was delayed a few times. We finally took off, three hours late and already tired and bored. But when we arrived, it was early afternoon and a beautiful, sunny day. The hotel wasn’t ready for us, so we left our bags and took off on a walk and walked down Market Street all the way through the Financial District to the Ferry Building near the Golden Gate Bridge.

In that walk, I took in a few things that surprised me about San Francisco. There were many street performers and street vendors with hand-crafted wares. There were also a lot of beggars. I saw more smokers than I’d seen in the last five years combined and there were more Levi’s jeans than I’d seen since the 80’s! Coffee bars are everywhere, two and three to a block and likely one of them is a Starbucks. The city is vibrant and filled with people, and many of them are tourists. I should have read my William Burroughs ahead of time, because he once said that it’s the place where:

“Jack Kerouac opened a million coffee bars and sold a million Levis to both sexes.“

It was a very long day, and gave me a greater appreciation for my husband’s normal schedule which has him leaving early, flying half-way across the country, and dealing with flight delays as a matter of routine. We had a nice dinner, and then turned in early; having been up for over 18 hours.

In the morning, the girls and I set off on foot for St. Patrick’s Church. I had picked it out primarily because it was closest to our hotel and had a service in English at 9 a.m. I was expecting there to be a crowd, Easter being the most popular day to go to church, but the last service was not out yet and we were the first there. Pretty soon some more people started to gather, all tourists.

I was expecting a congregation similar to one back home, diverse but with a core of Irish Americans…judging by the tourists outside, this was not too far off the mark. Both this church and my church back home were founded to minister to congregations of Irish immigrants. I got a chuckle when I realized that the congregation was almost exclusively Filipino! I guess the fact that they do a service in Tagalog should have tipped me off. Here are some pictures of this beautiful, historical church. I wish I could have captured the beauty of the singing, led by 3 women singers with voices strong enough and beautiful enough to match a full choir.

After church, we walked to the Nikko hotel where we met up with my husband and had brunch at Anzu. The buffet was amazing with everything from dim sum and sushi to fresh seafood on ice to multiple salads and chafing dishes full of every imaginable breakfast food and many meaty entrees. A chef manned the carving station and also made custom omelets. Here is a picture of just some of the desserts, which included many kinds of cakes, mousses, and a chocolate fountain. We all had different things and were soon full and happy!

Off we went to catch a Muni train out to the San Francisco Zoo. We had a lovely afternoon wandering through the zoo and snapping photographs of everything we saw. I must really like giraffes, because half of my pictures are of them, but I’m only sharing my favorite shot. We ended up at the petting zoo, where my younger daughter was enamored by the goats. This particular fellow was really chilling out!