Sight Seeing in Frisco: The New, The Old, and The Weird

Gosh dern it, but I’ve been a busy Mo lately.  Between two jobs, a theater apprenticeship, a band, doing freelance makeup work, and having a social life, I’ve not had much time lately.  Somehow Zac and I have still been finding time to explore.  Last week we were able to have one of our days out and check out new sites, old haunts, and strange city landmarks.

The New: Cable Car Museum

When you ride the bus or train in San Francisco, often you will see signs advertising the Cable Car Museum.  I thought it looked cheesy, so the whole time we’ve been living here we hadn’t gone.  We were wandering around North Beach and stumbled upon it, and since it’s free we had nothing to loose.

I really liked it!  It is a tiny museum, but housed in the Washington-Mason powerhouse and carbarn.  So while there is plenty of information on cable car history and how they work, the main attraction is the powerhouse itself.  From a viewing deck on the second floor, one can view the huge engines and winding wheels that wind the cables for the four cable car lines.  It is a noisy and impressive site.  The cables are always moving, from 6 in the morning until they shut down past midnight, the only time when repairs can be done to the cables.  The cars start and stop from the grip mechanism controlled by the operator that grips the cables running below the street.  Downstairs you can also see the sheaves and cable lines entering the building from under the street.

The Old: Japantown Center

Japantown Center is a place I’ve talked about often on this blog, and it seems these days Zac and I cannot go out without eventually finding our way here.  It’s one of our favorite parts of the city.  Stepping inside the Japantown center and being surrounded by animae, cute Asian things, sushi bars and crepe stands, and dollar stores, and it just doesn’t feel like you are in the US anymore.  That’s how we like it!

Our visit on this day was pretty mellow.  We picked up some cheap household essentials from Daiso, the $1.50 store that has everything under the sun.   After grabbing rice balls from a stand and coffee drinks from Iciban Kan, we went outside to enjoy the fine weather and reboot.  We wandered around some more and read for a bit before heading home.  Nothing special perhaps, but a nice visit to a much-loved part of town.

The Strange: Goodacre Statue at the Transamerica Pyramid Center

Earlier in the day, after the Cable Car Museum and before Japantown, we found ourselves walking in the shadow of the Transamerica building.  For those of you who haven’t been to San Francisco, the Transamerica building is shaped like a pyramid.  Which is pretty weird but adds a unique element to the skyline!

Part of the Transamerica Pyramid Center is Redwood Park.  It’s not really a park, just a small group of redwood trees that houses some really weird statues.  If the symmetrical frog fountain isn’t your cup of tea, maybe the Glenna Goodacre “Puddle Jumpers” statue is.  Cast in bronze, the statue depicts 6 creepy, soulless children forever stuck in the middle of jumping into a puddle.  Once I got over the vacancy of their stares, we had some fun fooling around with the statue.

And so another awesome, adventuring day in San Francisco was had.  We’ll see how much of this I’ll be able to keep doing in the future.  As I said, it’s getting crazy here on my end!  But I do have bigger things in the works. . .

Good Luck and Happy Travels,

Mo