Cable Car, Exploratorium and San Tung

During my three years of living in SF, I never rode the cable car.  After waiting about an hour to board, my anticipation was high.  I was imagining D hanging off the side and feeling the wind in my face, the kids squealing in delight.  Unfortunately, because we had strollers and because I misunderstood the conductor’s directions, we were relegated to standing up in the inside of the crowded car—definitely not the ideal.  (Turns out that you have to store strollers in the back, but we were still free to sit on the outside.)

View from the top of Lombard.

n actually fell asleep.

Next we drove to the Exploratorium.  We were able to use our Discovery Science Center passes to get in for free ($25 value for adults!)

Yes, this was our third museum visit of our trip!  It is definitely the largest children’s museum I have been to.  There were tons of hands-on experiments/things to play with.

Just outside the Exploratorium is the Palace of Fine Arts.  Next year, the Exploratorium is moving to one of the piers.  Their current location will be difficult to top, though.

In addition, the museum is right across the street from Crissy Field. 

Seeing the Golden Gate bridge never gets old.

Next up was dinner at San Tung in the Sunset District.  We have become quite reliant on our GPS, but this time she let us down, leading us on a circuitous route that seemed like forever.  We did pass some nice views, however. 

Once we arrived, hungry and somewhat cranky, we found out that there was already a sign-in list, and it was not even 5 p.m.!

We had to wait, but cut our wait somewhat by agreeing to sit at a large circular “Chinese restaurant” table with another party. 

Of course we had to order the famous dry-fried chicken wings.  They look spicy, but k and n were able to eat them, no problem.

We also ordered chicken chow mein, potstickers (which turned out to be ginormous, but not very flavorful), and green beans (which turned out to be quite tasty—a little sweet and a little tangy).  D added the restaurant to this Chinese food category, mostly based on the chicken wings!  Our final adventure of the day was trying to leave SF to go to D’s parents’ house in Napa.  This could be deemed the high point of our stress level during the entire vacation.  D and I were reminded why, although visiting SF is fun, we would never want to live there.  Let’s just say I have never been so relieved to be on a freeway!