the san francisco adventure part 1

i hope you are ready for a whole lot of pictures! i think between all of us we took more pictures than ever before, and i love it:)

so thursday night began with a long-distance packing phone call between jessica and i in her seriously exhausted state after not getting much sleep the last few days. as we were trying to figure out what to pack and not my parents were trying to fly to oakland to stay with my grandparents for a few days but couldnt get out of the airport because las vegas actually decided to have weather complete with hail and flash floods! it was an interesting start to the trip to say the least haha.

friday morning richard and i were up around 7a to make it to the airport to find my parents made it ok, but my moms luggage didnt, along with jessica boarding her plane at the last second because she wasnt super paying attention! like i said, interesting start. once we arrived in oakland we found jessica anxiously waiting for us in the baggage claim and boarded the bus to the bart station pretty easily. i apparently cant read a map correctly (im usually so good at it) and had us going about 20 minutes in the wrong direction! after jessica got us back on track we arrived in the city right on time to check into the hotel. we had booked it online and werent totally sure what to expect. the plus...it was literally steps from the bus stop and the bart station. the minus...it was in a really not so good area. so thank goodness for those transportation stops!!

we checked in no problem and set our sights on subway across the street for a very late lunch. we ate quickly because we were so hungry deciding to head down a few blocks to check out some shopping. the plan was to just kind of hang out the 1st day since we were doing most of our tourist things when my parents came into the city the next day. after a rather scary walk down the wrong side of the street we headed into the westfield mall to the be a little overwhelmed. it wasnt like any mall we see in vegas or phoenix! still very cool and it helped pass the time, plus jessica and i found this amazing chocolate shop that had amazing combos i had never seen before. 

not really knowing what to do after finishing we continued our shopping spree into union square and saw where the expo was being held! we were going there saturday morning with my mom so we steered clear. we decided on burger bar for dinner because jessica had never been and it satisfied all our culinary tastes! it was amazing as always and i was glad to walk it off a little bit afterward. we were soon able to meet up with betsy aka the everday warrior!! she and i had teamed up many months ago meeting over blogs and twitter to get a ticket into nike so i knew we needed to meet in person. we met at her hotel that had a great bar on the 39th floor with beautiful views. i was so glad to finally meet! soon afterward we decided it was time to head back to our hotel and turn in with such the long day of travel.

we finally meet!!!

saturday morning my parents were right on time with their bart train to meet at our hotel to head to the expo! my mom, jessica, and i took out coffee/tea with us as we headed to the fun while the boys stayed at starbucks. the expo was really cool and lots of photo ops of course:) inside the actual tent you are able to pick up your packet, check out a few of the sponsor products, and see some exhibits. the gear is all located across the street at niketown which we called in the boys for. i had seen a litle glimps online earlier in the week and knew my budget would be quickly out the window! oh man was it worth it though:)

after we got all our gear, bib, and took lots of pictures it was time for our hop on/hop off tour! it picked us up right in union square and our tour guide was hillarious. we got off at one of the 1st stops in chinatown and had a few eggrolls as we walked around! it was seriously cool. the tour buses are supposed to run every 1/2 hour so we headed back soon to the drop off point only to wait over an hour for the next bus. after much debate we decided to get off soon at the embarcedaro to walk down to the ferry building for lunch. well turns out i misjudged it a little (or a lot) and it ended up being about a 1 mile walk each way, oops. lunch was delicious once we finally got there and we decided no more getting off the bus once we caught it again.

one of each please!

we returned to the drop off point only to wait another really long time for the next bus. we decided to walk down just a little to pier 39 and actually caught the bus pretty quickly, thank goodness because i couldnt handle the anger anymore. the top of the bus was actually quite chilly with the wind and decided against our new plan of not getting off the bus again when we got to the golden gate bridge. i mean, really can you not get off for that??

as we waited for the bus to come back and pick us up, late again, i started dreaming about getting to little italy later for carboloading! my dad kept trying to convince us we needed to stay at the hotel and eat at the restaurant there. luckily i had lots of backup to help me veto:) we finished off our tour and headed back to the hotel to get warmer clothes. seriously, if you have an opportunity to do a hop on/hop off tour i highly suggest it, it was super fun, well when the buses were there to pick us up!

the chinese tea garden

jimi hendrixs house!

the adams family home.

city hall!

we headed to little italy soon after to lots of indecissiveness from my family and i was getting so hungry i just made the final choice. turned out to be a family style restraunt with absolutely amazing food. it was bursting with flavor and was just the right amount of food. plus i got to eat off of everyone elses plates, which is one of my favorite things ever:) i think we might have waddled back to the hotel after that one! sleep came pretty easy that night once back at the hotel with full bellys and early alarms set.

sunday morning was the big day! and i will recap the whole thing here...that you get to wait for:)

after the race we headed back ot the middle of the city and found a really great cafe still serving breakfast at almost noontime. we had an original plan of going to a place down by fishermans wharf that was suggested to my dad by his friends. but we stayed a little bit longer at the nike race and then my grandparents decided to come into the city about 2 hours early! needless to say our plans were switched around pretty well haha. spending time with them though was great and my grandma even brought my all time favorite cookies for me:)

our irish coffees, yum!

it was finally time for a shower, thank goodness! we decided to shower and chill out for just a bit before heading down to pier 39 for dinner and then onto the promise land...ghiradelli square for ice cream!!!! i finally got to have clam chowder and ice cream and in the same meal. it was glorious:)

yum!

we headed back to the hotel soon after since my parents had an early flight and there hadnt been a nap post race. i wont lie that i was getting a little sad part of our big group would be leaving:( i had a blast with everyone and am soooo soooo glad they were all able to make the trip! it wouldnt have been the same without everyone:)