A Secret

Year: 2010

Month: May

Day: 9th

Occasion(s): My 28th Birthday and my 2nd Mother's Day

One memorable gift: Surprise destination trip ... just Mom and me.

Can you guess where? Well, if you can't, here are a few hints...I bet you still don't have any idea, do you? Those of you who already know, just shhhh...That wasn't much more help, was it?

Am I at least allowing you to get a little warmer with your guesses or are you still freezing cold?

Does this look familiar to anyone at all? I bet you've guessed it now!! And, if you haven't... um... keeping comments to myself.

But, that's right, we went to San Fransisco! You ask, "How did she keep it a secret for so long?" Well, you see, I love to be surprised. And when Mom offered the trip to me in February or March, I was so excited about the unknown that I didn't want to know. I will tell you that SF was not at the top of my list for places to go, but I am so glad I went and would go back if I had the chance.

So, how/when did she tell me where we were going. That's kind of the funny part. We were in the airport having our luggage checked and she asked the lady a question to make sure that our luggage would follow us all the way to our final destination because we didn't have a direct flight. The lady's response: "Yes, the luggage will follow you to San Fransisco". Mom and I just looked at each other and smiled. I am not sure when she would have told me, but that didn't matter any more.

After leaving the luggage lady, we were on the way to security and mom told me that the reason why she chose San Fransisco was because that was her mother's favorite city and she had never been there before. She wanted to go and visit and see what it was like and what better way to do that than to go with her daughter. I almost started to cry, so I jokingly asked her to stop talking. I just wanted to be excited about the trip! For those of you that do not know, my mother's mom ("Grammy") passed away in February of 2008. She was 80 years old. Infact, she had just celebrated her 80th birthday on February 5th of that year (and passed on the 20th). She was a wonderful lady and a very special Mom and Grandmother to four children and eleven grandchildren. Needless to say, I was thrilled to be sharing this experience with my mom.

We only where in San Fransisco for a weekend but it was jammed packed with sight-seeing and tours. Mom loves to do those kinds of things because you learn so much more about the, um, "behind the scenes" stuff about the big cities. Especially when you have a good tour guide.

We visited the Golden Gate BridgeAte at Boudin Bakery each morning for breakfast, rode a double decker bus for a tour and got just a wee bit burnt after we only talked about putting sunscreen on, took a tour of Alcatraz...Saw the production "Wicked" with a dear friend of mine that lives near the area, saw the most expensive home in San Fransisco -- which is owned by Danielle Steele, toured downtown twice but saw different things each time, had a wonderful veiw of Lombard Street but my camera just wouldn't take a good picture of it, rode a cable car, and to wrap up the tours, we were able to view these famous "Ladies"...
Now, those were just some quick highlights from our trip. This posting would be way too long to detail EVERYTHING we saw and did. However, here are some things that I noticed while we were there and walking around.

1) The homeless don't lie: While walking the streets of SF, you will find that there are many homeless people asking for money. However, you should take note of their signs that request money. "No need to lie, it's for weed" or "No need to lie, its for beer".

2) Seafood smells make me nauseous: We stayed at Fisherman's Wharf and walked near the water quite a bit. There are several seafood resturants in a row on the main drag there and oh, my golly... do they stink!! Ewwe.

3) Danielle Steele is really rich: So I mentioned previously that we saw the most expensive home in downtown SF. I really shouldn't say that I saw the home because there is a HUGEMONGOUS hedge on the property borders that block the home, but I was able to see the top of it. So, she purchased that home for a whopping $30 million and the tour guide told us that before the market crash, the home was valued at $60 million!

4) The homeless (and others) will do some interesting stuff to earn money: I saw a man sitting on a crate holding a large tree limb/bush in front of him. There were a few picture takers behind him. He was facing on coming walkers and every so often he would shove his limb out a little bit and say "BOO!" and scare the day lights out of the people coming by. It was quite entertaining. Maybe it was because he didn't scare me... the first time I saw him do it, I was on the side of the photographers and I knew what he was doing when I came back by. I beleive the girl in front of me just about fell off the curb. It was quite histerical.

5) The Golden Gate Bridge: Is painted yearly and it takes 365 days to paint. Just as the painters are finishing the last stroke at the end of the bridge they turn right back around and begin again. Can we say, "job security"? However, if you go to visit the bridge make sure you go at the right time of the year because if you don't, fog will cloud your view of the bridge even as you drive on it.

So, again, I had a marvelous time and will cherish the memories of this trip forever. Thank you Mom for planning such a trip and maybe, just maybe, we can do something like this again?!?! :)