San Francisco

On January 10th, Mom, Dad, Mike and I boarded a plane to invade, oops - I mean visit Mandy and Kei in their new home in San Francisco!!

We had the opportunity to tour Alcatraz while we there...

It was a very interesting tour on a surprisingly beautiful island. Below you can see us on the boat ride out to the island.

Behind Mandy is the courtyard that the prisoners would use for recreation. You can see the golden gate bridge just beyond the wall.

And, here is Mike in the courtyard...

It is hard to believe that this seemingly romantic scene below is taken within the confines of the Alcatraz recreation yard.

Below you can see the view of San Francisco from the island. This view was only available to the residents of the island - the prison guards and their families.

 

Mike and Kei in front of the water tower spray painted from the time the Native Americans took over Alcatraz and claimed the island.

Let's move on to something a little lighter, shall we? Here you can see a few pictures from our day walking around the shops of San Francisco and our time at the warf.

 

After a long day of eating and then eating some more, it is always a good idea to make a stop at the infamous Mitchell's ice cream shop where you can get any flavor of ice cream you could imagine...even avocado ice cream!!

Yup, that is avocado ice cream.

On Saturday, we drove out of the city to have a BBQ at a beautiful ocean-side park.  Kei and Mandy created some Japanese cuisine and we soaked up some sun.

The day was capped off with the Packer play-off game graciously hosted by Yoriko and Neil!!

We had a wonderful trip and we are so grateful that Mandy and Kei put up with all four of us in their apartment for the weekend. It feels like a very unique moment in time that we were able to be in this beautiful city together in the final months before Mike and I are no longer just Mike and I.