Tuesday, August 26, 2008

California: Lombard Street

For anyone just tuning in, we took a vacation to San Francisco back in June. I wanted to recall and record the details of our trip after our return home, but I couldn't seem to get all the blogging done in a timely manner, so I'm doing it bit by bit as life allows. This is the next installment of the California series. To see all the previous vacation stories together, just click here.

As I mentioned last time, from the top of Coit Tower we spotted our next destination--one that we knew we wanted to visit while in San Fran but hadn't really worked into our plans yet. If you look at this picture, you might be able to see (in the top right quadrant of the frame) the tourist spot that we were drawn to. After seeing it at this height, we decided to make the walk up to Lombard Street.

Since we'd already walked a good 8 miles that day, we decided to just keep on hoofing it towards the famous crooked part of Lombard, which was only about 1 more hilly mile away. It was actually a pretty fun walk, because there are so many beautiful homes along Lombard Street. I was completely fascinated by the way most front doors on this street were straight up a steep flight of stairs, and most tiny garages were positioned directly beneath each home. No yards, no porches--all houses attached to each other. There were some really cool homes, but it is such a different way of living than here in the Midwest!

When we arrived at the "crookedest street" in San Francisco, we pretty much just walked the steps up to the top and took lots of pictures. They've done some beautiful landscaping on this block, and there are wonderful views of Alcatraz and Coit Tower from the top of the hill, but it's still kind of funny that it's become such a crazy big tourist draw. There are tons of people walking up and down the street at any given time and almost always a line of cars waiting to take their turn just to drive down it. It's kind of crazy that people are so entertained by this, since there's really not much to actually do here except climb up and down a bunch of stairs! With that said, I'm still very glad we visited Lombard!

2 comments:

amber said...

Kudos to you for walking UP Lombard! When we walked to it, we managed to walk up the streets leading to it (as countless shuttles holding tourists passed us, headed exactly where we were!). Once we arrived, we walked DOWN the street! I recall thinking that I'd never want to drive a big SUV down it because it seemed so tight. And I still remember the gorgeous hydrangeas. I'd never seen so many in one place. Thanks for letting me reminisce this morning too!

Beth said...

I remember Lombard Street from my family vacation to San Fran. It seemed like ridiculous city planning to me, even as a high schooler. The houses there are so fun ot look at, if not a little cramped to live in, I would think... :)