We first visited this restaurant in June 2011 and returned again in 2013 and if there is a way to fit it in this July we'll go again but our July schedule is pretty tight already as it is a 3 day flying visit.
Scenic restaurants can often rely on their location to turn the tables. Even if the food is not stellar the view can make up for it if you are hungry enough. In the case of the Waterfront the food is good and we have no complaints. The prices are not what we pay when we indulge ourselves in Fine Dining.
We most often eat just because we are hungry and not for indulgence's sake in some great chef's creations. Those are dining events and very memorable. Fleur de Lys is our SF go-to for fabulous cooking. The French chef there-Hubert Keller who would be familiar to viewers of Food Network or Bravo food shows (Top Chef) is one of our favorite TV chefs. What looks good on TV tastes sublime on a fork.
The part of the restaurant we are dining in is a tent structure with see-through plastic windows as it is an add-on to the bricks and mortar main restaurant. The view is exactly what we hoped for. The interior of the main restaurant is warm and cosy.
There is street parking but as we were already down at the Ferry Building (what a surprise!) we walked and took a cab back to the hotel afterwards.
I walk a lot in San Francisco, mainly in the morning before any planned excursion. Firstly to St Mary's Square for my first quiet cup of coffee, then downhill to the Ferry Building for coffee number two and to people/ship watch while the city wakes.
Once on the Embarcadero and with time to kill, I'll take the long walk North to Pier 39. From there it is an uphill and downhill trek back across the city to the Omni, skirting Chinatown along the way. I have yet to be in Chinatown at night nor have I eaten there as Chinese food isn't high on my list of favorites. Now if it was called Indiatown that might be different.
They were preparing for the America's Cup yacht race in July 2013 while we were there so those boats were often seen practicing. Our afternoon excursion that Friday was a sail on Carol's brother's yacht from it's home in Alameda out into the choppy bay. That would involve a drive over the Bay Bridge to Oakland. I love big bridges and San Francisco has it's fair share.
Along the way I passed by Mama's restaurant where the wait to get into the place can take two hours or more of standing in line on the street-for breakfast. (see Yelp.com for reviews and photos). I can say without hesitation that there is no restaurant on Earth (am not familiar with restaurants on nearby Planets) where I would stand and wait for two hours to sample their wares.
Back in March 2011 we decided to take our first sea cruise together-to Alaska on a Princess ship called the Coral Princess. When in San Francisco that June I found that the Sea Princess would be returning from an Alaskan cruise. As I am always up early anyway I thought I'd walk over the hills through Chinatown to the pier area on the Embarcadero. I knew she would dock at pier 35 and by now, after seeing Crystal Symphony at the same dock a few days earlier, I knew close-ups were not to be had. It was a nice morning for a walk anyway.
To any Princess fans reading, excuse my ignorance when I refer to the canvas area on the stern as the "Sanctuary". I hadn't been on a Princess ship then but now I have been on 5 and am up to speed.
On my last cruise (January 2014) some folks asked me if I worked for Princess such is my newly gleaned knowledge from sailing with them. Got a question? Ask away! I might make up some of the answers but this is America so cut me some slack!
The next video is another visit to the Cliff House but this time for dinner as the sun went down. Not a memorable sunset alas as there was a big bank of cloud hovering over the sea. The food there is good-not great. My favorite restaurant in San Fransisco is this one in the photo below.....
This is the home of a favorite chef- Hubert Keller, from Alsace, France and the food there is exquisite. It has no view though and that's where the Cliff House scores big. It's also half the price of the exquisite meal. I look forward to returning to Fleur either in SF or in Las Vegas.
As we were going to be in San Francisco during July 4th 2013, Carol, after some research, found a dinner cruise and I loved the idea of being out on the water watching the fireworks rather than being in a huge crowd on the streets. She booked a table for four.
So it was that a day that began at the Ferry Building at sunrise and continued through a morning visit to the Botanical Gardens followed by lunch in Noe Valley, wound up again near the Ferry Building before sunset as we stepped aboard our vessel for the four hour cruise. We paid a premium to have a window table. There was a duo-excellent guitarist and a girl singer entertaining us. Four courses were served at half-hour intervals so one was free to get up and walk out on deck and enjoy the sights around the bay.
We sailed close to Alcatraz then over to the sheltered bay at Tiburon. From there out to the Golden Gate Bridge before returning to a midway point between the two downtown firework display areas to anchor.
Here's a video from the cruise.......pardon the occasional wind noise.
If you are reading this via your email notification there will be a blank screen possibly where the video resides if viewed instead on my blog site. Just a head's up.
This is the video I was shooting as I was taking photos in the gardens.
From the Botanical Gardens we (and I mean the car's Navigation system) made our way to the Castro district as we were going to brunch with Carol's brother and his girlfriend.
It's a very hilly district (in San Francisco? How odd) so make sure your parking brake is working and remember to turn your wheels into the kerb so your car doesn't end up a mile away after bumping into 100 others on the downward journey.
There's a view from up there.....
Wow-there's a hill not covered by houses!
Panorama
We went to brunch at an old favorite called Savor where they have courtyard dining out at the back, luckily with shade and formed plans to go sailing as Carol's brother has a 34 ft yacht. Sailing in SF Bay is something we love to do and there's always an onboard picnic. Eating outdoors is maybe my favorite way to enjoy food. Everything seems to taste better somehow.
On to the desert plants, some of which look like they came from another planet.
We have traveled a lot in the Southwest of the USA- 8 visits to Santa Fe and 3 to Sedona, Phoenix, Flagstaff etc so we have seen some of these before but I can't identify them for you.
We've moved on from the desert and I know these are poppies.
Riot Police arrive to control children who were sniffing the fragrant flowers
Heading back to the main entrance in the distance after maybe three hours of strolling the gardens.
Walking back to the car I saw by the roadside my favorite flowers-known as Red Hot Pokers.
We tried growing them in our Michigan garden one year but there just wasn't enough sun to make them happy.
Nice.
So ended our happy time in these beautiful gardens.
If it's a sunny day you can do no better than visit this magnificent series of gardens showing trees, plants and shrubs from all over the world that suit the mild climate of California. You'll need a map and there's a lot of walking if you want to see it all. It's 55 acres of beauty set in Golden Gate Park.
Admission is $7 for non-residents of SF. sfbotanicalgarden.org
Parking is on the long perimeter road that circles the gardens and there's two entrances for convenience sake.
You can sample redwood forests, desert plants, Australian and South African habitat etc. We always like to start at the Japanese gardens.....
A tranquil and restful start to the tour. Little splashing waterfalls here and there
Coi pond
Great idea to throw coins in the water...(?)
I have yet to visit Japan but like their idea of beauty. Someday a Princess cruise around Japan is in order as my favorite ship, Diamond Princess, is stationed there.
Such a pleasant place to walk when you have no schedule, just living in the moment.
As I recall there may be a separate fee to enter the Japanese gardens but whatever it was it was laughably little for what you experience there.
Here is a map where you can see all the different areas identified. It's not just a "walk in the park"....
I am a big lover of what's known as an English Garden where plants grow together in a natural ad-hoc fashion moreso than formal gardens where each flower has it's own little patch. As Nature intended you might say.
As it was a hot day it was nice to step into the cool redwood forest.
Carol has found a bench but then that is her forte!
The city is now but a memory
Suitably refreshed by the cool air in the forest we were ready to move on to the desert gardens nearby...
Getting up early on vacation is habitual with me and maybe you can see why in the video that will come with this blog.
We've stayed at the Omni a few times now and will do so this July so my routine will continue no doubt. I walk North on California to St Mary's Square. It's a steep climb but only a block or so.
I have a Starbucks coffee in hand and a big camera bag over my shoulder.
The square is a nice calm, quiet place to sit and reflect on the day just passed and look forward to today's adventures-in today's case we are planning to revisit the Botanical Garden to the west of the city, something we had first visited back in 1999 when we were in San Francisco for some Wagner Opera.
We would return with time on our hands and better cameras to capture the beauty there.
Once the first cup of coffee is drained it's time for another but this one I get down at the Ferry Building which is a good 15 minute steady walk downhill until the Omni it flattens out . Most of the places that are open at this hour (7 am) are called Starbucks.
Across from the Ferry Building is a park where many of the homeless men are waking. They have shopping carts which they somehow forgot to return to the supermarket, piled high with-well, with anything.
There is also a daily street market geared towards the souvenir buyer-photos and paintings of San Francisco, cheap jewelry, bags and general bric a brac. They set up in a leisurely fashion as they have a long day ahead.
There may be a drummer in the center of the Embarcadero on an island between the wide traffic lanes, setting up his collection of inverted plastic paint tubs and beaten-up cymbals for today's improvised performance.
Most of the Ferry Building's shops are still shuttered as the crowds aren't here yet. The one that matters most at this hour is already doing a roaring trade from the people who are already arriving/departing on the Ferrys- Peets Coffee where they get you in and out quickly.
Once outside I find a bench by the water and relax, looking at the eye-candy bay.
A treat for the eyes.
Soon the commuter ferries will dock and people will walk of or ride their bikes off to head to work in the many office buildings, shops and restaurants nearby. All the shops in the Ferry Building will spring to life-artisinal cheese shops, bread shops, hot takeaway stands, seafood restaurants, meat purveyors, bookstores and so on.
On the deep sidewalk on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays there will be a fruit and veg market spring up. The Saturday one is the biggest and includes some stalls from local restaurants giving you a taste of their hot food. That draws a big crowd of munchers.
There's also the very excellent kitchenware store Sur La Table in the Ferry.
There's a short video coming up where I mention trying to get a closer look at a cruise ship docked at Pier 35 but this is the best I could do- looking through the glass door where passengers go in to embark. They are building a new cruise terminal at Pier 27 further south as ships have grown bigger over the years and carry a lot more passengers-2500 plus.
I used to work on a cruise ship back in the mid 1980's (Royal Caribbean's Song of Norway) and
hadn't seen one in a long time, hence my excitement.
Here's a little video of the Pier 39 area where a lot of the photos in the last blog were taken....
The Embarcadero is a very wide street running parallel to the water of San Francisco Bay. There are many piers along it's length including those serving the Ferry Building at the Southern end. Along the way various piers house restaurants, dinner cruise boats, luxury cruise ships, yachting marinas and tourist attractions like Fisherman's Wharf, where seafood is king and many tourist shops and restaurants abound. It's a noisy, fun-filled hub. Bars and coffee shops abound.
You can eat, drink and be merry here.
There's ample street and garage parking nearby and of course the area is served by bus and tram.
The Embarcadero is flat so walking is a good option from downtown.
Alcatraz is never far from view. There are regular sightseeing tour boats shuttling back and forth but I haven't shown an interest in taking one so far.
You may see an occasional Naval ship tied up. There was also a submarine when I was last there.
A fast thrill-ride boat at rest in one of the marinas.
This marks the location of Aquarium of the Pacific which I haven't found time to delve into yet- but as I am going back to SF for this year's 4th of July celebrations I might pay it a long-overdue visit.
Another warship-always something interesting at each pier so look right as you pass when heading North.
