Thinking about the problems of San Francisco with its noise and vagrancy issues spoiling the place. Then off over to Pier 41 and off to Alcatraz for boat trip and the tour and back for other experiences as a pair of nesting turtle doves caught our eye.
San Francisco is, like the rest of the United States, a noisy city but at least the lack of need for air-conditioning means nights in a hotel are quieter. The Americans will need to tackle the noise problem in a big way, along with their wasteful use of fuel as petrol or "gas" cannot be a sustainable resource when squandered at $1.20 a gallon. These problems are more soluble than that of the inequality, poverty and lawlessness where violence is often the result of desperation. A nice nature cameo greeted me this morning, however. A pair of turtle or collared doves started building a nest on the inside window sill of a facing hotel room as the occupants had left the window slightly open over night.
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The flying couple were happily carting twigs inside and ended up sitting on the nest and trying to lay an egg until the occupants awoke and spoilt things. Breakfast in the hotel grounds again, but "Oh La La!" were short-handed and struggling to cope just as the proprietor seemed to be visiting with a guest and the unfortunate waitress capped her performance by dropping a half-full mug of coffee on the floor by the service station! Unfortunately, Diana finds this formula far too tempting and helped herself to three pastries as well as a bowl of fruit and some fruit juice and coffee! She is still putting on a lot of weight this trip and shows little control in this land of excess and abundance.
It was 9.45am before we got out this morning (our latest time yet) but by this time the doves nesting again and seemed to be incubating an egg! Over to Pier 41 to buy our tickets for the boat trip to Alcatraz and, the first not being available until later, we walked over to Pier 39 and saw "The San Francisco Experience" where pictures, vibration and sound machines re-created the atmosphere of the city - its beauty, its history, and its traumas. The family then enjoyed the Alcatraz Tour; Della being this time old enough to understand its historic relevance.
Back later in the afternoon and, as the girls swam in the hotel pool, Di and I rode the buses on a circuitous tour around Coit Tower until we got to the "The Haight"; which is a road in the west of San Francisco where there was much for sale, but we bought nothing. This road was once the centre of the "Hippy" or "Flower People" population of the 1960's but now such problems as beggars and tramps spoils the attraction of this fine city - one tramp had to be ejected from the bus where he lay across the back seat in a sleepy torpor. Tonight, I took Di to an American restaurant at Fisherman's Wharf where we had a fine but expensive meal of ribs, chicken, and shrimp with ice cream-covered brownies to follow.