We knew Wednesday was going to start early so we ordered breakfast the night before to be delivered to the room . . . I highly recommend this.
We headed out to catch the 8am ferry. We asked the doorman to hail us a cab, but instead he asked had the hotel town car drive us to the ferry terminal . . . I also recommend this. We arrived in plenty of time to purchase our tickets and get to the ferry gate.
The weather looked a little threatening, but since we would be inside for most of the day, we weren’t too worried.
The ferry ride to Vallejo was uneventful and when we arrived we were picked up by Steve of Platypus Tours. What a kick! He entertained us all the way to the train station in Napa.
After a wine tasting in the station, we boarded the train. We were seated in the dome car.
Dinner was amazing.
The soup was so good I didn’t even get a picture!
The Napa Vally Wine Train . . . highly recommended!
Most of Tuesday was spent in Chinatown. The forecast was overcast in the morning and rain showers in the afternoon. Armed with umbrellas we saw the sights, we shopped, we ate, we shopped some more. It ended up raining some in the morning, but never enough to actually use the umbrellas, then the afternoon was mostly clear.
Upon returning to our room I looked out the window and realized I could see Chinatown from our room . . . I had looked out the window dozens of times and never realized.
In the afternoon we did a little shoe shopping, let me just say, the Macy’s and Nordstroms in Seattle have nothing on the shoe departments in San Francisco . . . heck the Macy’s women’s shoe department was a full floor of the store . . . a full floor people! We went into Bloomingdales, but I have to say that although they had all the designer names, the shoes were pretty much all the same.
We ended the day with a few drinks in the lounge, lemondrops . . . yummy.
Yesterday we rented this cute little car
and headed north over the Golden Gate Bridge to the MiB Collection Showroom. Now, let me just say, that if you are plus size fat it can be hard to get good quality clothing and if you are really fat, forget about it. MiB is the exception, but then you are ordering clothes from a catalog or the internet and crossing your fingers that they fit and are flattering when they arrive so you don’t have to do the exchange thing. It was nice to go into the showroom try on everything. The drive was lovely, especially through farm country.
On the way home we stopped to snap a few pictures of the bridge.
After returning to the city we took a trip down Jennifer’s memory lane and visited her old stomping grounds, it has been a while since she left San Francisco so the phrase “hmmm, let’s see” was used quite often while looking at the map.
Oh, and it’s possible that I bought some new clothes.
The day started with coffee & Bailey’s on the airplane, moved on to champagne with tea before heading out to wander the city. We saw them turning the cable car . . .
and ended up at the Blue Mermaid at the Cannery where we ended with . . .
There won’t be sandy beaches or cabana boys, but there will be fruity drinks. I’m heading to San Francisco tomorrow morning, for five days. One of my dear friends used to live in SF so I am dragging her along to be my tour guide. We are abandoning husbands and children for five days of sight seeing, shopping, fine dining and drinking (not necessarily in that order).
Reservations have been made for a lunch time ride on the Napa Valley Wine Train and Google has been consulted about the location of yarn shops to be visited.
See you Friday.
Dad came home from the hospital February 24th, after deciding not to pursue further medical treatment. He was offered dialysis, he declined since the chances of it actually helping were slim to none as he was facing both heart and renal failure. Dad had been in the hospital three times with stays in a rehab facility in between, but when we got him home he told me he was just happy to be here.
His brother flew down from Anchorage and both of his sisters were able to see him. One of my aunts was there at the hospital and then here with us almost every day, she was an amazing comfort.
I have many regrets about the last 3 months, but bringing him home will never be one of them. The hospice people were all wonderful, from the nurses to the social workers to the aides. Oddly, the nurse who did the hospice admit was the same one who did the hospice admit for my mom last fall and she remembered our family, small world.
Friends and family kept telling me what a great thing I was doing, and how strong I was, and how ‘amazing’ I was. I didn’t feel any of those things, all I knew was that no matter how strong or amazing the things I was doing were, in the end I was still losing my dad. We brought him home, thinking we would have weeks with him. In reality we had exactly one week, he died on March 3rd, here at home, with family.
I would give almost anything to have him back.
I still haven’t really broken down yet. It became a bit of a joke with friends and family that when it was all over I would have a spectacular breakdown on a warm sandy beach, with cabana boys bringing me fruity drinks with umbrellas.
Obituary
