San Francisco

The next morning, we awoke and had a date to meet Ray Stanton at around 10 am.  We headed over and spent a very nice morning with him and his new wife Peng.  

His home is an architectural masterpiece.  I simply loved it.  The columns holding up the roof were amazing. But you aren't reading this to hear about a building.  Ray has a few puzzles in his home, but sadly most of them were put in boxes.  He had just moved into this place recently and hadn't unpacked everything yet.  I did manage to take a few photos of what he had on display.  

One of the other things he collects is clocks.  He had some really beautiful wooden ones and a few others that caught my eye.  

We also spent a bit of time looking at his workshop and hearing stories of other puzzlers and why he chose the machines he did. 

We spent a couple of hours there and since it was Super Bowl Sunday, we left so he could go to a party. George and I had a few hours so we went back to spend a bit more time with Harry.  We brought lunch with us and had a nice chat again.  His friend Thomas was there and he and George talked 3D printers and George showed him how to use Burr Tools. Harry showed me yet another stash of puzzles under his desk and I added a few more to the collection.

From here we went to check in to our hotel.  We love staying at this tiny little hotel on Bush Street: Cornell Hotel de France. It has parking across the road and is in walking distance of the Bart station.  After we dumped our bags, we hopped on a train and headed over to see Derrick Schneider.  He and George used to work together a long time ago.

Because they are getting ready for a trip, we met in a local restaurant for dinner and a chat.  It was Mexican food if anyone is interested, too spicy on the salsa, delicious beans and rice.  The food the guys had looked good too.  We spent around 3 hours just chatting, but sadly needed to say our good byes and head back to the city for slumber.

The next morning George spent a good while in bed. Me? at 10am I headed down to the Lego store to check it out. I bought a few of their postcards and forgot to get my passport stamped.  I then wandered around the mall for a while before heading back to George.  

When I returned to the hotel we got moving and went to see his son Joe.  We had a nice walk around to a few puzzle stores and even managed to pick up 2 that we didn't have.  We then took a bus to Joe's new house and had a look at the beautiful neighborhood he lives in.  After a while George and I left to have some lunch in the Castro district.  I had pancakes!  This is the first time in over 5 years!  Man were they good!  The oozing butter, the sweet sweet syrup.  It was ecstasy.  And very heavy in calories and really just not good for me.  But every once in a while you have to break down and give in to temptation.  Just wait until we get to Texas.  I'm soooo looking forward to one of those state-shaped waffles. ;)

After lunch we returned to the hotel where George napped and I put together a few Nanoblocks. At 5 we left to meet Joe for a movie.  We saw The Triangle of Sadness.  Don't waste your time, it is about 3 hours you won't get back again but it was nice to spend time together anyway.  Dinner that night was in a Japanese place just around the corner and it was straight to bed for us.  

The next day George spent in bed catching up on all his lost naps and doing a bit of programming. I on the other hand had other plans.  I put together a few more Nanoblocks in the morning and around 10 I headed out for Japantown to try to find some more Nanoblocks.  I managed to get the deluxe pirate chest (3280 of the 4mm sized pieces). This should be a challenging build.  Maybe I'll save it for the ship across to Italy.

I found Daiso when I was over there and hit paydirt with their brand of Nanoblock.  I managed to find around 25 sets.  All at $1.75 each!  I bought every copy they had :) I then took a bus back to Lego to get that passport stamped and grabbed a pick-a-brick bucket and purchased a bunch of pieces for a project I'm working on. Oh what fun!  

I returned to the hotel with a late lunch and what I thought was a beer for George.  I didn't want to buy 6-pack so I found a place that sold beer by the can. I asked for a local dark beer and the lady behind the counter showed me a rather large can. I purchased it and brought it back to the hotel. It was called Loco.  14.9% alcohol and NOT beer.  I think this is the stuff the drunks on the street drink.  George took a sip and asked for a glass of water instead.  I took a sip and tipped the can down the drain.  So much for that.

In the afternoon we slept and I put together a few more Nanoblocks while George programmed.  At 6 I packed everything up as the next day we were heading south to meet more friends.  That night was our anniversary so we once again headed to the Roxanne Cafe for a simple dinner.  All in all, it was a nice few days in San Francisco.

Travel time and arriving in California

This sign says it all.  We started out yesterday in Colorado, drove through Utah and Nevada and ended up in California.  I didn't post yesterday because all we had to show for the day was a bunch of photos of the beautiful scenery.  At one point we passed sleeping dinosaurs.  We then entered the arctic, only to be closely followed by the surface of the moon. The country truly is a beautiful space.  For two days we lost ourselves in a Ken Follett classic and the beauty of the world around us.  

I saw tumbleweeds roll across the road, we saw wild horses, we saw fields of cattle grazing.  Our route was US50 and while it was a very good road, at times it was four lane, and others it was only two.  It is dubbed the loneliest road in America and I believe it.  We saw very few cars. There is a booklet that you can get stamps on all the way across, and when you collect 5 the parks service will send you a certificate. Sadly, I only managed 3. The places that have hte stamps were mostly museums and closed when we arrived.  No matter, it was fun all the same. When crossing the Sierras if the sign said slow down to 50, I quickly learned it really meant 30.  There were numerous times that we just didn't know how we would get across the mountain only to be taken on a windy road through a pass.  

I've had friends tease me about how in awe I am of this place, but as a child vacations didn't exist for our family.  I've traveled I80 across from Illinois to California, but never had i gone this route.  If we don't travel any further on this trip, these past three days have been worth it.  

We were to go into Nevada and see George's old friend Wally Lee, but sadly his health took a turn for the worse and we had to pass.  It all worked out in the end because we got to make a few extra visits that we hadn't planned on, but more of that over the next few days.

Since we missed Wally, George decided we should go to Giga Nevada.  We've seen Freemont and Shanghai so why not?  We didn't get as close as we would have liked, and while I was sitting on the side of the road looking up the next address, the Tesla police came and shoed me away.  You can bet we will go to Giga Texas in a few more weeks.

We arrived in Livermore at around 6:30 at night.  The mountains are beautiful, but I didn't like driving through them.  George will drive when necessary, but prefers not to and so far it has all been me.  I'll admit, last night I was a lot grumpy.  It was dark, I was tired, my back ached from driving so rigidly.  We were driving due west so the sun was in my eyes while we had it and the tension was just too much for me.  We ended up staying at some suites place. The bed was soft and inviting, but they really didn't have a restaurant, but just a little bistro. Now I've been trying to stay away from gluten, and sadly, that was really all they had on the menu. In the end I ordered some buffalo wings with the batter removed and the worst tasting olives I've ever had.  

We awoke around 8 the next morning, had breakfast and drove over to see Harry Nelson. For my non-puzzling friends, he had a hand in producing a boatload of puzzles.  A rather brilliant man.  We arrived at 11:15 and spent quite a few hours chatting about puzzles and people we all know.  He was probably as happy to see us as we were to see him.  After a while his son came in and we all spoke for a while longer. We made a nice lunch as Harry is unable to really go out much.  

Very kindly he let me go upstairs and rummage through a rom full of duplicate puzzles.  I filled up 4 boxes to take along for the museum with the promise of more to come in future.  The entire time we were there, I kept handing him puzzles and was surprised to hear that he had a hand in the design, or the invention, or the bringing it to market.  I guess my 'old puzzle people' knowledge isn't as good as I thought.  George and Harry reminisced about when they used to visit each other in the past.  It was a very nice way to spend the morning.

Our next stop was the lego store so I could purchase a gift for a friends daughter.  I also bought myself a monkey set. From here we drove to see our friend Dave Litwin, but my GPS took me to a different friends house. We got back on our way and the GPS told me I could save 5 minutes by taking a different route.  Sure.  Why not?  It took us down the most amazing road.  

We saw the giant redwoods, we saw a family of wild turkeys, we drove through the wiggliest road I've ever been on. The canyon to the right was so deep I couldn't see the bottom.

Eventually we got to Daves and he showed us his puzzle collection and his razor collection before we headed out for dinner.

 It was a great way to end a wonderful day. 

We stayed in a Motel 6 just down the road from dinner. It was the first hotel off the interstate.  OMG! The room was fine.  Cheap and it had hot water and a bed.  But around midnight, Johnny Walker and Peg-Leg-Pete took up occupancy in the room above us.  First they moved all the furniture around, then they stomped back and forth across the floor for an hour.  At 4 am I heard them wake up again from a shout sent by someone in a neighboring room.  Stomp Stomp Stomp.  George and I are convinced it was a traveling meth lab.  I turned the noisy room heater on to try and drown out that noise.  Oh what a night.