Tag: san francisco

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Westering Twilight

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Flew back home last night, a flight that lifted off on O’Hare’s eastbound runway 9R at 6:35 p.m. CDT, circled north, then climbed into a long westering sunset and twilight. We had cloud cover most of the way, but got glimpses of the Fox River, the Rock River, and the Mississippi. More gliimpses: Iowa farms, the North Platte River, Interstate 25 north of Denver. Further west, saw Utah Lake and the cities of Provo and Orem in the dusk. Then mostly blank, dark countryside until we crested the Sierra Nevada, where the lights of the foothills and Central Valley, the Livermore Valley and the Bay Area, all shone.

My seven Chicago days went fast. My dad is prone to what I might euphemistically call confusion about some day-to-day events (a confusion that does not extend to all things, though. When we drive around Chicago, he’s generally pretty quick to answer requests for navigation help). I had told him I was leaving Thursday and reminded him of that a couple times before yesterday. I kept him abreast of my preparations to go yesterday. Still, he twice expressed surprise when I appeared with my suitcase and satchel and said I was heading out. “You are?” he said. “When are you coming back?”

“When would you like me to come back?” I asked. “Tomorrow!” he said. Soon, I hope. But today, here I sit, 1,836 air miles away.

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Somewhere It’s Summer …

Well, summer is everywhere in the Northern Hemisphere, to be technical. You can tell because it’s hot just about everywhere east of the Berkeley Hills. And I mean everywhere: I hear on NPR this morning that Moscow (the one in Russia) just chalked up its first 100-degree reading in 120 years of record-keeping.

But west of the Berkeley Hills? It’s been a cool, cool summer so far. Jan Null, a local meteorologist, says in a message to his email list that San Francisco just went through the coolest July in decades. He writes:

“With an average monthly maximum July temperature of just 63.1 degrees, San Francisco had its coolest July since 1971 and the 13th coolest in the past 97 years. (See table below) Only one day reached the 70 degree mark (72 degrees on 7/3 and no day after the 17th exceeded 64 degrees.”

I will only add that now we’re into August, which by tradition if not meteorological fact is regarded as the coolest, foggiest month along this stretch of coast. The week’s certainly starting out with a nice cold, gray blanket of clouds–thick enough that we had a light drizzle this morning. (And lest anyone think I’m whining, let me add that most of these chill mornings in the East Bay have been giving way to spectacular, sunny afternoons during which the temperature gets clear up to the high 60s and maybe even nudges 70.)

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Overpass World

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Down where the northern slope of San Francisco's Potrero Hill flattens into the southwestern edge of South of Market, two big elevated freeways merge–Interstate 80, which begins its cross-continent trip about a mile west of the Bay Bridge, and U.S. 101, which emerges from its southbound passage on city streets and heads toward San Jose and Los Angeles. Below the freeways are a maze of streets where at least two of the city's clashing grid systems come together. I've worked in the area on and off for nearly a decade, and when I take the North Berkeley casual carpool over to the city, I hike through the heart of the area beneath the freeways–Overpass World, you might call it. It's bordered by an interior design district to the east and to the west by jewelry, antique, and auction houses. Overpass World itself is full of parking lots, invisible clouds of particulates spewed out by the hundreds of thousands of vehicles that pass overhead every day, homeless camp sites, and the occasional attention-grabbing graffito. And regarding those last couple of items, above is a scene from my walk into work on Friday morning, on San Bruno Avenue near 15th Street.


View Underpass World in a larger map

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Safe Surrender

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Firehouse on Bluxome Alley, just off Fourth Street, in San Francisco, during my Friday night walk to the ferry.

Bluxome runs parallel to and between Brannan and Townsend, well south of Market. I had never heard of it until the night of the 1989 earthquake. The quake caused a wall to collapse into the street at the corner of Sixth and Bluxome, less than two blocks from this spot, killing five people. I never actually walked along Bluxome Alley until 2001, when I went to work in an office at Eighth and Townsend. Occasionally I’d ride the casual carpool to First and Fremont, or somewhere in the vicinity, and walk over to Eighth. By the time I first strolled down the alley, the building that had partially collapsed was gone and a condominium building had gone up in its place.

(And what’s a Safe Surrender Site? Under a California law enacted in ’01, “a parent or person with lawful custody can safely surrender a baby confidentially and without fear of prosecution within 72 hours of birth.” The law “requires the baby be taken to a public or private hospital, designated fire station or other safe surrender site. No questions will be asked.” People who give up babies this way have 14 days to change their minds. The state says 348 babies have been surrendered in California in this manner since the law went into effect. Also: 46 other states have similar laws.)

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Love Me, Love My Suitable Instrument

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Posted on a newish condo-type building on Alabama Street, near 20th, in the Mission. What got my attention is that this looks like a custom-made sign. I’m taken by the stylized figure of the doberman-style dog and the crouching human (is that pose just art, or is it part of the health code).

Section 40 of the San Francisco Health Code, which the sign cites, is here. And also here:

SEC. 40. DOG TO BE CONTROLLED SO AS NOT TO COMMIT NUISANCES.

(a) It shall be unlawful for any person owning or having control or custody of any dog to permit the animal to defecate upon the public property of this City or upon the private property of another unless the person immediately remove the feces and properly dispose of it; provided, however, that nothing herein contained authorizes such person to enter upon the private property of another without permission.

(b) It shall be unlawful for any person to walk a dog on public property of this City or upon the private property of another without carrying at all times a suitable container or other suitable instrument for the removal and disposal of dog feces.

(c) Visually handicapped persons who use Seeing Eye Guide Dogs are exempt from this law. (Amended by Ord. 420s78, App. 9/8/78)

What’s the penalty if you don’t pick up (or fail to carry “a suitable container”)?

SEC. 41.13. PENALTIES.

… Any person violating the provisions of Sections 40,41.11(c) and 41.12(a) of this Article shall be deemed to be guilty of an infraction and upon conviction thereof shall be punished for the first offense by a fine not to exceed $10; for the second offense by a fine not to exceed $25; for a third and each additional offense by a fine not to exceed $50.

The requirements are pretty much the same under Berkeley’s Municipal Code (10.04.091): If you walk a dog, carry a “suitable instrument” for picking up dog leavings, and use it. The penalty is more expensive, though: $100 for a first offense, $200 for the second, $500 for the third.

All the dog-crap lawmaking has some effect: in Berkeley, most trash receptacles are full of “suitable instruments” (usually plastic newspaper bags) that are themselves full of dog waste. It’s still a little surprising to me how much people just leave, though.

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16th Street, Out of Sequence

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Shot Monday afternoon on 16th Street at Harrison in the fabulous environs of MiPo (Mission-Potrero). We had a day of winterish rain Sunday and showers early Monday. But by Monday evening the sky was scoured and the setting sun was brilliant. Today was bright, clear, and cool again. A warm-up is coming the next two or three days, but I’m not buying that the rain is gone for the season.

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Long-Distance Cycling: Behind-the-Windshield View

We drove up to Mendocino over the weekend using the easy route from the East Bay: U.S. 101 through Marin and Sonoma counties to Highway 128 in Cloverdale, out 128 to the coast and Highway 1, then up 1.

We weren’t in a big hurry, so we decided to stop in Cloverdale, the last town in Sonoma before you reach the Mendocino County line. The last several times I’ve been up there, I’ve either been on a bicycle or have been supporting someone else’s ride. In 2007, I remember going through Cloverdale twice: late at night near the northern end of a 400-kilometer brevet, shepherding a semi-lost and semi-lightless rider, then again passing through both ways on a rainy 600-kilometer brevet (I got doused on the way north; by the time I came back the next morning, the weather had turned and it was sunny and warm and a big tailwind was building–I smile just thinking of it).

All by way of saying that when we spotted several bikes at the gas station/convenience mart at the south end of town, it took me about five seconds to figure out I was looking at people on a brevet (the combination of the gear on the bikes and some of the jerseys–a California Triple Crown and a San Francisco Randonneurs–tipped me off). I asked and found that the riders were about nine hours out on a 400-kilometer brevet from the Golden Gate Bridge up to Hopland. From where I met them they had something like 30 kilometers to the turnaround point and several hours of beautiful March weather to enjoy before the night leg back to San Francisco. On the way out of town and all the way up the long climb on 128 to Mountain House Road–the beautiful (and roughly paved, last time I was there) back-country link to Hopland–we passed riders plugging away in ones and twos.

Did I wish I was out there myself? No–not in my current non-riding shape. But I did have an audio recorder with me and considered for a minute whether I might wait at the top of the grade to talk to the riders coming past. Didn’t do it, though. I did give a wide berth and a wave to all the riders we saw. Bonne route, boys!

***

Coming back from Mendocino, we made the counter-intuitive move of starting the southward trip by driving north along the coast out of Fort Bragg on Highway 1, then crossing the Coast Range to Leggett, where we could pick up 101 south.

I’ve never ridden this stretch of road, but have driven it three or four times. In my memory, the stretch from the coast had organized itself into a long, straightish section from Fort Bragg to point where you turn east, then a long climb up the mountains and equally long descent to Leggett, an old, broke-looking logging town that boasts a famous massive drive-through redwood tree. What I saw yesterday was a little different from what I remembered. The section north of Fort Bragg was neither as straight nor as level as I remembered. Heading up the highway, you turn inland quite abruptly; as you leave the coast, what look like trackless mountains stretch away to the north, falling straight into the sea. The climb and descent to Leggett turns out to be two ascents and two downhills with a bit of mostly level road between them. Driving it, I was reminded of friends who had done a 24-hour Easter weekend ride back in 2004, starting in Leggett and ending in San Francisco. What a way to start out.

We had no traffic behind us all the way across the climbs, so I didn’t have to push my speed or pull over. When we had descended nearly to Leggett and it had started to rain, we spotted a single cyclist starting up the grade. I slowed to encourage him, and he stopped to talk. I wished I’d gotten his name: He was loaded for a tour down to San Francisco and was figuring on doing 60 miles a day to get there. He looked like he was prepared for weather, and I think he’ll see some this week with a series of storms expected on the coast.

Did I wish I was out there? Kind of, though my last long ride in the rain isn’t filled with fond memories. Instead of pondering that, we drove home. Total mileage for the weekend, about 29 hours on the road, was 380 miles. I did reflect briefly that during that 600-kilometer ride in 2007, I rode 375 miles in about 36 hours — including six hours off the road to eat and sleep in Fort Bragg. I’ll probably remember that weekend, at least the road part, longer than I remember the driving I did this time around.

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Hilltop

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Yesterday’s walk to the Friday Night Ferry took me across the top of Potrero Hill along 20th Street, where I happened upon this scene The hill is an interesting place, and I may have already said that if I were to live anywhere in San Francisco, I’d try to find a place up there. It really feels like an island, with its own neighborhoods and feel, complete with amazing views in every direction.