[All the way back to the early hours of Friday morning...]
[The bookstore owner takes a nap.]
[Who needs Morrisons!]
39 A.D.
We arrived at 1.30 a.m., which was a bummer (in the summer), but at least we’d slept as well as can be on the bus. Still, with nothing open anywhere, we decided to try for some more snoozies. The guide book stated that sooner or later travellers will end up spending a night in the bus station and the top tip was to find a corner (first making sure it didn’t belong to a regular occupant!) Tim found a suitable corner with a view of the television (playing endless reports on the horrific theatre massacre in Denver) and he laid out his baggage and then himself, and I snuggled up next to him. The security fellow arrived and I thought we’d be turfed out, but he was very pleased we were regular Greyhound passengers and let us be, saying that he’d be across the room if we needed anything. All seemed to be going according to plan until an elderly lady and her four small grandchildren parked themselves immediately next to us on the floor (why? There were plenty of empty seats!) Out came the playmats and the toys and I pulled my hood up further over my eyes and Tim stayed securely behind his eye mask. I wasn’t dropping off and suddenly Tim leapt up, claiming that something was leaking. He was right – the water bottle in my day bag had spilt across the floor, but although a few things did get wet, it could have been much worse. However, after mopping up the mess, it gave me my excuse to leave and I went and parked myself semi-horizontal across a seat on the far side of the room. And, amazingly, I slept until 6.30 a.m.
Starbucks was, as ever, nearby, and we got our first coffees in 48 hours. After updating my blog (thank you ever so much for your continued reading!) I took a walk around the block, then down towards the pierheads. Already I could sense a really pleasant buzz about the place beneath lovely golden sunshine that was nowhere near too hot. Also, I realised that we’d met the ocean and, although our American adventure was far from over, we’d already made it from coast to coast. Sweet.
[San Francisco - Oakland Bridge.]
We had booked into the San Francisco International Hostel – a popular pace by all reports. It’s in a great location downtown and the website said we could check in at 11 a.m. – this is possible, but you cannot get to your room until 3 p.m. Rather worryingly, as we were completing the admin, a British girl came rushing down the stairs to reception, with hair dripping wet, and in a semi-hysterical state. She claimed her “dumb-ass room mate" had left their door unlocked and someone had gone in and pinched her stuff – purse, phone, ipod, you name it. Apparently said room mate had their stuff taken as well. This is not the type of scene you want to witness when you’re booking into somewhere for a three night stay! When the clerk turned to us and said we could store our luggage in the back room until 3, we had half a mind to turn around and walk away.
We decided to keep our booking and just make sure that everything was secure. There are free lockers on the first floor that anyone can use to store valuables in, which it sounds like British girl did not take advantage of. All the excitement had made me need to pay a visit, so I sauntered off to the ground floor restroom – a unisex affair with a bit of a mucky toilet (doesn’t happen much in the states). I gave it a flush before using and way-hay the whole thing overflowed like a mini Niagara Falls. I got my faded Puma plimsolls out of the way in time and fortunately the water gushed down a grill in the middle of the room...but it kept on gushing and gushing. What a plonker I was going to look like going up to the clerk and saying, “Errr, I’m sorry, but I’ve just flooded your toilet.” Fortunately the plonker found the plunger and I was able to correct the blocked bog, but it really wasn’t proving to be a good start at the San Francisco International Hostel.
When Tim starts writing his blog, I read my book, but when I start writing my blog, Tim has no book to read. Sure, he’s got his all-singing-all-dancing phone, but it’s not the same, so we decided he should find a second hand bookstore and pick something out. It was a good 30 minute hike across town to find what was supposedly the nearest used bookstore, and along the way we noticed plenty of faded hippies and drugs casualties, plus a distinct aroma that I couldn’t put my finger on, but which nothing else in the world smells like (apart from the communal hallway in my old flat on Aughton Road!) Eventually we found the store, Tim got his book (Mario Puzo, who as you probably know wrote The Godfather) and I got to nip across the road to my former employer, Safeway – long deceased in the UK, still going strong over here.
Returning to the hostel after 3, we got ready to play the which-room-mates-have-they-put-us-with game. Inside room 602 we met Raul, from India, who’s come to the US to wander around and essentially find himself. He’s a polite, educated young man and he seems fine. The occupier of the other bottom bunk, we did not meet, just saw his stuff scattered around.
The room isn’t too bad, but there isn’t much in the way of size and I end up storing virtually everything I possess on the top bunk with me, a top bunk that won’t be much fun climbing down if I need to get up a for a visit in the middle of the night. Raul (who’s already been there a couple of nights) says that it’s quieter up on the 6th floor and we wonder if this is a direct reflection of San Francisco real estate where elevation equals wealth. Yes, yes, I know that wealth in this case isn’t wealth-wealth, but at least we’re not down on the lower floors where larger numbers of people share rooms without private bathrooms and things apparently get lifted. I’d got my sandwich supplies in from Safeway and I wasn’t looking forward to storing them in the communal fridges on the ground floor – far too many bad memories from university hall of residence food theft!
On the plus side, this hostel has a full-on night club in the basement and every evening they serve free beer at 9.30. EVERY evening. And so I’m off there now...
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