What We Learned in San Francisco

Early in our planning, we knew that wanted to make a stop in San Francisco.  For one, we anticipated that the girls would be tired of camping at this point in the trip, and two, it's San Francisco.  In the end we spent four days in the city and had fantastic accommodations in a very nice flat off of Golden Gate Park. Here we met up with Ellen's sister, Betsy, and her significant other, Tom. Ellen, Tom, and Betsy all had (have) birthdays within a week or two of the visit, and Tom had just recently returned from a tour of duty in Afghanistan. There was plenty to celebrate in the city by the bay.

We also had some learning objectives while in the city.  We wanted to visit both the California Academy of Sciences and the Exploratorium.  Since it was rebuilt in 2008, the California Academy of Sciences is the newest natural history museum in the country, however it's been around since the 1800's. The building is among the largest structures in Golden Gate Park, and the museum portion of the property is impressive with plenty of green technology built in to the design. The rooftop is perhaps the most obvious example, as it's planted with vegetation and rain catchment systems.


Despite the one million visitors that go to the museum, the primary mission of the institution is research, and about 70% of the property is devoted to this activity. The Academy is rightfully proud of this and uses its staff scientists to engage visitors in cutting edge science. Being a natural history museum there was much to captivate our attention. There is a rainforest exhibit that places the visitor inside a giant terrarium with rainforest plants and animals from all tropical regions in the world. One even has to enter the rainforest through an airlock to preserve the fragile climate of the exhibit.

In addition, we watched a tremendous program about earthquakes in the Morrison Planetarium. The movie takes the viewer deep into the earth's crust to better understand the tectonic events that are constant around our active planet. Earthquakes of course have played a very significant role in the history of San Francisco, which was presented in a compelling fashion. The movie made a large impression on all of us and helped to reinforce the idea that our own human view of a static world is limited by our relatively short view of time.

The reframing of our concept of time is so easily accomplished by studying natural history. It forces an appreciation of a much larger time scale that diminishes the importance of human lives and underscores the dynamic nature of earth as a closed system. Somewhere in the future of humanity we must come to terms with this perspective if we are to live sustainable lifestyles.

The Steinhart Aquarium, also on the museum property, has many excellent tanks with marine organisms from around the world. There's even a Southern Swamp that has an albino alligator. This made a whimpering impression on us since we were on this trip to see things distinctly non-southern. What did make a great impression on the girls were the South African penguins. Specifically there is a famous penguin there, Pierre, about whom a well known children's book was written.  Pierre lost all of his feathers during a molt, and they failed to grow back right away. Concerned for possible hypothermia, keepers there fashioned a small neoprene wetsuit tailored to him. He wore this wetsuit (on display in the picture) until his new feathers grew in. Not only was Pierre's life saved, but he is now the oldest penguin in the exhibit by several years. We were told that he has sired many offspring and even has "grandchildren" that are now part of the display.


Now no tourist visit to San Francisco is complete without a ride on a cablecar, and we were able to do this on our last day in the city.  We avoided the lines by starting our ride one stop up, which meant that we got onto a extremely full car.  For a moment, we thought that perhaps we'd be stuffed in the back, craning for great views, but we had an fantastic driver.  Within minutes he had maneuvered the girls into a better position, and by the next stop he had Craig riding on the side of the car.  Soon after, the rest of us joined him, and by the time we were near the end, both Grace and Julia were standing along the side, arm wrapped around the bar, riding the rails in true style.  It was the perfect cap to our stay in the city.


Of course, we did much more in San Francisco, but this post is already long.  You can find all of our San Francisco photos (including some from the church where Ellen's parents were married 52 years ago) here.