We left our hearts in San Francisco

Fog plagued our views for the first several days then all clear

from Marin headlands

Fancy chocolate shop in Sausalito where Naomi had 'frozen' hot chocolate. Bruges chocolates would be a bargain compared to here

Interesting art

Naomi looking across the Bay from Sausalito to San Fran

Lincoln Park, San Fran

land's End San Fran. Usually has good views of the Golden Gate bridge. Not this day

Very early last Saturday Naomi and I flew to San Francisco where my brother lives 25 miles south of along the Pacific Ocean. I think I took more photos than I did in Holland and Naomi took about two times as much as I did. She had never been there before. We packed a lot in with a new adventure every day. Unfortunately I picked up a cold on the plan felt quite run down so I couldn't do my usual exercise routine, not that I had much time to. Hopefully walking for miles counts. We did bicycle one day along the ocean.

Gee it is almost a week later, still tired and trying to resume my exercise routine that I had before my surgery. Finally today I was able to run the distance I  used to albeit much more slowly and do my full weight routine.

I went to my friend's funeral yesterday. She had plenty of time to plan every detail of it. It was in the Catholic church my grandfather years ago got married to his second wife though he never converted and continued to go to his Congregational church. His wife in her will put a provision to have a priest pray yearly that my grandfather doesn't roast in hell for not dying Catholic. She had many friends and clients so lots of people were there. For her 'special' friends she gave heart shaped crystals to put in their ears. I don't often wear earrings so it was a task to get those things in. She had called me a few days before her death while I was out in California. I could tell from her very weak voice that she was in her last days. She was only 57 and leaves a 30 year old daughter and a 27 year old son. She will never see them get married or hold her grandchildren. She had breast cancer 8 years ago and was treated similarly to me but the Adriamycin caused her to have leukemia which was 'cured' by a stem cell transplant. She was lucky her brother was a match, only happens 25% of the  time. Kids and parents are much less likely to match.  For almost five years it was a painful balancing act to suppress the immune system that was attacking her versus being vulnerable to numerous infections. She spent a good amount of time in the hospital Finally in May, a new growth suddenly appeared that was wrapped around her aorta. They assumed it was lymphoma but could not biopsy it due to her fragile health plus she did not want any more treatment. Her hips were both broken due to avascular necrosis, a side effect of the immunosuppresants. Her lack of lung function meant no anesthesia so she had to take heavy duty narcotics for pain control which suppressed her breathing further. She had enough and signed up for home hospice. She was told she would be lucky to survive beyond June but she did make it another 2 months.  She loved to talk and called me almost daily . I will miss her.

So we packed in a lot of activities while we were in California. Both of us took zillions of photos .
On our first day, we headed across the Golden Gate Bridge into Marin County. It was very foggy until late afternoon and then a new wave of fog rolled in. Not unusual. The bridge has all these projections sticking from its underbelly now. They are installing a $200 million suicide net now due to its popularity as a lace to kill oneself.umber one in the country though not in the world as some Asian countries have much higher suicide rates. They do have regular patrols that prevent about 75% of attempts but many manage to jump anyway thinking it will be painless though survivors (and there are some) say its like hitting a brick wall. One survivor managed to surface (with numerous broken bones but now is OK) and felt some sort of sea creature against him and assumed it was a shark and tried to punch it. Didn't he want to die? He passed out but the sea creature was a sea lion that held him afloat until the coast guard rescued him. Plenty of witnesses. After driving up 800 feet hoping for good views (all we saw was white), we got some good views fairly close to the bridge.

We then went to the artsy cute town Sausalito where Naomi was thrilled to have frozen hot chocolate. Good views across the Bay of San Francisco.  We did stop at Land's end in San Francisco for what was supposed to be the best view but new fog rolled in.

Fog horns from the nearby harbor sound every 8 seconds and in the morning, we could hear the colony of sea lions barking.