Father-Daughter Central California Coast Trip – Day Four, Part One

June 20, 2010
Happy Fathers Day

We met in the breakfast room around 7:30AM and finalized where we were going.  San Francisco won.  After we ate we turned right out of the motel and headed north on California 1.

The drive to the city by the bay went smoother than I was expecting for a Fathers Day with very little traffic.  As we entered the city, I started to remember how much “fun” it could be driving in San Francisco.  The drivers there are in a world of there own so I remained on my best behavior so I would not tick off someone therefore, we found a gas station to top off the tank and headed towards CA 1 and the Golden Gate Bridge.

Both CA 1 and US 101 meet at the San Francisco side of the bridge and when we came to Manzanita, we exited left to continue on CA 1 and back to the coast.

My intention was to show my daughter how far her mother and I went up the coast when we were on a short vacation in the mid 90′s.  It did not quite work that way.  We drove right past the spot where we stopped and turned around.  I think it was a lookout over Muir Beach but that is only a really big guess

However, the drive turned out to be really beautiful… and fun if you like really narrow and winding roads.  The nicest thing about this part of the drive was that we were going through little towns that look like that time stood still and had somewhat of a 1960′s look.

When we came to a town called Olema, we stopped, as we needed to take a short break.  After stretching our legs my daughter picked up the driving and we started to head back.  Neither one of us really did not want to go back the way we came as traffic was starting to get heavy.  I then noticed a sign pointing towards San Rafael so we headed that way.

The drive through the forest was a complete change of scenery from the coastal drive we just completed.  The cut was just wide enough for a two-lane road and not much for a shoulder.  There were times that the sun was really trying hard to break through the canopy.

About the time we arrived at the city limits of San Rafael, we were both starting to get hungry and since my daughter was driving, using the iPhone to look for a place was out we needed to look for a place to eat the old fashion way… sign spotting.  We kept to the rule of eating only at local establishments so it took us a little bit of time to find a place that was not crowded because of Fathers Day.

We eventually found the Bay Thai Cuisine on 4th Street in downtown San Rafael.  What a great place to eat.  She had Pa Thai while I had the Blue Plate Special.  Great food at fantastic prices.  It is too bad that this hole in the wall place was not in the San Diego area.  I would make it a point to show up as often as I could.

As we started to head back to San Francisco via US 101 we somehow managed to get on I-580.  This ended up being a good thing as we ended up taking I-80, then crossed the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge and ended up in the middle of the bay on Treasure Island.  I asked my daughter if we could take a quick look around the old Naval Station Treasure Island before we headed back to Santa Cruz and she said it was not a problem.

The only problem it turned out to be was instead of a quick look, it ended up being around a three-hour tour back in time.

Continued on:  Father-Daughter Central California Coast Trip – Day Four, Part Two.

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