I’ve been hanging out in San Francisco for the past few days, I’m enjoying the California sunshine and eating as many free pancakes as I can stuff myself with every morning.

I’m sharing a room with a guy from Korea called Kym and have spent a couple of days doing the tourist thing with him. We went down to see the Sea Lions on Pier 39, they are all wild and apparently they like the bay because the water isn’t salty enough for their predators(the great white shark and the killer whale). They are funny to watch, they seem to spend there whole time either sleeping, barking or trying to stop other sea lions from getting on their little patch of pontoon.

We also went got a bus up to the Golden Gate Bridge, which is amazing to look at, but full of tourists (and I guess I’m one of them) ticking it off the list.

After the bridge we went to the Golden Gate Park, which was much nicer. It’s very well designed and you can easily get lost in it all day.

I also took a walk through China Town, which had a nice busy feel to it. similar to the one in New York, once you get past all the tourist girt shops and overpriced restaurants you can get a real feel for life in the Chinese community.

The Hostel I’m staying in has a nice Atmosphere and seems to have things on most days and nights. Last night was a cheese and wine night (although in my case it was a slightly less sophisticated cheese and beer night). And there is also TV/Movie theatre in the basement showing a couple of movies every night if you can’t find anything better to do. There are a lot of Asian students staying in the hostel, far more than I’ve seen anywhere else, Kym told me it’s because it’s cheaper to stay at the hostel than it is to get accommodation in the area.

I spent most of the last two days in San Francisco either watching movies in the Hostel TV Room or hanging around the park or Union Square reading. I did make a little geeky pilgrimage to the CNET building in the business district where a lot of the Tech podcast’s I listen to every day are recorded. I guess it’s a bit like a “normal” person going to the set of Coronation Street or something. The evenings on the other hand were a bit more lively, drinking in the basement party room of the hostel, playing pool and table football.