Day 13

If you're going to San Francisco, be sure to wear some flowers in your hair...

Left Mateca, CA 10AM Pacific Time. With a stop in Berkley, CA. Final destination San Francisco, CA approx. 1:00 PM Pacific Time. Approx. 130 miles.

We hit Jamba Juice in Manteca and headed to Berkley.  We figured that since Davis missed our visit to FIJI at Alabama we ought to let him in on the fun.  Accordingly, we stopped to tour the chapter house at UC Berkley.  We, again, were pleasantly surprised with what we found - a sizable house, complete with stained glass windows and female residents.  The bro we found in the kitchen explained that brothers taking summer classes lived in the house along with sorority girls that needed a place to stay.  This seems like a game changing idea that might serve W&L well...

We arrived in San Francisco a little after noon.  The drive in afforded us our first glimpse at a city skyline since Houston.  Our hotel sits in the Union Square district, conveniently right off the highway.  Lunch consisted of pizza at a local joint two blocks from our hotel.  After lunch we proceeded to meander about the city.  We haphazardly stumbled upon the real Chinatown area, summited Telegraph Hill, got as close to Alcatraz as we could, trekked up Lombard Street, and took in the beauty of the Palace of the Fine Arts.

We basically completed about an eight mile circuit around the eastern half of the city, allowing us to intimately experience a number of the city's neighborhoods.  The purpose of said circuit, though, was to reach Haight and Ashbury - the epicenter of the counter culture movement in the 1960s.  Here, we took Davis' picture 45 years too late.

We ate a scrumptious Thai dinner at "Thai Express" on Geary Street and then made our way back to our hotel for a brief stop before heading downtown to see "The Tree of Life" since sans ID Davis could get into any bars and because he has been waiting to see this latest Terrence Malick film for almost over a year.

The downtown/ financial district was completely dead by 9 PM as we strolled to the theater and got a taste of a chilly San Francisco summer night. How to describe the movie itself? It would probably be best to read Roger Ebert's review to get a good idea of "The Tree of Life". As a group we all appreciated how well done the movie was and think it will be a forerunner to take home some accolades at the Oscars. The movie reflects the modernist theme of displaying the universal through the particular. The particular would be a sub-urban family in 1950's Texas and the universal one could say is the miracle and tragedy that is life in the cosmos. The film in many ways transcends description. It may have benefited from some tighter editing but will still go down as one of the most original and hopefully one of the greatest films of our time. (If you can't tell I, Davis am writing this review).

We are now off to breakfast, but before we go the massive improvement on Rob's beard deserves a photo of its own.

Peace and Love,

The Three Dudes