San Francisco, Part II

Before we made the trip out west, I brought home a DVD from the library that featured San Francisco. It was a Globe Trekker episode (Jenny's favorite travel show). It was from a few years back, but it gave us some ideas of neat things to check out.

Near the end of the episode, the host joined in a Crtitical Mass bike demonstration. Steve had told me about a similar massive bicycle protest that's often held in Portland. (I guess they're actually held all over the world, and originated in San Fran.) Basically, a ton of cyclists get together, and bike as a huge group, intentionally blocking traffic as they go. Fighting for bike advocacy seems to be the main purpose. Here's a Wikipedia article, a Critical Mass Web page, and a SF Gate article, if you want to learn more. After watching the DVD, Jen and I both had the same thought- how cool would it be to witness that?

After Matt and I got back from our mountain bike ride (which I wrote about a couple weeks ago), we showered, and got ready to head out to dinner. Since there were six of us, Matt, Meredith, and I got in one cab, while Joy, Jen, and Erika rode in a second cab. On the way to Enrico's, our guy took us through a tunnel. Wrong choice. We got halfway through, and traffic came to a halt. As we were sitting there, I saw someone on a bicycle up ahead. No way- could this be it?

When it became apparent that we weren't going to be moving for a while, I started lobbying for us to get out and walk- we were only a few blocks from the restaurant. Both Matt and Mer thought it would be mean to ditch the cabbie. The meter was running, and we weren't moving. After a couple minutes, they agreed, and we hopped out, and finished the tunnel on foot.


As we came out of the tunnel, there were hundreds of bicyclists on the road. Just when the light was going to turn green, a few would stop immediately in front of the first cars waiting for the light to turn, and stop. There was some honking and cursing, but the motorists couldn't really do anything. After a few minutes, the group moved on to a different part of town, and the cars once again owned the road. I just wish I could have been riding in it...