Honeymoon Day 1

Today we got to San Fran. We got up at 3:15 am PST to pack up and leave the Motel 6 in Albuquerque to get ourselves to the Sunport. The flights were OK, and we made sure to get good and loaded up with caffeine. Or at least I did. Do only annoying people fly, or is it just that those are the only people we notice?
We hopped a shuttle to get to the rental car area, which for some reason is only vaguely associated with the Oakland airport (it's at least a mile away). The rental car guy tried to scam us out of some money but Alison brought the hammer down. Driving in California is always stressful for us small-town folk, but I decided the best tactic would be to position the car behind a big-rig that was going slow and just follow. Worked like a charm, although he had to switch rigs a number of times. I was super excited when, shortly after leaving the rental car place, we drove past McAfee Colisseum, where the Oakland A's play. We didn't stop to gawk, but it was neat all the same.
We arrived in San Francisco at lunch time. After much consternation and signage so bad a Mainerd might get lost, we found our way to Pac Bell/SBC/AT&T Park, where the Giants play. We found a pretty good parking space, surprisingly, although we had some trouble corralling coins for the meter. Had a slice in a pizza place that was pretty tasty, then headed down to the park. I had the idea of going on a tour (a lot of good things have been said about this stadium), but there were no tours due to some sort of God concert. Sorry, God rock concert. So instead we walked around the outside a little and took some pictures.
After this we offloaded the car in a garage and dropped off our luggage at the B&B on Washington Square. Luckily they didn't have the room ready or this likely would have been the end of our day. Instead we walked over to Telegraph Hill and Coit Tower and looked around up there, then headed down to the waterfront. We went to Pier 39 and Fishermen's Wharf, and were too late to catch a boat to Alcatraz. To make up for it, we went over to Ghirardelli Square and shared a cookie bottom sundae. To work that off, we immediately started finding the longest and steepest hills we could so we could walk up them. We went up Russian Hill, then walked down the super-crookedy part of Lombard street. From here we decided we'd had enough of downhill and went up Nob Hill, and walked by Grace Cathedral. Back to the south we skipped over to Union Square, which, as it turns out, is all shopping and such. We did not stay there long enough to take any photos.
From Union Square we headed north to Chinatown, which I was very excited about seeing. Not so much for Alison (she's been there). We went to a bunch of cheapo markets there and bought some stuff we probably don't need, but can justify because it's our honeymoon. My favorite pickups were the good-luck cat and the set of Mah-Jongg tiles. Alison got a cute bag and a loose-leaf tea brewing pot. We ate at a place called Snow Garden, where the food was pretty good though not great (we're starved for good Chinese in NM) and the attendance was super low. I guess nobody eats at 5. Alison spent most of the dinner trying to will a crab out of its death-trap aquarium. It never did make it, poor guy.
We headed back to the B&B to drop off stuff, then went looking for (and found!) the City Lights bookstore, home to beat poetry, progressive thinking, and general dissent. It was a neat place, although with over 20 books in the queue I was browsing. Alison bought a couple of books, one out of which we will surely get a lot of use. From here it was finally back to the room for a shower and some sleep. We got to bed around 9:30 pm PST, which means we were up for 18.25 hours on day one. And with several miles hiked over hilly terrain, we were pooped.