SCULPTURE IN THE GARDEN 2015 IN WALNUT CREEK: THROUGH JULY 19

For one month every summer, The Ruth Bancroft Garden in Walnut Creek, California is transformed into an outdoor art gallery.

The Garden is a "hidden treasure", less than 30 miles east of San Francisco. Ruth Bancroft's collection on the property where she still lives at well over 100 years old, is known for its world class collection of succulent and drought-tolerant plants.

The Garden provides a spectactular backdrop for the displayed art works, most of which are for sale.

We attended the opening of the exhibit last week and got to meet several of the artists.

My favorite piece is by Leslie Safarik, whom, I, by chance, starting chatting with while enjoying a glass of champagne and tasty finger food. Her big red cat sculpture is the at the beginning of this post.

The Garden's final event during the Sculpture in the Garden show will be on Friday, July 17: Blues, BBQ and Beer Sunset Social. Tickets can be purchased on the the Garden web site.

Levi's Stadium & Museum Tour: Very Worth Doing

Despite all the current controversy surrounding NFL players behaving "badly" the Bay Area's excitement, curiosity and some frustration about the 49ers new football stadium, Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara, continues.

Last month, before Levi's Stadium opened for the football season, Dave, Jim and I journeyed to Santa Clara to take a Public Tour of the stadium.

The tours are given year-round, every day of the week, except when there is a home 49ers game or some other Levi's Stadium event, and on some holidays.

The Guided Stadium Tour (90 minutes) costs $25 for adults; add a tour of the excellent Museum, and the cost is $35.  If you just want to visit the Museum, admission is $15 for adults and $10 for those with discounts. There are discounts for seniors, children, locals and several other. Private groups can reserve their own tours. Between the tour, the museum, and lunch, we spent the entire day here.

Tour parking is free in the lot right by the entrance to the Stadium where the tours start.

The best way to reserve is in advance, though the Stadium's web site (link above), but you can take your chances and show up at the box office at the Stadium and hope to get tour tickets sometime that day. The tours start every half hour from 10 a.m. until 4:30 p.m.

Even Season Ticket Holders do not get to go behind the scenes to many of the places that the tour took us.

Our well-informed guide took us into several Club Levels.

We left the inside of the BNY Mellon Club to sit in the club's stadium seats. Looking down on the field, we saw a lot of discussion going on in the middle of the field.  While our tour guide was extolling the merits of the Bandera Bermuda turf on the field, a new drought-tolerant variety, little did we know that this would be that turf's last day. As we watched, the turf was being closely examined by many, including Coach Harbaugh. 

The next day, the turf was torn out because it was not holding up during a few exhibition events that had been held in the Stadium and the it was felt to unsafe for play.

If you care about turf, here is a closeup of the Bandera Bermuda, maybe an historic photo…

On the Press Level, we went into the Press Boxes and wandered this level's hallways which are decorated with magazine and program covers from past 49er's seasons.

Up on  the Roof Level, where the luxury suites are located, we went out the amazing "Green Roof." Throughout the tour, our guide pointed out energy-saving and environmental features of the Stadium, including the solar panels up on the Roof Level.

Levi's Stadium is the first United States football stadium with a LEED Gold certification. 

We visited the Away-Team Locker Room.

And, also, the Cheerleader's Locker Room. I couldn't resist taking a selfie at one of the Cheerleader's makeup tables.

Our guide would have escorted us into the museum, but we decided to have lunch first and do the museum later on our own.

The 49ers Museum itself is interesting and extensive enough to spend a good part of a day just in it. It chronicles the entire history of the 49ers with displays, exhibits, films, and much more. The Museum fills 20,000 square feet. Sony created/designed the Museum. 

We had fun with the live sizes statues of players and coaches, past and present. 

Five Super Bowl Championships: Lombardi Trophies.

So you want to be a cheerleader? Take an interactive lesson with a real 49ers cheerleader (on screen) and then be tested by dancing with the entire squad and then graded on how well you've done! This woman got high marks.

Finally, Save time to shop in the 49ers Team Store.

It is the biggest team store possibly at any NFL stadium, and I mean, HUGE!  Because there are two football teams in the Bay Area and there was a possibility that the Oakland Raiders might want to share this stadium, NFL required that the Team Store be large enough to accommodate merchandise for both teams.  For now and probably forever, the 49ers have a Team Store twice the size of usual stores at football stadiums.  It's a wonderful store and, of course, I updated my 49ers wardrobe a bit and bought a shirt, earrings, pins, and other decorative items for my annual Super Bowl party.

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LUNCH

While the stadium's food concessions are closed on tour days, celebrity chef Michael Mina's Bourbon Steak and Pub, right at the Stadium, is open every day of the week. The Pub is open daily for lunch and dinner (Brunch on Sundays) and the Steak part of the restaurant is only open for dinner. 

We reserved in advance for lunch, a good idea as it is already extremely popular with the local business people who work nearby.

Bourbon Steak and Pub is Chef Mina's first sports-oriented restaurant. And, he had fun designing the menu.

I knew ahead of time that I was going to order the Nachos because I had read about the fun Chef Mina had in creating it. Instead of a pile of tortilla chips covered with cheese, peppers and whatever other toppings, Chef Mina makes his nachos with whole tortillas that are layered with Borracho beans, corn salsa, and cheese and topped with a sunny side egg (charred peppers and chile are optional extra toppings).  

Then, my server came to my plate with a mezzaluna knife in hands and proceeded to slice through the entire creation, cutting it into quarters.  

The end result was something more akin in appearance to traditional nachos, but with runny egg mixing into it.  It was so so good and the "theatre" of the presentation enhanced the experience.

The boys were a bit more conventional in their lunch selections:  The Smokin' Double Wagyu Dog for Jim. It was garnished with Honey Mustard, Cole Slaw, and Chicharrones. It came with a side of very tasty Fries. 

and, the Pulled Pork Sammy for Dave. Dave's sandwich was on a Black Pepper Potato Bun and came with his choice of a side dish. He chose the Salt-Roasted Potato Salad

I've never had Frickles before but have always wondered what could be so good about deep-fried dill pickles.  At Bourbon Pub I couldn't resist ordering them for our table to share, figuring if someone was going to prepared them well, it would be Michael Mina.  They came with "Secret Sauce" for dipping and were yummy. I'll have them again the next time I dine here.

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MAKE A DAY OF TOURING LEVI'S STADIUM; IT'S FOR THE WHOLE FAMILY

I highly recommend a tour of Levi's Stadium. It's a fun, interesting, and modestly-priced day-long outing. While I may never get to see a live 49ers game, I know I will be back for another tour and visit to the Museum whenever friends or out of town visitors want to do something fun and new in the Bay Area.

Crossing the new East Span of the Bay Bridge on a Sunny Warm SF Day

I hope I'm not losing my "edge," but, I actually waited almost 5 days before driving across the new East Span of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge.

The Bridge reopened late on Labor Day evening (September 2), after a very long Labor Day weekend closure (5 days) for final touches to connect the new East Span to the Yerba Buena/Treasure Island tunnel and the West Span of the bridge, which has remained intact.

The Bay Bridge opened for traffic in November, 1936; that's nearly 76 years ago. It is 6 months older than the more-famous Golden Gate Bridge, which connects San Francisco with Marin County.  For just about all of this time, the Bay Bridge has been a true workhorse of a bridge, carrying close to 300,000 vehicles each day, between San Francisco and Oakland.  It has two spans, connected in the middle by a tunnel that has exits to Yerba Buena and Treasure Islands. The west span is a double-deck suspension bridge. The east span has been, until this past week, a two-level cantilever bridge.

During the Loma Prieta Earthquake in 1989, a portion of the east span of the Bay Bridge collapsed.  It was repaired, but it indicated that the bridge was not sufficiently seismically strong enough to sustain future earthquakes.

Finally, nearly 24 years later and a lot of politics and "challenges", the Bay Bridge now has a magnificent new east span.

This new span cost a lot of money and some say it did not have to be such an architecturally-interesting structure, but, I predict, the criticisms will soon be forgotten and this magnificent Bay Bridge will become another San Francisco Bay Area icon.

And, it is as seismically safe as a structure can be, anywhere.

So, Saturday was my day to drive over the new Bay Bridge.

Jim and I left the house at 8:30 a.m. and went through the toll plaza at 8:46 a.m. We left early in an attempt to avoid the heavy traffic that has been on the bridge since it opened.  Our drive was as perfect as it could be.



We've been having a heat wave in the Bay Area and Saturday was one of those rare warm sunny days in all parts of San Francisco, even on the very western edge of the City, which was our destination for the day.

The new east span is very open and consists of one level, with separate parallel roadways going west and east.

I drove and Jim was my camera person. We had the sunroof open so he could take upward pictures of the cathedral-like tower.

These photos chronicle our drive:

This is the Yerba Buena Tunnel entrance, going west, at the end of the east span. It connects to the west span of the Bay Bridge and has an exit to both Treasure Island and Yerba Buena Island:

Here are a few views of the west span of the Bay Bridge, as we drove west toward San Francisco. Notice that it has a straighter approach across it.





On the way back to the East Bay, leaving San Francisco, you can see the old Bay Bridge east span on your right.  Having crossed this bridge hundreds of times, I've never really had a good look at it...to me it looks like an old railroad bridge, which, for a time it was when the Key Line went over the Bay Bridge into San Francisco.






There is a bicycle/walking path parallel to the east-bound side of the Bay Bridge's east span, on its south side.


 It is a temporary structure, for the time being,  until about 3 years from now when the old east span will be totally removed.  Eventually, the permanent path will go all the way to Treasure Island where there are at least 8 wineries, a nice deli, housing, and fabulous views of both San Francisco and the East Bay. For now, the temporary path ends before the Yerba Buena Tunnel.

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And, what did we do once we got to San Francisco?

We drove across the City as far west as one can drive before driving into the Pacific Ocean, to spend much of the day at Land's End, which is part of the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy.

Land's End is in the northwest corner of San Francisco. It has miles of semi-rugged trails, some portions paved, with breathtaking views of the Golden Gate Bridge, the Pacific Ocean, many small beaches, old shipwrecks, the ruins of Sutro Baths, and passing freighters and other boats.

We hiked at my leisurely pace for several hours, going from the fairly-new Land's End Lookout Visitor Center, along the Coastal Trail to the parking area at El Camino del Mar, another entrance to Land's End. We parked in the large free parking lot at the Visitor Center.

Some of you will recall that I blogged about Land's End about a year ago, shortly after  the Visitor Center first opened.

We started here.




Jim is off and hiking.



One of many stops to enjoy the views.

At the Eagle's Point Overlook looking out at the Golden Gate Bridge and China Beach.

Looking down on the Sutro Baths ruins and the Cliff House off in the distance, to the right.






Zooming in on the Cliff House



and rocks that often have seals on them, but seemed to just be inhabited by birds on this day.



After all this, we were famished. Lunch at Louis' seemed to be the thing to do.

Although Louis' has been in business here since 1937, this was my first time at this small, very popular restaurant that serves breakfast, lunch and dinner every day.

I've looked in before or after a meal at one of the Cliff House dining rooms, and, last time at the Cliff House, decided that I had to eat at Louis' where the menu is similar to that at the Cliff House's casual Bistro dining room, but less expensive, more popular with locals than with tourists, and with just as fabulous views.

Louis' boasts that they have only taken cash payments since 1937 and continue to do so.  So, bring cash, or your ATM card (they have an ATM right in the restaurant).

We were happy with our lunch here and even with the congenial wait outside on this warm day.

Jim, of course, had the Shrimp Louis salad.

And, I could not resist the Tuna Melt.