For our final day of our California vacation, we drove down to San Francisco. After two days of visiting wineries and vineyards on a pretty packed schedule, it was a nice change of scenery and pace — although I’m already itching to go back to Napa… 🙂

SAN FRANCISCO:

We stayed at Hotel Adagio in Union Square, which aside from the delay with check-in, I really liked. Cool vibe, modern rooms, and they randomly upgraded two of our friends to a suite with a huge rooftop patio overlooking the city… just wish we’d had more than one afternoon to take advantage of it!

Upon arrival, my first request was stopping by the instagram famous Mr. Holmes Bakehouse for some baked goods. Churro and chocolate croissants and a tasty apple pie pastry that didn’t make it more than about two blocks past the bakery. I do love a baked good.

After a couple miles of HILLY walking, we landed in Fisherman’s Wharf for lunch. The area mostly seems to be filled with tourist traps, I’m sure The Franciscan Crab Restaurant was one of them, but we wanted seafood, and it seemed much less offensive than Joe’s Crabshack. The bubbly was refreshing, the seafood was good, and we had views of the sailboat-filled bay while we ate.

After lunch, we went on a search for a cable car station and got a pretty view of the Golden Gate Bridge while we waited to board (along with 50,000 girl scouts who were in town that weekend). You really couldn’t beat the weather in SF that day!

Seriously, how lucky did we get with this room upgrade?! Incredible city views, mini bar happy hour, and the best friends… not much more you can ask for on the last night of vacation.

Trip took the job of being our fabulous bus driver to and from Napa, so when he requested drinks at Tonga Room, we happily obliged. It’s a very similar vibe to Trader Vic’s (we have one in Atlanta that my old coworkers and I have fond memories of) — except this place has a pool in the middle of the room and it rains from the ceiling!

We’d originally had plans to head over to Sausalito for dinner at a fun place called Bar Bocce on the bay, but we ended up just wandering into a fancy little Mexican place called Colibri in Union Square. Although the eight of us were crammed at two tiny high top tables because we walked in without a reservation on a Saturday night (oops!), the food was some of the best we had the entire trip. It’s always a nice surprise when the random places you find end up being a win.

We got up waaaaay too early the next morning to make the long flight back to Atlanta, but I couldn’t get on that plane fast enough. We had the most amazing time and it was a much-needed and welcomed vacation…. but nothing beats coming home to my baby girl! It’s amazing how much you can miss someone after just 5 days. My mom was so incredibly gracious to keep Leighton for us at our house, and I’ll be forever grateful to know she’s always in the best care when we’re away.

After writing these posts and reliving our trip, it’s hard to not already start dreaming of where we’ll go next time with our travel buddies!