Sunday, July 21, 2013

BUS STORY # 362 (Muni!, Part 3)

You can read Parts 1 and 2 here and here.

We were familiar with the Ferry Building Marketplace from a BART trip some six years ago with a good friend of ours living in Oakland at the time. It is a foodie mecca, with small specialty restaurants, markets and shops. We went foraging for a picnic dinner and picked out a salad from Farm Fresh To You, razor-thin-sliced Salami Pepato from Boccalone Salumaria, a Pepato cheese from Cowgirl Creamery, a sour baguette from the Acme bakery, a jar of walnut Dijon mustard from Sur Le Table, and from a bargain bin at Village Market a half-bottle of Pinot Noir from Chile with a twist-off cap which proved to be... potable.

We visited every market in the building, stepped outside to the wharf to enjoy the view and the gorgeous weather, then turned back to the street to catch our ride home on the legendary F Line.

This is the line that features vintage streetcars.  Muni's history page reports the idea for historic streetcar service began in the early 1970s, and Muni acquired its first vintage car, now retired, from Hamburg, Germany. The current F Line runs from Fisherman’s Wharf to Market and Castro.

One of the old streetcars pulled up to our stop while we were waiting to cross the street. This was No. 1062. I couldn’t find any information on this vintage car inside, but I made a note of the number for a later Google session.

Sure enough, I located not only the story of 1062, but a wonderful website dedicated to San Francisco’s Market Street Railway projects.

When we got there, it was standing room only. I wanted to wait for the next car so we could sit, but Mrs. Busboy was ready to go back to our room. She eventually got a seat, and I got one when the car lost over half its riders to Pier 39. We got off at the end of the line and worked up an appetite by hiking up a couple of steep blocks on the walk back to our room.

We had our picnic at the little table in our room where we reviewed our day. Mrs. Busboy gave me five stars for my planning and the transportation. I know she had not anticipated how good the buses would be.

The next morning, we got back into our car and headed home to New Mexico, which is where we’d left our hearts.

__________


The photo at the top of this story is a screenshot from the page featuring No. 1062, from the Market Street Railway website.

5 Comments:

Anonymous Brenda said...

What a wonderful trip for you and Mrs. Busboy. You'll cherish those memories I'm sure!

8:53 AM  
Blogger Top-of-the-Arch said...

Good Sunday afternoon to you Busboy,
I could not believe when I saw your post with the photo of Muni bus in front of Comfort Inn - my husband and I were in SF, checking in to Lombard Motor Inn on July 4th, there until July 7th (to drive along Big Sur). We walked to Van Ness/Franklin to catch the bus and then the cable car to Chinatown. We could have sat next to you and the lovely Mrs. Busboy at Chowders at Pier 39!
And we did the same, walk or Muni - parked our car (the Mustang), left it there and took it out only to zigzag down Lombard Street and take photos at the market where Frank Bullitt shopped and his "apartment" across the street!
Good job with planning - sounded like you had a great time.
Small world - perhaps we should coordinate our next vacation for a "blogosphere" meet and greet :>)
Thanks for sharing and have a good day/week.
TOTA
PS: We had a great time in SF but our hearts are in STL.

11:40 AM  
Blogger Busboy said...

@ Brenda: It was indeed a lovely trip, thank you. And not only because of all the wonderful things we did and sights we saw, but also because we were able to spend a lot of time with friends and family all along the way. We count our blessings.

@TOTA: Wow! Our visits were only a week apart. How incredible is that? We walked down the zigzag on Lombard, then worked our way over to Pier 39. Sounds like you had the bread bowl of chowder. My first time in SF, and it was terrific.

12:37 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Nice recap, it was all wonderful. The Muni added so much to our visit.
Thanks for all of the planning and research.
BBBH

5:45 AM  
Blogger Busboy said...

Sweet! Thank you, BBBH.

9:58 AM  

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