our last day. day 7

at breakfast on our last day, we went through our list and chose what we couldn't bare not to see before going home. (we had come with a very long list!)
1. we took a cab to the mission district to visit the oldest remaining building in san francisco. the mission dolores was built in 1776 for the ohlone indians and while the nearby cathedral was destroyed in the 1906 earthquake (and later rebuilt), the mission chapel stood strong. the graveyard in behind was where kim novak hung out in hitchcock's "vertigo".
2. we took a long stroll along valencia st. just to take in the sights of this multi-ethnic area - mexican and italian and indian and irish and asian. and had a wonderful indian lunch.
3. we kept walking and ended up at dolores mission park where we got an outstanding view of the city.
4. the castro district with it's beautifully colourful houses, it's streets proudly decorated with rainbow flags, borders the park and we went to harvey milk's store (if you haven't seen sean penn's movie "milk", you must) and the human rights campaign action centre.
5. in the late afternoon we took a cab out to the marina to "the palace of fine arts". it was a fake greco-roman replica ruin built of burlap and plaster for the 1915 international exposition and in the 1960's was recast in plaster. weird and wonderful. the pink plaster against the cherry blossoms. the sorrowful women.
6. we walked along the marina past the yacht club to the "wave organ" built in the 80's to capture the sounds of the ocean. it was unfortunately low tide but we still were impressed.
7. and then the final stop of our trip was greens restaurant for supper. greens has been going strong since 1979. it is run by the tassajara zen centre (started in 1966) and is by far the best vegetarian restaurant i have ever been to. all the produce is grown organically and locally at 3 garden centres (we saw one - green gulch farm - on our visit to the muir woods). annie somerville has been their head chef for most of that time. she came out of the kitchen and we had a lovely chat with her. i've never before experienced such a relaxed chef and staff!
8. so on our last evening, we ate a beautiful meal looking out at the pacific ocean as the sun set behind the golden gate bridge. a perfect trip.