18 and 19 May 2002 San Francisco Bay to Breakers and Katie's Birthday

For Katie's 30th birthday, we went to San Francisco to walk in the Bay to Breakers (B to B) Race. We were scheduled to walk 18 and 10 miles this weekend, so the Bay to Breakers at 7.5 miles on Sunday would work out OK. We headed up to my parents house in Pacifica after work on Friday. Katie had looked on the web and found an 18 mile training walk in the hills of the City.

Saturday morning we got up and headed out the door for the City. We parked just west of Fort Mason in the Marina area. It was a beautiful sunny day, we could not have asked for better walking weather. We headed out of the Marina to Aquatic Park and on down the wharf to the Embarcadero. From there we headed up and over the hills west on Clay street (parallel to Sacramento and California streets). As we headed up the east side of the hills we got very hot and then as we crested the top and got into the cool breeze coming off the ocean we got cold. All day was on and off with our jackets. We continued west to about 39 avenue and then turn south and down in to Golden Gate Park. We wound our way east through the park and stopped in front of the Academy of Sciences (the Aquarium) for some hot dogs from a vendor. After lunch (two hot dogs and a granola bar each), we headed back to the Marina and the car.

The plan worked perfect, we walked at an average of 3 miles and hour and finished about 5:30. Into the car, back to Pacifica, shower and then off to Chinese food at 7:00  with Mom, Dad, Jim and Angela. After a very filling dinner a small cake was brought out to the table, Jim and Angela had smuggled it into the restaurant kitchen before dinner.

Sunday morning came way too early. We had plans to meet up with Tom and Stacy Gonzales in the city at 6:30. Dad got up early (he has always been an early riser) and made us breakfast. We were out the door at 6:00 and driving by the corner of the Great Highway and Judah street, where we were to meet Tom and Stacy at almost exactly 6:30. The problem was parking, we had to drive back down the Great Highway about 10 blocks to find parking. We finally met up with Tom and Stacy about 6:50. The City runs special B to B buses, Tom was thinking ahead, so we had bought special all day Muni passes with our B to B entry stuff. We jumped on Muni, and we were off to the Embarcadero and the start line.

Tom and Stacy brought "party stuff" for us. They did not bring stuff for all 75,000 invited to Katie's birthday walk, but they had stuff for the four of us. We put on hats and Katie had a special tiara with blinking lights. There were poppers and streamers and little blow things that roll out as you blow, Tom was bummed that they did not make noise. The Muni made it's way through the city, picking up people along the way until there bus was filled to the max. Finally the bus got the the Embarcadero and we all unloaded. The majority of the crowd headed down to the start line, but Tom again came to the rescue and directed us up to 4th and Howard Street at the Moscone Center. We were about five blocks up from the start line.

We waited here with a large crowd of people with numbers on, lots of people start here. A little after 8:00 the police cars and the "real" runners went by and the pack of want-to-be real runners. As the pack thinned out, we stepped into the street and we were on our way.

There were all kinds of people, dressed in all kinds of ways, and not dressed. We went only a couple of blocks and it started to rain, not just a San Francisco fog mist rain, but real rain. As we walked on it rained more and more, harder and harder. As we walked, there were people as far as we could see in front of us and behind us. It just kept raining more and more and we just kept on walking. Then the cold SF wind started to blow. We were wet and freezing, but we were having a great time. Finally we reached the Golden Gate Park, the 5 mile mark 2.5 to go. We walked on through the park and out to the ocean and the finish line.

We were all cold and wet. Tom and Stacy wanted to head home and get dry, but Katie had to have a B to B t-shirt. So she and I headed back into the park and the after walk festivities. There were all kinds of vendors booths and a stages setup. If the weather had participated, it would have been lots of fun, but due to the rain there were no bands playing and many the vendors were not open. We got our shirts and two for Tom and Stacy and started the long walk back to the car. I figure we had to walk about 2 miles back to the car, we were cold and wet so it seems like 10 miles. Boy were we cold, I could hardly get the keys into the car door. Once in the car, we cranked the heat up to max and headed to Pacifica.

Once home we took hot showers and had some great food. This made us feel better. We then had a relaxing evening with Mom and Dad and some sound sleep.

With all the walking (over 700 miles at this point) we have booth lost some weight. So, on Monday we headed out to the mall and to buy Katie some new clothes. We had a blast shopping and got her half a new wardrobe, two weeks earlier she had bought the other half. The following weekend, it was out to buy me all new pants, the old ones were just too big. We do not have a scale at home (so we do not know the exact figures), but we estimate that we have both lost 20 or more pounds since last August!.

Bob