The icons of big cities are usually emblematic buildings, historical monuments or glittering avenues. But when someone thinks of San Francisco, almost always does it on a tram. A city that has made urban transport its universal emblem has, course, my sympathies. Addition, I had always wanted to get on one since I saw Karl Malden and Michael Douglas Flying with his car for the steep arteries of the city in "the streets of San Francisco".
It matters little that currently only three lines exclusively survive as tourist attraction. When thousands of kilometers are traveled pursuing myths, too much attention is usually paid to the small print. So just put a foot in San Francisco from Las Vegas, I was in a hurry to see the Golden Gate or navigate to Alcatraz. I wanted, especially, get on that tram from the city where cars flew in the memories of my childhood.
When thousands of kilometers are traveled pursuing myths, too much attention is usually paid to the small print
The dream was waiting very close to our hotel, A step away from the central square of Union Square. Of the crossroads Powell and Market Street leave two of the lines still in operation. There you can buy tickets in a Muni booth (The tram network, buses and subway from the city), however they can also be acquired on the march. About twenty tourists whisper next to the stop, a liturgy that is repeated in the same place day after day and at all hours. Some cloudy gaze and distracted trial observes the scene from its hundreds of nights without stars and, how wanting to shatter that tourist happiness, exclaims an unintelligible phrase drowned by the tram bell, that does not understand without roof.
When the car arrives, An operator is responsible for turning on a wood, But now in the opposite direction. This line Powell-Hyde Dies in the Pacific Waters, In the busy Fisherman´s Wharf, to a few apples where the Powell-Mason concludes, that also uploads to Noble Hill but then deviates towards North Beach.
Some cloudy gaze beggar and distracted trial observes indifferent to tourists from their hundreds of nights without stars
You can go comfortably sitting in wooden seats, But what everyone expects is to travel on the stirrup.. This is how you really enjoy this means of transport with almost a century and a half of life behind it since it was invented by a Andrew Hallidie.
Way of the hill Nob Hill, one of the 44 city, The tram dates back the famous slopes of San Francisco with Parsimonia, How to give us time to recreate with experience. They are just two apples, But the inclination has a multiplier effect of distance. At the crossroads with California Street (where the third tram line runs) A place with a cathedral opens that reminds Notre Dame and a cast of postín hotels, those of marbles that you do not dare or step.
The tram dates back the famous slopes of San Francisco with Parsimonia, How to give us time to recreate with experience
We stop to visit two of them, el Fairmont y el Mark Hopkins, que presume de vistas en el restaurante de su última planta, Top of the Mark. The panoramic, course, It does not detract, With the unmistakable transameric pyramid irrigating as a scepter of the modern architecture of the Californian city. Otra cosa es sentarse en una mesa a pedir algo. Before even doing the threat, The pocket shouts disconsolate. Two minutes later we are in the elevator.
When the tram locks down the downstream, With the sea already in sight, Way of the old fishermen docks, advancing by Hyde Street entre el tráfico de vehículos, There is no doubt that we are in San Francisco, In the city where police cars flew by chasing criminals. Standing on the stirrup, Filling us with sea, we Fisherman´s Wharf, A gum of the "American Way of Life" where it is almost obliged to stop in a seafood street to test the crab.
A Spanish ship, San Carlos del Marino Juan Manuel de Ayala, He was the first to navigate San Francisco Bay in 1775
At one step away from the tram stop is the Recoleta Ghirardelli Square, where a famous chocolate factory was located that gave way half a century ago to a mall. The square, Quiet and lonely, He has great views of the bay, Those waters that the San Carlos del Marino Español sailed for the first time Juan Manuel de Ayala in 1775.
Already at sunset, We return in tram to North Beach, The Italian neighborhood of SF. As in New York, Linda with Chinatown. Here the first Italian immigrants arrived during gold fever, When the waters of the bay reached its streets. Epicenter of the Beat Generation, The neighborhood pulse is Latino, With its coffees and terraces. An unbeatable place for dinner good pasta with Washington Square, The square around which North Beach's neighborhood life beats.
In Stockton Street it smells like lacquered duck and fish. It is Chinatown's essence
To get to the Chinese neighborhood, A good option is to get on the tram that travels California Street, that leaves you right next to the entrance door, unmistakable with its columns and roofs of Pagoda. Inside it houses one of the largest Chinese communities in the United States and the oldest street in the city, Grant Avenue, Always crowded, although perhaps the essence of Chinatown is breathed with greater authenticity in the nearby stockton street, where the visitor walks between embroidered tablecloths, Varied restaurants and jade crafts smelling of lacquered duck and fish and mixing with the bustle of goods and daily purchases. At the end of the line, again the sea, the Embarcadero Center And a few docks, to those who seem to have gun, where to sit down to spread nostalgia.
