San Fracisco
Los Angeles

San Francisco

I wasn’t sure what I expected going into my trip, but I can gladly say my experience exceeded all expectations. The weather was amazing (although a little chilly in the early mornings), but the wind blew a little cold so I finally understood why sleeveless Patagonias were all the rage in the tech bro space.

One thing that was a very interesting experience was riding Waymo. If you’re unaware, Waymo is a self-driving taxi operation which started in SF, but has now branched out to many other cities in the US.

• Battery Chamberlin: A popular overlook of the SF bridge. I originally thought it was an artifact leftover from WW2 meant to defend against the Japanese, but it turned out it was built in 1900 as general coastal defence.
• Presidio: My friend was off to work for the day, so I decided to go to the Palace of Fine Arts. I was a little disappointed that it wasn’t a museum, but the “palace” was very pretty. I walked alongside the beach and also managed to hit the original Ghirardelli chocolate shop.
• Muir Woods: While the true redwood forest was a little too out of reach to visit, Muir Woods just so happened to be about an hour away from Fisherman’s Wharf. We didn’t spend a lot of time there, but I was absolutely exhausted on the bus ride back to the boat.
• Golden Gate Park: This was one of my favourite days in SF. It wasn’t the prettiest day with all the grey clouds, but taking a rental bike from the Panhandle to Ocean Beach was very fun. The roads in the park were closed to actual traffic, so the whole area felt a lot less hostile.
• Autodesk Office: Earlier that year, from January to April, I was an intern at Autodesk. I realized when I came to SF that I could visit the Autodesk office there as well as my manager.
• Coit Tower: This was a small little tower with a 360 view of northeastern SF.

• Acai Bowls: I was instantly addicted to these. The only thing that barred me from buying them on a daily basis was the price. The sweet and cold acai paired with crunchy granola, and whatever toppings you threw on made it a texture heaven.
• Panchita’s Pupuseria: My manager from an internship recommended I visit Panchitas where they specialized in Pupusa, an El Salvadorian and Honduran dish.
• IHOP: An all-American breakfast chain. I knew American diners were unhealthy, but this was next level. Their entire menu consisted of carbs, fat/protein, and oil. We decided to go big or go home and got the chicken fingers with onion rings, fried eggs, breakfast sausage, french toast, and a hashbrown. Not a single vegetable came with any of this. The food wasn’t all bad, I enjoyed it for what it was but I certainly didn't plan on going back anytime soon.

The coffee scene wasn’t as large as I expected. Of course, cafes and the like were boundless, but specialty coffee was what I was looking for in particular. A particular location called The Coffee Movement just to the side of Chinatown was particularly memorable for a strawberry tasting note cortado that smelled like strawberry jam. I thought when it came to really well brewed espressos, if the scent itself matched that of the tasting notes, then it was certainly something worth remembering.

Los Angeles

I mentioned earlier how the place seemed like GTA V and I wanted to reiterate that. Because I didn't watch a lot of TV shows, a lot of my experience with what LA was like came from this one video game. Everything from how busy and noisy the Hollywood Walk of Fame was, to how intensely squiggly Beverly Hills were, and even the massive unfinished highrise in the middle of downtown (despite the fact that both are wholly unrelated, life did imitate art in a way).

Because LA happened to be a large lump of relatively unorganized urbanism, it was pretty hard to gauge how big the city was. Even from the observatory, which was already on the west side, getting to Santa Monica would’ve been an hour of driving, or two hours by transit. It was a combination of this, and the fact that we didn’t have a lot of time left in LA that we had to skip over the famous pier.

We rented a car for our 8-hour road trip down to LA. We were given a Kia Niro - an EV. This would’ve been perfectly fine if we were driving around in SF. Unfortunately, where we were headed was LA where a massive stretch of highway and desert stood between. Of course, we didn't typically put the words “electric vehicle” and “road trip” together, but we had to make do with what we had. We managed to survive the trip southward, but the return trip was a bit of a mess.

We left early in the morning and gradually made our way through the desert when we started to get low on “gas”. If our commute had been anything like the one we had on the way down, we could’ve pulled into a surprisingly numerous amount of charging stations. But because we took a slightly different route up, the closest charging station was barely within reach. We realized that we would reach the charger with only 6 miles left, which would be cutting it way too short. The Kia’s ‘miles left’ estimator was completely off too because it would constantly overestimate how much distance we actually had left, so in reality we would’ve made it with -10 miles on the dash.

Luckily, a nearby community college with some absolutely archaic charging stations existed. These were probably from the early 2010s based on the design plus cobweb count, and from their charging speeds, they were most likely at least that old too. Typically, an electric vehicle could charge from 10% to 80% within the hour. We charged for an hour and a half but only managed to get to 15% (~40 miles). We decided to cut it off there, and head towards the charging station we were originally going to go to.

Thanks to this wonderful sidequest that was bestowed upon us, we realized we weren’t going to be able to return the car by the 5 pm deadline so we extended by one day, and headed towards Palo Alto instead where my friend’s girlfriend was. We made the trip back home that evening, and the car was returned the morning thereafter.

Despite the troubles, I thought that every journey with hardship always came out as a more memorable one. When things hit the fan and problem-solving was required when it wasn't expected, the experience that normally would’ve been a drab drive back home, turned into a fun story to tell (with some valuable lessons like never renting EVs for road trips).

• Highway 1: One of my all-time dreams was to drive alongside the coast on Highway 1. Going southward had some incredible views. I’m sure you had seen it before without even realizing it: Apple’s Big Sur desktop wallpaper was of the Cabrillo Highway, a northern section of the highway. The highway was foggy for most of the northern areas, but soon after we were met with beautiful beaches and piers whose decks were filled with overpriced but delicious clam chowder bread bowls.
• Presidio: My friend was off to work for the day, so I decided to go to the Palace of Fine Arts. I was a little disappointed that it wasn’t a museum, but the “palace” was very pretty. I walked alongside the beach and also managed to hit the original Ghirardelli chocolate shop.
• Highway 101: The original plan was to continue down Highway 1, but road closures due to landslides put us in-land on the 101. I was ready to be disappointed but the change in scenery actually made it the highlight of the trip. Only a single mountain away from the shore, it was an actual desert. Temperatures were reaching 45oC and it was brown and dry as far as the eye could see. What made it so memorable was how new the environment was to me. I had never been in a desert-like environment, nor had I seen anything like a long stretch of flatland, barriered in by mountains on both sides.
• Anime Expo: Lots and lots of amazing things went on here with so many people and events. Unfortunately, we didn’t end up visiting a lot of seminars, but we did look around artist alley a lot.
• Griffith Observatory: You could see almost the entirety of LA from up here. From the Hollywood sign to Santa Monica beach (on a clear day though).

• Highway 101:We ran low on food so we dropped by a Mexican convenience store to grab something and lo and behold, the best burrito I had ever had in my life.
• In-N-Out:Honestly? It was a little underwhelming. I wasn't sure if it was because everyone had been telling me it was the best thing ever, or because we had to wait an hour for food, but it really didn't match my expectations. The burger was tasty, but what brought the score down were the “animal style” fries. They tasted like they sat in a pool of oil for 30 minutes before being fried again, giving them an oily, hard, and dry texture.
• Mexican food:LA was home to many Mexican folks, and with that came some seriously good Mexican food. While my favourite had been in random desert restaurants, food trucks also delivered some great eats.
• Korean food:Jokbal isn't particularly a cheap dish even in Korea, but I wasn’t expecting how much it would cost in LA. I already knew Korean food in North America was expensive, but $45 USD for a mediocre set of it?I don’t think I’ll be eating in Koreatown when I visit next time.

We were a little bit too busy to worry about getting coffee. We managed to drop by a cafe just before Anime Expo just off the train, but it was a bit forgettable.

My trip to California was a fantastic adventure of contrasts: the foggy, hilly charm of San Francisco versus the sprawling, desert-bordered urbanism of Los Angeles. I found that the most memorable parts weren't the ones I planned, but the unexpected moments, like the 'sidequest' with the EV or discovering the best burrito of my life in a random desert convenience store. It was a trip that filled my camera roll and left me with a long list of reasons to come back and explore more. This was actually one of the many trips in 2024 that eventually lead to me getting myself a camera at the tail-end of the year.