busy day in the City

The morning started early with my files... During the previous day I had tried to copy/move my milllion image files to the newer hard drive... it took hours so I would leave and go shooting on the streets of San Francisco... when I returned, the operation aborted for some unknown reason and now I'd have to compare both folders on the source and destination locations, and copy the files not moved.... what a pain. So, I decided to just back-up all of the files. It'd just be a slight duration of a few days!

That operation in progress, I started by climbing the hills again to Telegraph Hill. Today Coit Tower was celebrating its long existence and was offering free elevator rides to the top; something I've never experienced in my life though I faintly remember a school field trip as a very young child. The view was amazing from the top, and it was well worth the trip up those hills and the stairs! Plus there were old fire engines and a display of period callsic old cars, and the Mayor would be speaking later that day - I didn't stick around but did get pixs of the engines and cars.
Last night I had heard online that a zeppelin would be flying over the city! So, I drove to Crissy Field then walked toward Fort Point at the base of the southern tower of the Golden Gate bridge..... stopping enroute to snap away at birds and more.
By time I reached a halfway point, lo and behold there was a huge white airship coming toward the bridge from the south... I started taking pixs with both a 170-500 and the wide-angle, finishing up with my standard 28-300. Many sunning at the beach were looking up at the airship, and there was a fireboat throwing up streams of water in celebration; this is the first time since the 1940s that an airship has flown over the City!!

That done, I went walking back to the Crissy Field marsh and photographed the birds there...
it's a "clean" marsh but getting filthier every week... but still... getting close and tight one can see the water and not the cups, plastic and filth... though it's still there!!

That done, I drove home, parked the car and walked toward Chinatown to see a friend who was participating in the San Francisco ARTwalk... I wanted to participate too but didn't have the money for printing the pictures, storing them in some protective sleeves, etc. It's not cheap nor easy to sell or even display images!! This morning I was starving as I hadn't eaten anything all day and had already walked a few miles, plus now will be walking up some steep North Beach hills, so I stopped at my previously favorite dim-dum place for a few snacks. They had depleted their supply of shrimp dumplings, so I took what remained - two - then grabbed some pork thingies that I liked too... the taste of the shrimp dumpling wasn't what I was used to... much has changed in the few months since I'd stopped there before. I went and found my photographer friend on Mason Street in front of the Cable Car Museum and stopped and chatted for an hour... she has an uncanny eye for flora details, and I love her work!!

After that I walked up and down those same steep hills again and drove my sister to a birthday party for her grandson and her brother-in-law.... I dropped her off to finish with the backing up of my files, plus to download the images of the morning and the zeppelin, etc.

I now went to the birthday party and spent over 3 hours there and finally returned to discover the backup operation continuing and now only two days and quite a few hours remaining!!