I left my heart in San Francisco...

When we first got to the Travelodge in San Francisco, everything seemed fine. The room was nice and there were partying Santa's everywhere we looked – we couldn't understand why the motel was so cheap, but we would soon learn! That night was the Santacon, which is an event that started many years ago in San Fran and has since spread to major cities around the world. It's basically a night where everyone dresses up as Father Christmas and goes out on a huge pub crawl about town. Having seen everyone having so much fun, me and Kev decided that we should go out too. We quickly got ready and headed out looking for the Lucky 13 pub that we had noticed on-line.

We left the hotel and turned right instead of left and walked for an eternity. The further we looked, the more dodgy the streets seemed to become. We decided we should head back and try the other direction. So we battled our way through the millions of drunken Santas and through the hundreds or homeless zombies that take over the streets of San Fran, and we made it to the Lucky 13 bar.

While me and Kev had left the UK thinking that American's can't handle their drink, this preconception was gradually being eroded during our time in the States. The Lucky 13 bar did nothing but dispel our belief even further – we now stand by the conviction that American's can drink....like fish! After ordering one JD and Coke and being handed a glass of barely drinkable neat alcohol, I chose to order another Jack Daniels, but this time in a long glass. In Rosy world, ordering a spirit in a long glass, means ordering 25ml measure of alcohol but in a glass with a lot of Coke. In America, this simply means pouring a long glass full of JD and then adding a splash of Coke – but charging the same amount of money for it as the small glass! In Kev's eyes, this was the best thing ever, but for me, this resulted in a very sore head in the morning!

And it was on that morning that Kev forced me to embrace the day and get out of bed to go for a wander. I'll be honest, that day I really didn't feel like going anywhere, but Kev tempted me out of the motel by promising to buy me breakfast (considering we were using a joint money account, that was a school-boy error on my part, but it got me out of my pit nevertheless!).

We walked up towards the area of Haight and found a popular looking breakfast diner, frequented by many many super gays. As Kev gobbled down his eggs, I sipped my lemonade and tried hard to stomach anything at all, while sound of the gays filled the room. I could have sat there all day listening to the campness and loving it, but Kev was on a mission to explore the city that day. We wandered off and soon stumbled on a neighbourhood that we instantly knew wasn't very friendly. It's strange how you can literally cross one road and find yourself in a terrible area and then walk on a block and cross the road again and be instantly in the safety of a good neighbourhood. So in this bad bad area, there were loads of bums hanging around on every corner and a few crazies and homeless people thrown into the mix. We picked up the pace and got the hell out of there and later looked the streets up on the internet. We found out that we had stumbled across an area called Tenderloin....one of the worst neighbourhoods in San Francisco!

Once we had escaped Tenderloin, we walked down towards Union Square, but when we got there it was so busy with tourists and homeless people that we instantly wanted to leave. We walked back along Market Street to our motel and were stunned by the number of homeless men and women everywhere – I'm honestly not exaggerating when I say that the homeless double the population in this area. Again, checked this out on the internet when we got back to the motel and realised that Market Street and Union Square is the main hub of the homeless in San Fran. So this answered our question of why our motel was so cheap – we were staying in the worst part of town!

Once we were back at the motel, I refused to leave again and we spent the evening watching TV! I think Kev nearly went mad with boredom, but there was no way I was going back out there with the scary people. Despite getting a really early night, we didn't get the best night's sleep as on this Saturday night, the streets were loud with drunken revellers and at around 2pm some bum went around knocking on everyone's door, probably asking for money. When we heard the knock at the door, we both sat up bolt upright in bed and looked at each other, unsure what to do...should we open the door, shout through door or phone reception – oh no, we couldn't phone reception...I'd spilt water all over the phone the night before when trying to pour myself a glass full, which had totally killed it...well done me and good job we didn't need it as a lifeline that night! Thankfully, it took us so long to do anything at all that the bum moved on and went to the next door, but once a strange person has tapped your door in the middle of the night, it's pretty hard to go back to sleep. The intrusion makes you immediately aware that while staying in a motel, the only thing separating you from the dodgy outside world is a small bit of glass or a flimsy plywood door. Thankfully, that was the last night we would spend in a motel!

The next morning we got up early and packed up our bags before getting as far away from Downtown San Francisco as possible. We drove up the roller-coaster type hills to the San Remo hotel in North Beach, San Fran. And what a difference! The San Remo is a lovely, traditional Victorian hotel, which is decorated in a quaint little style my Mum and Kev's mum would totally love it. As soon as we saw our room, I said to Kev 'This hotel is bound to be haunted'! But to be honest, for once this didn't bother me – as my Mum had always said 'it's the people who are alive you want to be scared of, not the ones who are dead!' and having spent the last two nights in Downtown, I was inclined to believe her and take my chances with the spirits.

We checked in and got back in the hire car for our final drive to the rental store, where we were met by the friendliest New Yorker we had ever (and would ever) meet, not that that's hard! He took our hire car away and after spending more than 3300 miles in that vehicle, it was time to say goodbye. Thankfully, Kev didn't take the loss of this car as badly as he had taken the end of his time in Rehab. He hadn't enjoyed the driving in America at all, it's either too busy or too quiet, nothing in between!

From the rental store we walked back to Union Square, but only to the nice bit where the posh shops are and the nice rich people! From there we wandered back to the hotel via that crooked street that you see on all the films, you know, the windiest hill in the world. That afternoon we went along to the waterfront at Fisherman's Wharf and decided to check out San Francisco's Hard Rock Cafe, to see whether it was as good as the one in Vegas. Admittedly, it did have a lot to live up to, but unfortunately, it didn't quite make the grade, but it was OK.

We stayed there for far too long and spent far too much money and then headed off to get some sushi for dinner. We found a great sushi bar just by the hotel and then went for another wander along the main road in North Beach, Columbus Avenue to sample the bars along there. There was a great little cafe/bar where we interrupted a Christmas party and met a beautiful little Boston Terrier called Shuh Shuh. From there, we moved on to the nearest Irish Bar, and then to a lovely local place called Sweeties just by the San Remo, before going back to the haunted hotel for the night. Strangely enough, that evening, we were sat in the hallway getting Wi Fi on the computer when we saw the owner of the hotel showing a young guy around. As he walked towards our hall way we heard him say...'this is the corridor that they call the haunted corridor' – great, I thought, my suspicions had been clarified. The owner proceeded to tell me that people who sleep in those rooms report seeing a blue light in their sleep. Luckily, I was so tired that night that I fell straight asleep and no blue lights could have woken me even if they'd tried!

The next morning we walked down to Fisherman's Wharf again to get on one of the famous San Fran trams. The trams are actually cable cars and they're the original ones so it was great fun to ride up and down the hills on it. We took the cable car to Union Square for a quick wander around before taking the tram back up over a different hill to Fisherman's Wharf again. We looked around Pier 39, which was basically just tourist shops, but was nice and then it would have been rude not to have popped back into Hard Rock as we were so close by!

That evening we went back to Sweeties bar just round the corner from the hotel and there we met the best Boston Terrier I've ever encountered. It's great in San Fran because everyone has Boston Terriers and they're awesome. Before we left for this trip we had always wanted to get a Pug, but had been concerned about the vets bills as they're notorious for having breathing difficulties. Boston Terriers are just like pugs, but cuter, friendlier and don't have the breathing issues – ideal, I can't wait to have one!

As well as Lola the Boston Terrier, that night we also met some guys from an organisation called Plastiki. These guys were British but had been in San Fran for a couple of years while they built a ship made of plastic bottles. They were planning on sailing to South America in the name of charity on this ship. Unfortunately, they've already been snapped up by the Discovery Channel so my attempts to get them for Matchlight failed, but keep an eye out for them in the news in future!

The next morning we had to wake up earlier than we'd woken for ages as today was the day we were getting thrown behind bars! Typically, this was the only day of bad weather we had the whole time we were in San Fran, it was raining and foggy and when we got to the pier we couldn't see the rock that we were about to head to. We boarded our ferry to Alcatraz and froze the whole way there (it's only a ten minute journey, over a mile and a quarter, to the prison, but still it was really cold!!).

Alcatraz was awesome, although much smaller than we had expected. The audio tour that you get given is totally worth it and as you wander around, the genuine prison guards and ex-cons talk you through the cells, the guard's quarters and the escape stories. First thing in the morning is totally the time to go as well, it was pretty quiet and it gives you a chance to feel the eeriness of the place.

We spent most of the morning at Alcatraz, but the weather was pretty grim and so we didn't wander around to appreciate all the flora and fauna that the rock has to offer. Once we'd seen the dank and dirty prison cells we'd seen enough! We hopped back on the boat and back to the bustling shoreline of San Francisco, the same shore line that all those prisoners looked out to while they were cooped up in Alcatraz.

That afternoon we had a lazy afternoon of watching films in the hotel while it poured with rain outside. An evening of sushi and an early night ended that day – we needed to get all the sleep we could that night, it would be a while before we would get to bed again!

The next morning, we checked out of the hotel and stored our luggage in their office. Then we just had ten hours to kill before we could get our shuttle bus to the airport. We chose to spend those ten hours getting a lovely breakfast in Little Italy and then wandering up to the Coit Tower, admiring the view of the Bay Bridge and the Golden Gate Bridge while we were there. The weather was beautiful that day thankfully. We then took a walk up and down the ridiculous hills of San Fran, along to the Ferry Building, and around the media area and along to a great little pub called Grumpies, which played an endless selection of the Deftones. From there it was back to Little Italy, which is a lovely part of San Francisco and then back along for our final night in Sweeties.

Typically, this was the best night in Sweeties and during a pool competition, Kev met Vinnie who was a fireman in San Fran who lived on a boat down at the pier. Vinnie introduced us to Cleveland (that wasn't his real name, but a little nickname I liked to use) and a whole load of other locals from the area. We had a great time chatting to them and finding out more about the city that they, and everyone else, seems to love so much. But alas, at nine pm it was time to go and pick up our bags and get our shuttle bus to the airport.

The bus picked us up from the San Remo and drove us out of town, picking up speed and refusing to stop at red lights as it ventured through Downtown in the dark! We had arrived at the airport by about half ten and we couldn't check in until 4am. So the only thing to do, was what everyone else who was saving money on a hotel that night did...sleep in the Subway restaurant! We bought ourselves a foot long, made ourselves comfy and settled down to get a few hours sleep.

At four I roused the reluctant Kevin and we went down to check in before going through to the gate to wait for our flight to New York City....our final destination.