A fan of the #SanFrancisco Crosstown Trail posted his tribute "Straight Up," a walking route straight up the middle from the south side of SF up to the Golden Gate. Monday, I walked it.
I got a hint that my timing might not have sync'd up with the author's intent when I read the route instruction "As it [Pope Street] turns north, look down the street and you’ll see Mt. Davidson straight ahead." Thus I looked up from the instructions to behold Mt. Davidson:
It was foggy. That was on purpose: I'd headed out early in the fog to get in as much distance as I could before the day heated up. But my timing had consequences. Because I didn't wait until the end of summer vacation time, when I followed the route through the City College San Francisco campus, the library temporarily housing the Diego Rivera mural was closed. I saw maybe three students as I traversed the early-morning campus. (But when things heated up later, I would indeed be glad I'd gotten an early start.)
My foggy-morning timing made Mt Davidson not so much fun. Eucalyptus trees eagerly drew water from the fog and tried to drop that water onto their roots. I say "tried" because something blocked the water's path: me. I grumbled at the old city moguls who had attempted to start a lumber industry in the bay area by planting eucalyptus trees, accidentally choosing a type of eucalyptus ill-suited to lumber and then…just letting the trees grow. Now I walked through a false rain. A few times I started to slip in the mud, scrambling to keep my feet. I walked up to the huge cross, a memorial for the Armenian genocide. Yesterday, more than 100 years after that genocide, I'd read a quote from Azerbaijan's president that he still felt justified in Azerbaijan's conflict with Armenia. Humans are smart; it's too bad we devote so much of our smarts to holding stupid grudges. Somehow, I made it down off the hill without falling on my butt in the mud.
As I made my way from Mt Davidson to Mt Sutro, the fog burned off. Soon the day would warm up, not so great for walking. Nevertheless, I wasn't sad to see the fog go: I was about to walk under more eucalyptus trees.
Though I lived across the street from Mt Sutro's trees, I hadn't walked there in quite a while. A while back, UCSF's groundskeepers had started chopping down many many eucalyptus trees. Moguls, in their wisdom, had planted trees all at once, and the trees were dying all at once; the groundskeepers had a hard time keeping up. Finally, they'd gotten ahead of the game by cutting down many of the old trees. I kept getting notices: don't try to walk the Sutro trails for the next few months; they're clearing trees in the such-and-such area. I'd stopped trying to keep track on which areas were open for walks; I just gave up on walking there. I hadn't noticed when the notices stopped. Now this walking route was sending me into that trail system, making me realize it was open again, had perhaps been open for a while.
I emerged from Mt Sutro and headed down the Farnsworth steps, crossed Parnassus half a block from my apartment. I followed the route through Golden Gate Park. As I walked at 2nd and Cabrillo, I looked over a block to the intersection near my parents' house. There was a fleet of power trucks gathered, no doubt upgrading some infrastructure. I kept walking to Geary where I was interrupted by more infrastructure-upgrading: new asphalt was going in. I gave up on following the route exactly, moving over to Arguello.
At St. John's church, I took a little side jaunt. A recent SF Pursuit activity had made me think about San Franciso's labyrinths. Thus, I took a break to walk the labyrinth at St John's. Sort of. It was a bit neglected. My path was blocked by plant fronds. My contemplative mindfulness is amazing, I thought to myself as I awkwardly stepped over them.
I made my way through the Presidio pretty much on autopilot. In my youth, my mom and I had walked through the Presidio to get to my great-grandparents' house. Nowadays, I walked through it to meet with friends and/or SF Pursuit activities in the Marina district. The route instructions had me walking the Tennessee Hollow Trail, warning that it was tricky to follow; and it was tricky, but I soon realized I'd followed all of its pieces before on previous walks. I reached the route's destination: the beach at Crissy Field, which was windy. All in all, a good walk.
