G-lato’s Bay Area Trip, Part 3: Cable Cars, Malls and Cafe Bistro

Cable car going from Union Square to Fisherman’s Wharf

After enjoying a tasty Root Beer Float at Ghirardelli Square, we made our way to the cable car ticket booth to buy some tickets. If you ever decide to ride cable cars in San Francisco, make sure you understand a few things about the way they work. They offer round-trip tickets (basically, you get to hop on the cable car twice) and also an all-day pass. We paid $10 for our round-trip tickets even thought it was only $1 more to get the all-day pass. There is a reason why getting the round-trip tickets make sense. You see, the cable car we took goes from Ghirardelli Square goes to Powell & Market, a little past Union Square, with a some stops in between.  The cable cars are usually PACKED because most people don’t get off in between. This means that if you decide to get the all-day pass and stop buy Lombard St, Chinatown, etc…you might have a wait for a cable car that actually has room for you. If you go in a large group, that can become problematic since you could end up spending some time waiting for a cable car with enough room for your group.  I recommend just getting the round-trip pass and taking it all the way to the end.  Make sure you hang on the outside of the cable car, it’s fun!

(left) Inside the Westfield Mall (right) Cafe Bistro

Once we arrived at the Powell & Market station, we walked over to the Westfield Mall. Apparently, there was this restaurant on the top floor called “Cafe Bistro”, so we decided to grab a little something to snack on. I wasn’t really hungry, so I just wanted a glass of water…at least that is what I THOUGHT I wanted.

My niece wanted pizza since she was hungry (She’s always has room for pizza for some weird reason. It’s her favorite food or something).  I do not like cheese pizza. I consider cheese pizza to be the simplest and most ghetto form of pizza in the world. Yet, this is probably the best cheese pizza I’ve ever had. I guess adding some oregano does help enhance the taste somewhat.

Creme Brulee

My body was still digesting the Thai Food we had earlier in the day.  Adding on the pizza I just had and I was pretty much busting out at the seams. Still, I needed to at least “try” the creme brulee for the benefit of the blog (talk about a great sense of duty, aren’t you impressed!?). It was quite tasty because you can actually taste and see the freshly ground vanilla they used to make it. Unfortunately, it wasn’t good enough for me to have more than one teaspoon of it. Although being full had a lot more to do with it than anything else.

After our little snack, we made our way around the shops and stopped by the Virgin and Apple store a few blocks from the Mall. We didn’t spend too much time there since we were pressed for time. We had dinner reservations at 8pm and we still had to make our way back to our car, which was all the way over between Ghirardelli Square and Pier 39.  We browsed through the stores quickly and made our way back to the cable cars station. Here are some pictures our ride back. Lotta Fun!!! Although a bit cold for mid-July…that’s San Francisco for ya.

(left) a shot up Lombard street (right) coming downhill near Union

Next Stop, DINNER!

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