The Bay

Fog and Flowers

By Nathan Tsai

August 29^th, 2021

With COVID continuing to plague the United States, traveling away from the Bay Area has become a more complicated affair. To keep on scratching the photography itch, I began to plan a few trips around my hometown as if I were approaching a foreign city. This is the first of these posts.

Golden Gate Bridge

At 4AM on a brisk summer morning, I stumbled my into the car with a case full of camera gear. My first stop of the day was to capture San Francisco's most iconic piece of architecture -- the Golden Gate Bridge. Unfortunately, the other icon of San Francisco -- the fog -- was out in full force. The wind too, accompanied the fog and if I stood up and fully faced the ocean, I would invariably be forced back with each gust.

I estimate that my visibility was no more than twenty feet. Sometimes, if the wind surged strongly enough, I would be able to glimpse the looming shadow of the bridge and a few of the fog-lights that illuminated the Golden Gate.

Searching for a Skyline

I am familiar with San Francisco and it's foggy foibles so I had a few backup plans in place. I figured that I'd use the fog to my advantage to capture a moody shot of San Francisco's skyline. I had a few prospective locations marked out on my map and set off driving from point to point in an attempt to find the cityscape I was looking for.

San Francisco

The Bay Bridge

Waiting for Breakfast

I found myself in Berkeley upon accomplishing my quest for a skyline landscape. Task completed, I started my hunt for breakfast. Like I planned my photography, I also had a list of some coffee places that would be open early in the morning and also sounded good enough to try out.

While I don't have a picture of this, I have to give CoRo Coffee Room a huge shoutout. They pulled an exquisite shot of espresso and provided a small glass of cold water to wash it down. The price was more than fair, the service was quiet and professional, and the coffee was excellent.

With the first place checked off my list, I headed towards the second name -- Bartavelle Cafe. As I drove up to the small shopping plaza the cafe was nestled in, I noticed that there was a massive line of people (all standing 6 feet apart) that stretched out of the parking lot, around two corners, and along an entire block of houses. I figured that I had just blundered into a hyper-popular coffee spot and as I had not much else to do, I parked near the end of the line and joined it.

I waited in the chilly air for more than half an hour. I snapped photos of some flowers that grew along the sidewalk, and listened to an audiobook. When I finally rounded the last corner and stepped into the parking lot, I realized two things. First, the cafe I wanted to visit was closed. Secondly, the line we were all standing in was feeding directly into the Acme Bread Co., a Bay Area staple for wholesale bread. Having already sunk my time and body heat into waiting (and because freshly baked pastries and bread is perhaps even better than coffee), I stood in line for a few more minutes till I was permitted to enter a small, cozy room attached to the back of a giant industrial bakery. The room was filled with a soft warm light and absolutely packed with all manner of pastries, breads, and confections.

Acme Bread Co.

I picked up some cookies for some friends I was meeting later, some loaves of sour baguette for snacking on at home, and a blueberry sour cream puff pastry for breakfast.

The puff pastry was crispy and flaky on the outside, soft on the inside, and coated with a light dusting of powdered sugar for a bit of sweetness. The blueberry filling was delicious; it had this lovely jammy texture without tasting too sweet and the faint undertones of the sour cream really rounded out the flavors of the pastry.

Onwards to UCB

My final destination in the morning was to the very top of the hill that overlooks the main campus of UC Berkeley. At the very summit, the University of California Botanical Gardens are secreted away between science laboratories and guarded government facilities.

University of California Botanical Gardens

I'm not sure if it was the light or the fog, but there were some lovely textures that were accentuated by the cool, grey-gold light.

Of course, there were plenty of bright and vibrant flowers on full display.

Fin

As I headed back out to my car, I tried to catch one last glimpse of the San Francisco skyline. The fog had swept back in and wreathed the city from view.