Afternoon, Dec 26th

We’re currently relaxing on a bench at the Ghirardell Chocolate Factory near the end of Columbus Avenue. It’s near mid-afternoon, temperature is about 58, and there is a harmonica blowing guitar picker entertaining the folks here in the courtyard. People are beginning to put up their umbrellas. Not a good sign.

After leaving the internet caf? this morning, we went by our trusty car rental agency (we’ve used them a couple time before) and reserved a car for Thursday. The forecast for Thursday is good so we are planning a day trip. The destination is yet to be decided. Monterey is the likely choice.

We then hopped on the cable car to Chinatown. I took some good video on the way. I had a great standing position in the front of the car. We tried two recommended restaurants (Italian) that were closed. Nearby on the edge of Chinatown was the House of Nanking which Richard Hyatt had recommended to me. He told me that you should look for the man with salt and pepper hair and then tell him “I’m hungry”. You don’t have to order anything specific. They’ll just start bringing you food. Well, we weren’t that hungry so we just asked the waiter for a recommendation. He had salt and pepper so we think he was the same person referenced in Richard’s story. He asked us which meat we preferred. We chose chicken and asked about a pancake that we had seen on an adjacent table. The waiter told us that was called “Mu shu”.

It sounded good to us. We also ordered hot tea. The tea came out first. Jaime says that it was the best she had ever had. It was made with green tea leaves and flowers (among other things).

As we waited for our meal, I looked around the restaurant which was very small. The walls were covered in white ceramic tiles. Both side walls displayed framed newspaper and magazine reviews of NanKing.

We were quickly served the Mu shu Chicken. The server actually spooned the chicken mixture into the paper thin pancake, wrapped the it, and then served them to us.

It was really good. The chicken was quite spicy, but in a way that we had not experienced.

We spent just a little money. The bill was less than $16.

After leaving Nanking’s we walked back to the cablecar line and returned to the hotel for a little while before departing again by cablecar for Ghirardelli’s.

Ghirardelli treats everyone to free chocolate samples as we are herded into the small gift shop. Jaime made a small purchase. I went over to the ice cream shop for a cone. After waiting in line I slowly moved close enough to the ordering station to see that a one scope cone was $4. I quickly left the line, not will to part with my $4 for a single scope!