Going to San Fran for Cisco Live, things to do

[mjohnson]

Originally Posted by javadog

..... Buses and streetcars could get you to tourist places like the fisherman's wharf area. It's not a destination that would be high on my list, though....
JR

I make an exception for the mechanical museum on one of the piers. It's next to the Pompano submarine. Tons of coin operated things - pinballs, fortune tellers, nickelodeons and so on. Free admission but the machines take quarters (duh). The only real cost is dealing with the panhandlers/tour groups/TGI Fridays/clipboard-zombies native to big tourist areas. I usually walk back quickly to Jackson Square(?) and the Rogue Taphouse...

[javadog]

I used to go to that when it was out by the Cliff House. It's somewhat interesting but the rest of fisherman's wharf is just a bunch of stores that sell crap I don't need. Much better places to go in the city...

JR

[john70t]

Limited time-frame. No car. Wife.
Get on your walking shoes, a pocket full of sweets, bus maps, and grab the warm 'thick skinned' coat.

-Pier 39/FishermansWharf/Giardelli is touristy but fun, with a view of the GG bridge.
Buena Vista Irish coffee is at the very end of the line.
-Union Square has high end shopping and the cable car to the north.
-'Top of the Mark' Hopkins Hotel for deserts, jazz, views at night. Taxi there.
-Avoid the Tenderloin anytime.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by john70t

-'Top of the Mark' Hopkins Hotel for deserts, jazz, views at night. Taxi there.

I was going to stay at that hotel, but it seems like they jacked the rates up for the time that I'm going to be there or something.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by javadog

Yank Sing dim sum restaurant is in the financial district. I'd probably eat there every day.

Ding, ding, ding! We have a winner. I went for lunch today, yeah, I could eat there everyday too.

I've also hit up Thai, sushi and Chinese, and all have been very good. We've stuck with stuff that we can walk to. We've walked through Chinatown a few times. We've walked to the top of Nob Hill. We haven't made it to Fisherman's Wharf yet. We did rent a car (V6 mustang) and drive over to Mill Valley and Muir Woods. Muir Woods was really nice other than the crowds. The trees and area is beautiful. When I wasn't hampered by traffic, the road down to Muir Woods and down to Mill Valley was fantastic. Yowza, if I lived there I would never go home, I would just drive around all day.

Cisco Live has been very cool!

I met Mikester today. Great guy! We've even got a picture to post eventually. I need to get some pictures of some of the booth babes, but I keep forgetting. For you crazy network guys, I met a guy with 7 CCIEs, apparently he was the only one in the world, but I guess there are two now.

[mikester]

That was fun! I'm exhausted!

[mikester]

Originally Posted by stealthn

Eeeewwww I'm all giddy built many a DMVPN....
Do you work for Cisco?

Bob, sorry I was just reading this thread again and realized I never answered your question.

Yes I do.

[LakeCleElum]

Twin Peaks park - 360 degree View......Visit it every year...

[Tobra]

I liked to pedal up there on clear days. Lived right at the bottom of the hill on 7th Ave. My brother has a picture, or series of pictures rather, of SF ablaze post 1906 earthquake that I believe was taken from there.


Twin Peaks or Mt Diablo are about a toss up to me.

[pc100porsche]

In the Financial District is located an Awesome Steak Restaurant "5A5" .... check it out :

5A5 Steak Lounge - Financial District - San Francisco, CA, United States | Yelp

[mikester]

Shows over guys, I'm still recovering.

Steve! It was great to finally meet you. Hopefully we can meet up again in San Diego next year.

Hope you enjoyed my session.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by pc100porsche

In the Financial District is located an Awesome Steak Restaurant "5A5" .... check it out :

5A5 Steak Lounge - Financial District - San Francisco, CA, United States | Yelp

Thanks, I'm back home, the event was last week. I mostly ate at various Asian restaurants.

Originally Posted by mikester

Shows over guys, I'm still recovering.

Steve! It was great to finally meet you. Hopefully we can meet up again in San Diego next year.

Hope you enjoyed my session.

Mike it was great to meet you as well. It's a shame we couldn't hang out more, but with the missus there with me, that was difficult. I had planned to come talk to you and congratulate you on the great presentation, but you got rushed by folks with questions after, and the missus and I had plans that evening.

I think Mike said that there were something like 25,000-30,000 folks in attendance. Everywhere I went downtown, I saw folks from the event. On my flight back to Houston on Friday there were 8 people that had gone counting me, and those were just the folks with some sort of visual reference that I noticed, there may have been more.

It's a pretty impressive event. Lots of folks, free wifi for 25,000 network geeks, and the speeds were screamin' fast. Free breakfast and lunch every day. There was a free party on Wed in ATT Stadium that included a free concert with Lenny Kravitz opening for the Imagine Dragons (had no idea who they were, and the song that they have that's been in the top 100 forever is blech). Everyone gets a free backpack, it's a decent backpack.

Registration (getting your ID and backpack)


some of the crowd


Mikester(right) and myself(left)

[stealthn]

No wonder how all our customers networks worked flawless during this time, no network cowboys around to dick with the config


Looks like fun, reminds me years ago at Networld/Interop when I met a smokin hot girl who was actually the one who designed and built their networks for the event.

Don't see many women in your pictures

[Neilk]

Originally Posted by stealthn

No wonder how all our customers networks worked flawless during this time, no network cowboys around to dick with the config


Looks like fun, reminds me years ago at Networld/Interop when I met a smokin hot girl who was actually the one who designed and built their networks for the event.

Don't see many women in your pictures

What you really met was a "5". It's just that you were amongst too many males for 3 days and all of a sudden any girl starts looking good.

I work with hospital billing software where we have to visit their billing offices for 2-3 days. The first day you are there, just about all the women there are 2-4, by the time you leave, one of them will turn into a 7 or 8... I attribute it to "billing goggles".

[masraum]

Originally Posted by stealthn

Don't see many women in your pictures

Well, there were some smokin' hot booth babes around in the vendor fair. There were also helpers all over the place, and several of them were cute. But what did surprise me was how many women were there as attendees. And I think I saw a handful that were reasonably attractive. I didn't get any photos because I was too much in shock to take a photo.

[mikester]

I had 15 of my own customers there and 2 were women. Which is just under 15%.

Not bad but also not accurate for the number of women actually at my customer doing stuff which is more like 40%.

While there may not be a lot of female network engineers, voice, call center and video are a whole other ball park.

[mikester]

It's in San Diego this year, I got the speaking gig again too - my session was approved today. Waiting for the official note but looks like I'm good to go with some minor revisions to my direction (that are in line with what I wanted to do anyway).

[masraum]

Originally Posted by mikester

It's in San Diego this year, I got the speaking gig again too - my session was approved today. Waiting for the official note but looks like I'm good to go with some minor revisions to my direction (that are in line with what I wanted to do anyway).

Sweet! Congrats. Unfortunately, I'm sure I won't be there this year. We have a lottery here on who gets to go, and I suspect since I went last year my name won't be in the running this year. That's a shame too, I've never been to San Diego.

[vash]

chit!! how did i miss this?!!


Tadich Grill! order a martini and a Cioppino.

[stealthn]

Maybe I'll send one of my female CCNP's to balance out the geekdom