Dragon Boat Festival

This weekend's adventure took us to Treasure Island to the San Francisco International Dragon Boat Festival.

What is Dragon Boating?
For those unfamiliar with the sport, dragon boating simply put, is a boat of 20 paddlers, a drummer and a steers person paddling to cross the finish faster than their competition. It's a team sport in its purest form that encompasses the elements of power, speed, synchronization and endurance.

There were a 120 teams competing over 2 days. They came from all over the globe, several from Canada and at least one team from London, England.
The start line was about a 1/3 of a mile away. They're rowing near the Bay Bridge with the Oakland hills behind them.

The paddlers dig deep and synchronize to the beat of the drummer.

Each heat race had 6 boats, till the final race with the top 6 competing for 1st place.

Seating was free, just find a flat rock along the shoreline and enjoy the race and the views of downtown.

After the races, we enjoyed the festival.
Taiko drummers...

Maori dancers...


Adorable hula dancers...

and lots kid friendly rides, crafts and costumed characters.

All this on one little island with spectacular views.

J Pop

On Saturday, August 25th, Jimmy and I went to the J-Pop Summit Festival in Japantown.

The J-Pop Festival is "a pop culture-themed street fair that covers the grounds of Post Street from Webster to Laguna and the Peace Plaza of Japantown, San Francisco."The theme is often related to anime, harajuku or kawaii styles or fashion.

Ninja warriors vs. harajuku.

sweet or sassy?

a little more edgy than cute.

costumes, wigs and short dresses.

Jimmy and I are trying to get in the habit of going on a long walk one weekend day. There's so much to explore in this city and every weekend there's a plethora of free events happening.

Crowd Control

We were out with a lot of people this week. Thousands and thousands.

On Wednesday, we celebrated the 4th of July, America's 236th birthday with all these people.
These were just the ones in the part of town we were in. We heard that an estimated 200,000 people were there to watch fireworks.

We got there 2 hours early and found a spot on a stairway away from the main crowd who were watching along the water's edge.

There was a house that partially blocked our view, but I liked how it gave the skyline a little more to focus on.




Then today after finishing up some chores, we went to the Fillmore Jazz Festival on Fillmore Street.
We didn't get there till almost 4 and we just caught one performance, but it lasted for 2 hours.

There was quite a crowd there, too! I'm not sure exactly how many, but there were 4 different stages and we only saw this one. There had to be tens of thousands of people walking around, enjoying the great music, good food and eclectic vendors.
(edit: our local news said approximately 90,000 people were anticipated to attend the festival.)

But as for us, once Kim Nalley started singing, we didn't want to move. We stood in the same spot for 2 hours and by the time she finished at 6, the vendors were tearing down their booths and serving their last beers.

How Weird

Today was a beautiful, sunny day. A fantastic way to start the month of May.

Spring and summer means a lot of street fairs. Today, there was a street fair right across the corner from our abode so we walked the 100 steps to check it out.

It's called the How Weird Street Faire, on Howard Street.

And How Weird it was!! Lots of loud electronic music, lots of dancers, lots of people wearing minimal clothing. And a few vendors selling art, clothes, jewelry and other stuff. Some of the reviews likened it to a rave. Yet another review said it was like a scene in CSI before they find the dead body.

The faire was in the middle of downtown, safely nestled among tall and historic buildings.

One of the many stages, all playing some form of electronic music. Very Loud. Very. Loud. Did I mention Loud? But it was hard not to get caught in the beat and next thing you know, you're bouncing.

If you're not dancing, you're shopping.


When you're not shopping, you're people watching.
I shoot from the hip a lot in crowded places, which causes the angled shots. I like it.

He must have been hot.

Stay hydrated.

Dancer in an outfit made entirely of soda can tabs. Nice!

Halloween costumes can be reused for this event. Bonus!

We live thataway.

Hula Hoops are entertaining.

Even rabbits like to dance.

Hippie or Hipster?

Grooving down in downtown.

Even Marge tweets about the How Weird Street Faire.

Who wants to go next year?