I'm sure I've told you that Seb's job with United comes with flight benefits. He can fly on any United flight on standby, any time he can get a seat. In practice it's kind of complicated, and it's definitely not a no-hassle ticket to anywhere you want on demand, but you can, apparently, figure out the system and get some great benefits from it! Seb really loves it and uses practically all of his days off to fly to interesting airports, fly on certain planes he likes, or even just come home and spend a day with us. He can even fly first class if there are seats available.
What I don't know if I've also said is that we (his parents) get those benefits too! Because of the logistics of flying on standby, we haven't and probably won't be able to use them as often as Seb! It's not the best system for if you need to be in a certain place at a certain time, that is only way a working man like Sam CAN travel! But it's kind of fun and cool all the same. This year, Seb also listed Goldie as his one "friend" who can get the benefits too. So, a few weeks ago, Seb called me saying, "Flights are really open in the next few days. There are 50-60 seats available on a ton of different flights. Do you want to go somewhere?"
Well yes, I did! After much consulting back and forth we decided we'd go to San Francisco for the day and take Goldie too. (You have to look at flights home too, when you're deciding where to go…there have been a few times Seb has easily flown to a place but then been stuck trying to find flights home!) So, Seb flew in to Salt Lake from Denver on a Monday night, and then Sam drove us back to the airport really early the next morning.
Goldie is a willing student of all Seb's plane and airport knowledge
The flight was so empty, we all had entire rows to ourselves! I love having a window seat. We flew into a beautiful sunrise!
Coming into the Bay Area
Little mountains poking out
From above, the clouds looked like they were just made of little bubbles, but as we descended we could see that each little bump was actually a big cliff of clouds!
We had about seven hours to explore before we had to be back to the airport. We rented a car so we could get out and see the city. It felt like we were able to do a lot in that time! We have been to San Francisco before on a family trip, but it turns out Goldie wasn't even born at that time! Seb remembers it, though. That was the trip when he lost his stuffed monkey, Brownie—we reminisced about it sadly while we were there. 😢
Oakland Bay Bridge (a lot of these pictures are Sebastian's)
We walked on Pier 39 and saw the sea lions. It was so mild and pleasant outside—60º. Perfect, in fact.
We rode a cable car up the hill…
(I took this picture of the cable grip, for the little boys, of course)
The blossoms were out (a little ahead of ours) and everything felt so spring-y!
Sebastian insisted on picking an (ornamental?) lime from a tree in a little park we walked through. He impaled it (the lime) on a convenient sundial so he could suck out some juice. It wasn't bad. Kind of woody. Like lime infused with rosemary. (Seb always has liked his yemons and yimes.)
We fortuitously wandered past this little cafe and immediately stopped and went in. "Do you have actual bunnies?" we said, thinking surely they wouldn't. But they DID! You had to pay to go in a little room and actually sit and play with them. But they let us pet this cute little guy that was about to go out on his walk.
They looked like happy bunnies, with little couches to and beds to sit on. I'm glad.
These driverless Waymo cars were everywhere and it was very unnerving. Especially when you were crossing the street in front of one.
We of course wanted to drive across the Golden Gate Bridge! Still Sebby's favorite bridge, I believe. I don't think we drove across it when we were here before.
We liked how even the nearby guardrails and lampposts were painted with the same orange color.
As the morning clouds cleared away the bridge looked so pretty against the blue sky!
Such a beautiful morning, and a beautiful Goldie! It's right that she should visit this bridge.
Back on the other side
We found a fish restaurant around on the ocean side of the city and had the BEST lunch out on their tiny patio. Then we drove back toward Fisherman's Wharf through Golden Gate Park.
We stopped and got some sourdough bread to take home, and a little second lunch of clam chowder (yum)
We saw this horrifying guy—not a true floppy guy, but with a single floppy arm
And then we went back to the airport and waltzed through the nonexistent security line in good time for our flight back. We hugged Seb goodbye (he was flying straight home to Denver, but got us all settled for our flight first) and boarded our plane—whole rows to ourselves again! Saw this lovely view of the city flanked by the Golden Gate and Oakland Bay bridges as we flew out.
And we got back to Utah just as the red moon was coming up over the mountains.
Goldie and I were so lucky to have such a fun little day trip with Sebastian!
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