I definitely failed1 to get this together before work got really busy and I lost all track of time.
I took the trip to walk across the Golden Gate Bridge back in November 23rd. A group of us left early in the morning and drove over to the Presidio area. We worried about the weather (aka rain) leading up to the day, and indeed it was a wild day for how much the weather changed—but that’s SF for you lol.
The spot we parked near didn’t have the ideal shot2 of the bridge I wanted, but I snapped a few shots before we started walking toward the bridge. For this trip I took my Fujifilm X-T3 with the 27mm lens.
It rained early in the morning, so we had pretty clear weather as we walked closer to the bridge and into the visitor area. I brought my sling and backpack, because I was worried about stuffing too much into my sling, but I really need to carry lighter next time (and I finally do in my pre-Christmas trip). With the risk of rain, I didn’t want to get my camera wet, so I needed the space in my sling for my camera.
There was a flag at the visitor area, at the south end of the bridge, but it was hard to get it in frame with everything else; I only captured one decent shot of it.
This was a specific trip with a few of my friends who also had cameras, so we all took photos and I didn’t feel like I was the only one stopping all the time. Once we walked near the bridge, there was a lot of fencing in the first section. I took a bunch of shots through the metal fence.
You can also see how much clouds there was over the city. We soon found out how much it shifted over the bridge. The weather changed multiple times as we walked across, going from hot and sunny to windy and rainy.
I didn’t take too many photos as we walked on the bridge itself since it was pretty busy. Though there weren’t too many interesting shots either, except when the rain cleared for a bit and we saw a rainbow.
The weather north of the bridge was much warmer and I got a few sunny, bright photos.
But the sun made the exposure difficult, and it was hard to see the lighting and contrast when both the camera screen and EVF was affected by the sun. I’ll have to figure out something in the future to deal with it.
Originally we wanted to walk around the area, following some of the hiking trails, but it was really hard to reach the nearby fort on foot. If I do this again, I’d like to visit it properly. At least the view from far away was nice.
We tried walking along the freeway road, but after a while the path ended and we would’ve had to risk walking next to the road, so we all decided to backtrack and go another way.
After circling back, we followed some other people and found there was a marathon happening near. We followed near the runners and took a trek partially through one of the trails and eventually to the overlook point.
Again, the exposure was sometimes off, but it did give me these moody shots of the trees. I really liked these shots.
On the overlook, there was a lot of people. A nearby fence was also full of locks. I guess that will always be a popular thing to do regardless of the location.
A few more nice shots of the scenery, before we trekked back to the bridge and headed down south again.
A few of us, myself include, made some bad choices in footwear3, so it was not the most comfortable walk back. I should’ve worn thicker socks, because the uneven terrain of the hike up to the overlook made the bottom of my feet a bit sore, and my feet started sliding around. I barely had the mind to take any photos on the way back.
Once we reached our original starting point, the sun had shifted quite a bit, so I took a bit more of the iconic view.
The bay itself was a pretty nice view. I think one of these days I’ll take a ferry across, maybe even finally visit Alcatraz4.
When we headed back to our cars, it was starting to get a bit dark, so I managed to get this shot of the trees near Presidio Battery West I really liked.
We ended the day by grabbing dinner in the city, and then driving back home. I was pretty exhausted by the end when I got home, but overall it was a fun day out.
I really want to make a more concerted effort to go out and do stuff, especially all the nearby landmarks.
I’m writing this now, after I returned from Christmas travels, so I want to catch up to my backlog before 2025. I have a bunch of photos to post.
Footnotes
- I really need to figure out a consistent workflow for extracting and going through my photos to post before it builds up again. I’ve gotten even worse about transferring the photos to my phone to post to Instagram. ↩︎
- On the way back, when we drove away, I saw the ideal spot near the beach that gets you the better view, but I don’t know if I want to fight the crowds to get a parking spot if I return. ↩︎
- Due to the rain, I wore my leather boots, but I really should’ve just accepted getting my feet wet and wore softer cushioned sneakers. I’ll definitely do it next time lol. ↩︎
- It’s kind of crazy to think about how long I’ve been near the bay, but I’ve never visited Alcatraz. After I got home I did look up ticket info, so I think I’ll visit sometime in 2025. ↩︎
