Unwrapping the past: My visit with King Tut…

The year 1979 is significant for multiple reasons including it being the year Sony introduced the Sony Walkman, the year my parents introduced me to the world (ie. I was born), and it was the last time the treasures of King Tutankhamun’s tomb had been on display in San Francisco.  Quite a year, I know.  😉

I’ve always been fascinated by Egyptian history, especially the story of King Tut the boy king who died unexpectedly and mysteriously at the age of 19.  I remember making and painting a plaster model of his death mask and seeing pictures of all the treasures uncovered at his tomb.  I never thought I would have the opportunity to see these items in person.  Although the death mask was not on exhibit I still got chills viewing the artwork and images that were created over 3,200 years ago.  It was amazing…  =)

But I’m getting ahead of myself.  There was a whole lot of adventure to be had before we even got to the museum.  Let me start at the beginning.  Marshall and I had decided to take BART into the city and that was a great choice because traffic and parking looked like it would have been a nightmare in Golden Gate Park.

Marshall and me at the beginning of our journey to the city. Happy smiles all around. =)

On the train to San Francisco a girl across from us suddenly started crying.  Then she stopped crying, then she started again and it seemed to be that whatever was causing her to cry was something very deep, like maybe she had just learned a family member had died.  Everyone ignored her crying (which seemed like the right thing to do) so I didn’t feel guilty about that but I did feel guilty about that fact that I couldn’t help silently trying to analyze the situation.  She had a tattoo with the name “Reese” on her neck and a tattoo on her arm that looked like it said “Thug For Life” and yet she was coming from the Dublin BART and was headed to the city.  Hmm… well I’m sorry for trying to analyze her life and hope she finds comfort for whatever was upsetting her.

After making it to San Francisco we had to transfer to Muni.  This was actually a lot easier than I would have thought however we screwed up the first part by getting on an inbound train instead of outbound so we had to get off at Embarcadero and then turn around to get on N-Judah outbound.  Thank goodness for good maps and friendly people on the train who informed us about the inbound/outbound designations.  =)

I'm so glad they had this map. Even with relatively good directions Marshall and I still ended up getting on the "inbound" (ie. wrong) train to go to the deYoung museum.

Next we weren’t sure about when the Muni bus/train would stop so Marshall pulled the “Stop Request” cable when he thought we were approaching our exit and we ended up getting dropped off about 4 blocks too early.  No worries though, I wore tennis shoes so walking was no problem.  =)

Finally after a nice stroll through the park we had reached our destination, the deYoung Museum in Golden Gate Park.  Hurray!  I was so excited that I started chanting “King Tut, King Tut, King Tut..” as we approached the entrance.  Unfortunately my excitement was not to last as we were told upon entering that tickets were sold out until 5pm.  =(  But wait, a guy standing near the ticket counter said he had two tickets for 1pm (30 minutes away) that he’d sell for $30/ea.  I’m always suspicious of these kinds of transactions though so I told Marshall that we’d just leave and try another day…  (wipe away tear).  As we were walking out and I was saying how disappointed I was Marshall said, “you know what, let’s go back.  We can wait.”  Hurray!  Now I’m happy again.  =)

Hurray! We're going to see King Tut (or at least a number of priceless artifacts recovered from his tomb). I got goosebumps going through the exhibit.

This time when Marshall went to get the tickets, the guy at the counter said, “Wait, do you have cash?  If so, you should buy from this guy and then you can get in right away.”  Sweet!  An endorsement from the actual museum guys so that makes it official.  Two tickets please.  =)

The exhibit was absolutely amazing.  We also paid the $7/person for the audio tour which really helped me to take in all the information.  Apparently I’m more an auditory learner so this worked out well (and I didn’t even have to laugh to remember it).  😉

After going through the exhibit and purchasing a $50 book on the exhibit and history of King Tut (I couldn’t help myself, I love these kinds of books) we headed up to the tower and were treated to panoramic views of the city.  Awesome!

A view of the Music Concourse from the tower of the deYoung museum. The roof was very cool as it was covered in plants and odd domes with what appeared to be portholes on them.

An amazing view from the tower of the deYoung Museum. Awesome!

Then it was down to the gardens where I got to check out what appeared to be prehistoric plants and elegant floating lilies.  I would have spent a ton more time at the museum but unfortunately Marshall was dying from carrying a heavy bag (we traded off briefly and yeah it was super heavy) and he was hungry so we headed back to the Embarcadero for a bowl of clam chowder and salty sea air.

Super leathery dinosaur plants. Cool!

A lotus flower floating in a murky yet still beautiful pond in the deYoung Museum gardens.

Marshall taking a picture of me taking a picture of a picture of something else.... oh no I've gone cross-eyed. 😉 I gotta hand it to the new iPhone, nice picture quality. =)

On the way back to catch Muni we ran into this restaurant.  As hungry as we were, we were saving our appetites for clam chowder.  Gurgle, growl…. Ok, we better hurry up.

That's right. While I was in San Francisco I decided to open my own burger joint. I considered calling it "Tempjen Burger" but then decided to just use my full name. 😉

Man I love that stuff.  We always go to “Chowders” on the pier.  I like it a lot more than the clam chowder in Monterey although that is good too.  =)  After feeding our stomach’s we headed out to the viewing stations and were lucky enough to catch a view of this crazy powerboat taking off into the choppy waters of the bay.  It looked totally dangerous to me but I guess that’s part of the attraction.  I like the colors.  =)

Just as we were coming out to the pier this speedboat took off with a bunch of rowdy passengers aboard. I'd never seen anything like it.

Then a picture of us with Alcatraz lurking in the background (we’ll have to go visit Alcatraz next time we go to the city as I love its lore as well).

A friendly passerby offered to take our picture. How nice. =)

And then an obligatory picture of the seals.  I don’t remember that sign last time I was there.  I guess that’s like proof that the sea lions you took pictures of were actually genuine Pier 39 seals.  “We’re the real deal!” – Sally Sea Lion

Pier 39 seals. They reminded me of Sierra when a few of them rolled over on their backs with their heads upside down.

Ah, my little gangsta baby, so susceptable to the cold. =)

At this point it was getting a little chilly and a little late.  We still had a long ride home on BART and both of us were exhausted from a full day of play.

I still had a bit of energy left in me so I had some fun attempting to climb and then balance on top of these rope hitches and then took more pictures.  It’s really beautiful over there.  =)

Practicing my mad balancing skills (I still fell off). =)

Relaxing in the gardens after a delicious bowl of clam chowder. So good!

View of the spiral arch near Pier 39 taken while standing directly underneath it. I like it. =)

Beautiful orange flowers near Pier 39. I had to stop to enjoy them.

Apparently the walk from Pier 39 to BART is only 1.4 miles but at this point my feet were killing me.  Seriously I guess I need to go with size 9.5 shoes next time.  =P

Heading back to BART after an awesome day of fun, sun and sea air.

And because I’ve always seen it but have never gone to check it out, Marshall and I crossed the street early to get a closer look at this modern art structure.  I didn’t realize it but you can actually climb stairs up and through the structure was was really cool.  Totally worth the little detour.

I've seen this structure every time I've walked from BART to the Embarcadero but never checked it out. It's actually really cool and you can take stairs up to get a birds-eye view of it all.

So all in all a super cool trip.  We got a little lost, had some aches and pains with all the walking but had a great time.  Thanks for the great trip Marshall.  =)