Seconds With Steff

Good morning from our final day on the road and this crazy road trip.

The last few times I stayed in San Francisco, I stayed at the Hilton in Union Square. It’s really nice. But last night I decided to change it up. I kind of have a thing for their Curio hotels. It started with the Hotel del Coronado back in 2021, when I realized how much I love Hilton’s high‑end boutique line because they aren’t just high-end. They are usually extra-special. The Timbri Hotel opened in January 2024, and has a surprisingly rich history. The building was originally constructed in 1909 as a printing and typesetting house, but over the decades it also became part of the Tenderloin’s long LGBTQ story. This neighborhood was a safe‑haven for queer and trans people long before Castro became famous, offering refuge, anonymity, and chosen family to people who had nowhere else to go. It was the site of the Compton’s Cafeteria Riot in 1966, three years before Stonewall, when trans women, drag queens, and queer youth fought back against routine police harassment. Today, the area includes the world’s first Transgender Cultural District, preserving the legacy of resilience and activism that grew out of these streets. So yes, the Timbri sits in the Tenderloin, but it also sits on decades of courage, community, and history. And despite the neighborhood’s reputation, my car was valeted and safe, and we were too as we were greeted by security who watched over us as we gathered our things from the car.

We hit the ground running with a complimentary breakfast from the really nice guy who checked us in last night. I’ve made a habit of leaving all our leftovers in the room for staff, but last night we had quite a bit left over, so I left it with the front desk instead. He was genuinely grateful and handed us comp tickets for breakfast… which was especially nice because the restaurant was gorgeous and would have been wildly expensive. They gave us fresh fruit instead of toast, which was a hard score. I even told her it was so much better than toast.

We finally took our Celebratory Drive down Lombard Street which we had wanted to do last night but couldn’t because we arrive at the Western Terminus so late.

Then we headed down to a parking garage on the pier, which made me incredibly nervous because of the crime rate in San Fran, but with Hunter throwing the aquarium in at the last second I didn’t have a choice. We paid for parking which gave us some security. We also shuffled all of our packing right there in the garage. I tried to do it outside the hotel, but someone had pulled up so close to my car at valet that I couldn’t even open the back door of the Jeep. Once everything was squared away, we headed over to Hunter’s favorite place… the sea lions. He has been very clear with me that he would move to San Francisco without issue!

After enjoying the sea lions, we walked around the pier a little and headed up to the aquarium. And this is where the lesson comes in. I did not check to see if the Aquarium by the Bay’s was accredited by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums. I do not go to non‑AZA zoos/aquariums (unless they’re small local ecology centers), and they lost theirs in May of 2024.

It was sixty dollars. It took us eleven minutes to go through; however, it was a really nice small aquarium. I spoke to an employee and said, “This is going to sound terrible, but this is a really nice aquarium, and you need to work on getting your AZA accreditation back.” She sighed, and said they are working on it, but it’s a long process. I told her I had assumed they were accredited, and if I had known they weren’t, I wouldn’t have come. But it was genuinely nice, and they should get it back. She was very appreciative.

They had beautiful shark tunnels and even moving sidewalks. But $60 for eleven minutes… you can do the math.

After that, we were off to the San Francisco Zoo. After about fifteen minutes of circling an entirely too‑small parking lot — even the disability parking was taken — we finally made our way inside. Immediately I loved the layout. We went to check out the lemurs and were put into a little viewing area. Then we hit the aviary, and the trip was saved because they had a toucan. I have never been so happy in my life. When Omaha didn’t have a toucan, I thought Hunter was going to break down. But here it was. Last year there was a lm Hallmark movie called The Three Wiser Men and a Boy, and the kid would say, “And Christmas was saved.” That is all I could think… And the trip was saved.

It was a perfectly nice zoo. They had a red panda, which made me happy.

But what I really loved was their penguin habitat. It was unlike anything I’ve ever seen. They weren’t behind glass. They weren’t in an enclosure. They were out in a pond for everyone to see — ducks and penguins together. It was amazing.

It was a nice afternoon. We were there for a couple of hours.

But we were still done by one o’clock, and we didn’t have to be at the airport until 4:30 at the latest for my anxiety. So I had one more trick up my sleeve… Can you guess? I’ll wait.

Here’s a hint… what are the two things I looked for before we started the trip?

I told Hunter I had a surprise for him, but not before we got In‑N‑Out one more time.

Did you get it? That’s right… San Francisco has a Thomas Dambo troll. Located at the Filoli Historic House and Garden, a historic 1917 estate in Woodside that was built by the Bourn family. It’s known for its grand Georgian‑style mansion and world‑famous formal gardens. It’s now part of the National Trust for Historic Preservation and is one of California’s most beloved heritage sites.

Rose Wonders is the largest troll Dambo has built to date at twenty‑seven feet tall. She is unlike anything I have ever seen from him and completely interactive, expressive, and alive in that whimsical Dambo way. Rose is just as curious about you as you are about her.

And then we were on our way to the car return at the airport, where I knew I had to face everything that had happened with that windshield. I pulled in and a nice young man opened my door and asked how I was doing. I said, “Honestly, one of the worst experiences of my life… but don’t worry, how are you doing?” He asked what made it so bad, and I told him about the initial dirty car, how it wasn’t what I ordered, how big it was, how I was supposed to get a call from the regional manager and never did, how I traded it for the Jeep Compass, how the tire blew, how I got another Honda Odyssey from another place where they were not pleasant, and then the cracked windshield. It has just been one thing after another — the full rental‑car saga.

Five minutes later, while Hunter and I were unpacking and repacking, he came back over and said, “Would you say you got the car with a cracked windshield?” I looked at him for a moment and said… “I mean… yeah, you could say I did, but…” And he said, “Yeah. I think you did.” And just like that… the universe handed me a huge win.

We went to the terminal where once again I got randomly picked to be scanned, except this time it was just my phone and not my body. Then Hunter wanted spaghetti and meatballs and the helpful woman at the pizza place told me exactly where to get it even though I did not want her to. She told me anyway. We sat at the bar and ate spaghetti and meatballs and I drank water because we had just had In-N-Out.

A man approached us and asked why we were not sitting with him. The bartender looked at me. I looked at the bartender, who I had been chatting with, and said I think I am missing something. Are you not Susan. I said no I am not. And this is not whoever he thought Hunter was. He apologized and went back to his table. I looked at the bartender and did the international sign for drinking too much. He nodded. He communicated that to his staff.

Then Hunter and I were off to our gate, which they changed three times with an hour and a half before boarding. And here is the fun part. My feet got caught on the blanket we brought and I went ass over teakettle in the middle of the airport. I fell on my butt, cracked my head, and my right arm. Hunter asked if I was okay and picked up my glasses. I think I am okay. It wasn’t enough for a concussion, but my right arm is pounding.

So here we sit. Hunter and I are starting to put together a top ten for our reflections. You can look for that tomorrow once I’m home, showered, and slept.

And a few random pics…

Unreliable Summary~ Aquarium, Zoo, Trolls, Home