Flying Across the Rockies in Utah and Nevada, very few settlements. Then over the low portion of the Bay Bridge and into San Francisco.

Jerry Weitz, the CU Dentist, picks me up and drives back along US 101 (numbering starting at US 1 in Boston) stretching from Canada to Mexico. All the landmarks of this beautiful city: Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz, Transamerica Building, Red's Java Hut on Pier 39. I like the grass hilltops in the middle of the city. Onto the Mission District and on Cesar Chavez blvd the Mexican workers waiting for a pickup truck. Mission Street is busy and ethnic. Only a couple of empty storefronts in two miles: Luggage, cell phones, clothing (esp dress up for children), Food, banks and payday lenders.

I stop in to see Jenny Rodriguez, a former NFCDCU Board member, who now runs Mission Arts Latino Center. In the fifteen minutes we visit, she hardly recovers the inquisitiveness about what I really want, which is nothing.Everyone says La Taqueria is best for lunch, so I try it. Tacos a-la-carte, you name each ingredient, Spanish only.The Bed and Breakfast is on South Van Ness, the Inn San Francisco. An over-the-top gingerbread Victorian. Small room, but good breakfast. I didn't try the jacuzzi in the back yard.In 1997 Mission area FCU had a negative net worth of 10% of their $7,000,000 assets. Salvador Duran took over as Manager and with Jerry Weitz on the Board, brought them back to positive 8% and $8MM this year. I was invited to their strategic planning meeting. Basically, the problem is that the crisis has left them too conservative to see that their situation has changed.

MAFCU is located on the third floor of the Union building on 16th St. Lots of history, including a reforming union Rep shot in front of the building in1912.Jerry, Salvador and Margaret Libby (Hello Joe C) take me to Dinner at Nick's in Pacifica to sketch out the work. The restaurant is right on the beach so I'm occupied by the platoons of pelicans parading by. In the other room, a band with an Elvis impersonator.After the work, Salvador and Jerry took me on a wire tour of Sonoma and Napa, with a stop is Sausalita on the way home. Across the Golden Gate for the first time, bikers and hikers, though the bridge is actually rust Red.

The grape farms are spreading out of Napa amidst arguments about whose grapes are best. Salvador likes fine wine and knows each of the 400 wineries. We stop at Robert Mondavi Wineries for a finishing tour for the young wine snob. We learn how to open up a cabernet sauvignon and how to read the legs running down sides of the wine glass. Mondavi has split from his brother, sold the farm to a conglomerate, and retired. They show a satellite image of field to trace heat loss and anticipate disease. The fog "rejuvenates" the soil, which I suppose means that it stands instead of rain, which doesn't happen in summer.

We visit Vallejo, the home of the Bear Flag and Independent California for three weeks in 1846. The mission and barracks are still there.We have a huge Lunch on a lawn at a cheese factory, then went back, with a short tour of Sausalito, rich rich rich.I drive Route 280 / 85 towards San Jose, through the lakes and valleys, and mountain Redwoods to Santa Cruz. Santa Cruz. Much like Ithaca only a lot more so. Traffic Calming, Street musicians, Brick sidewalks, boutique everything.

At SCCCU, I have lunch with Ginger McNally and then visit with Sheila Schatz. Still lots of Bill Leland karma bouncing around. I take Highway 1 back. Beaches along the way; Farms strawberries and brussels; Cliffs, slides and repairs; Creeks delta into the ocean; paragliders, sweeping views, and Mule Deers.Salvador drives me up Twin Peaks, for a view of the fog rolling into Castro, Haight Ashbury, and the Golden Gate Park. The view is spectacular before the fog forces itself on us.

We want to eat at Nanas, run by a former 13 year old Salvadorian guerilla, now 40; closed on Monday. Next best, and perhaps better is Limon, Peruvian. I have Ceviche Limon as an appetizer. Salvador tells me how to prepare: Lime juice, Don't marinate more than an hour, add hot sauce, onion, garlic; then Halibut, Cameron, Octopus. Sides of yam, onions, huge kernal brazed corn. The hot sauce is HOT. Then Anticucho de Res, skewered beef in pepper sauce. In Peru it's Anticucho de Corazon, heart meat. Salvador has Empanadas