We first went to the Legion of Honor and saw some fantastic art. Medieval, Renaissance, & Mannerist Art, French & Italian Baroque & Rococo Art, 17th to 19th Century Decorative Arts, Sculpture (many of Rodin's most famous works are in the Legion's collection) British Art, 17th Century Dutch & Flemish Paintings, Ancient Art, and more. The Legion also has two special exhibitions right now; Highlights from the Israel Antiquities Authority: The Dead Sea Scrolls & 5,000 years of Treasures, and Annie Leibovits—A Photographer's Life, 1990-2005. That is what got us to the Legion of Honor to begin with. I haven't been to a photography exhibit in years and could not pass it up.
The girls were fantastic. CK walked around with daddy and he filled her brain with all sorts of information about the art she was seeing. He said she understood it all. He was pretty impressed with her. Needless to say, CK loved the museum. Her favorite was the Dead Sea Scrolls and Treasures, specifically the Table, Byzantine Period, late 6th-7th century C.E., Caesarean Maritima, Gold and glass mosaic. O was good too. She declared “I want to go home” after being in the museum for about 15 minutes and every once in a while reminded me, but overall she was very good. It was lunch time after all. O's favorite was the “horse” statue (Joan of Arc) in front of the museum. (By the way, O took the picture of CK and with daddy—not bad.)
After the Legion of Honor we went to the Presidio. We found a very expensive, so-so place to each lunch (La Terrasse). Expensive was not our intention, but we were very hungry and the place was there.
After lunch we went to the Presidio Officer's Club Exhibition Hall. They had some things on display, such as old officer's uniforms and items found on site. It was fun to see the old building. They also had a modern art exhibit, Transforming Art, the art of Chris Hardman. It was very different. The girls loved the 3D room. They put the 3D glasses on and had so much fun with the art. They didn't want to leave. After seeing the rest of the exhibit they wanted to go back to the 3D room.
We weren't sure what to do next. The girls played on the lawn around the old cannons while we figured out what to do. Then C got an idea. “I have a surprise” he told us. The girls were curious, but daddy wasn't saying anything. As we walked back to the car O says, “Oh, I needed that.” They always feel better when they get to run around a little.
So, we headed off to our surprise. We were still in the Presidio and had a great view of the Palace of Fine Arts. The landscaping was beautiful. It's been fixed up and renovated by Lucas. Yep, we were at Letterman Digial Arts Center. The new headquarters for Lucasfilm and ILM. It's just beautiful. All the old brick hospital buildings.
We had coffee (hot chocolate and chocolate milk for the girls) at Starbucks. Where else of course. I'm sure Lucas got it put in just for his employees. Everyone is walking around with art/poster tubes. We were so curious to know what was inside all of them. C thought there was a public area—museum or store—but we didn't see anything. C asked one of the many employees walking around. There isn't such a place, but we could see the Yoda statue. Off we went to find Yoda. There was more inside the lobby of Lucasfilm headquarters but we weren't sure if we should go in or not. We stood outside for a few minutes and I thought for sure C would say we need to leave, but he went in! The girls and I followed, and boy am I glad we did. It was so cool to see all the Star Wars memorabilia. I got pictures, of course. Here are just a few.
After hanging around Letterman Digital Arts Center we headed toward The Castro to meet up with D and her boyfriend (J) for dinner. We went to Home for dinner. Great place. Good food. We had a nice walk to and from dinner. After dinner we had dessert back at J's and he taught us how to play the Wii. What a fun game. CK was really good at bowling. We'll have to take her for real. C got a little carried away trying to help O play tennis. He was tossing her around. She didn't seem to mind. We had a great visit.
What a fantastic day. We came home thinking about all the wonderful things we saw and learned. The day ended perfectly with our visit with D and J. Thanks for dinner, btw! We need to go to The City more often. So much to see!
