Day 17: Stanford

There is not much to write about the final day of our road trip except that we have finally made it. At noon, we arrived in Stanford, where Kelly will soon begin her PhD program. Nevertheless, we could not begin her move-in today, as she had to undergo a test for tuberculosis at the university’s clinic. The justification for this requirement continues to baffle me, as the vaccination rate in East Asia is way higher than what America could ever dream of, and Kelly has not even left the country since taking a TB test for her last program. Coupled with some bureaucratic miscommunication, the whole episode threatened to cut our trip short, but things turned out well in the end.

We ate nearby and walked around the campus before we returned to our hotel and before Kelly started her hectic round of errands. We drove 202 miles today, and our grand total for the entire road trip stands at 5870 miles.

The Hoover Tower at Stanford

Encina Commons

Encina Commons with the Hoover Tower in the background

Stanford Memorial Auditorium

A totem pole

Hoover Tower again

A picture of us having made it to Stanford

Over the next few days, we would slowly move Kelly into her new accommodation. We had plenty of things to buy and pick up at Costco, Target, Trader Joe’s, and Bed, Bath, and Beyond, not to mention having to continually unload the car. It took two days to finish the bulk of the work, though I imagine Kelly will be buying little items here and there for many more weeks.

On the fifth, we made a trip to Berkeley to visit our friend Tiana, who ate omelettes and pancakes with us and showed us around the local campus. On a whim, we decided to visit the local botanical garden, but when we returned to the car, we saw that the gash we had acquired in Montana had suddenly grown several inches. We decided it best, therefore, to return to Palo Alto, and Kelly had the windshield changed the very next day.

Sather Tower at the University of California, Berkeley

Sather Gate

On the sixth, Kelly and I made our final sightseeing trip. We took the train to San Francisco, all the while marvelling – after our journey through America’s heartlands – at the existence of half-decent public transport. Both of us felt in the mood for spicy Chinese food, so we began and ended our day in Chinatown; we ate lunch at Chongqing Xiao Mian and dinner at Spicy King, both of which were delicious. And, unlike in Oxford, when a menu advertises lotus roots, one can rest assured that lotus roots will indeed be in stock.

Sandwiched between our decadent culinary experiences was a half-day’s tour of San Francisco. We crossed the hill from Chinatown to Pier 39, where we viewed Alcatraz and observed the local sea lions, after which we boarded a bus heading to the Presidio of San Francisco. Despite its impressively frequent buses, the public transportation system in San Francisco is designed to baffle outsiders. Bus stations are often unmarked, and when marked, they frequently fail to note which buses depart from them. The buses also fall under different bus authorities, which means that day passes for one type do not apply to another.

We thus missed one bus before finding the right one. That bus, moreover, did not stop where Google Maps indicated it would, so we ended up missing the Presidio by quite a distance. Guessing that this might happen, we decided to continue and only get off by Golden Gate Park, which is home to the De Young Museum. We had seen several advertisements for the temporary exhibition on Ramesses II, and since we had arrived just after the last admission, we had to promise the very kind ticketer that we would speed through it if he let us in. We stayed true to our word, but still enjoyed the educational experience. For example, we learned that Egyptians did not just mummify themselves and their pets, but essentially any venerated animal they could get their hands on, such as crocodiles, lions, and scarab beetles.

After our speed-run of the exhibition, we thought it would be nice to visit the botanical gardens. The closest part was the Japanese Tea Garden, which we found to be a ticketed venue. I may never find out whether we should have gotten in for free or not, but Kelly seemed sufficiently self-assured when she asserted that as an affiliate with an American museum, she could enter and bring a guest. We were let in without a question.

Our final stop in the city brought us back to the Presidio, which has lookouts over Golden Gate Bridge. I imagine that these are better to visit in the morning when the sun shines from the exposed eastern side, but even so, it was magnificent. We only arrived at Stanford at around half past ten. I left the US again on the following day.