Giants to Warriors

My first opportunity to see the spanking new Chase Center in Mission Bay was going to be on a miniature golfing outing with Dave. This is because golf is very important to Dave, I won't do 18 holes over 4.5 hours of grim turf trudging, and because Mia thought miniature golfing would be a blast. And the Chase Center was nearby. Yosemite intervened. You can read about that elsewhere.

Instead, I headed up to the Ferry Building on an early Saturday morning during Fleet Week to grab a homemade fig newton at the farmers market, and walk down the Embarcadero past the sports arenas, Oracle Park, where the Giants play, and the Warriors' new home at Chase Center.

"There are lots of sailors here," I texted Mia. "Should I take pictures?" I didn't expect an answer since the eyeroll was implied. Instead, I walked past the harbor and along McCovey Cove behind the Giants' ballpark, reading the plaques and peaking into right field where I could see the Giants Employee Appreciation Day events taking place. I returned from Seattle to the Bay Area well after Candlestick Park was replaced by this jewel box, and I still feel the seven-year old boy in me when I walk by.

What I haven't seen at all is the new Mission Bay development, all gleaming and bright new on a sunny fall morning. I strolled down Misson Bay Commons Park to the San Francisco Bay Trail which should run through the under-construction Bay Front Park. Chase Center rose across from the construction like a billion dollar bank vault.

It's interesting to see a neighborhood at its birth, everything clean, hopeful, the empty streets and vast sporting center grounds making the area feel bashful and self-conscious. I hoped in ten years it still measures up, despite the ups and downs of economic cycles and sports team successes. Chase Center at its birth is impressive. I appreciated the effort to put it there as a turnaround point for my walk.

Sunshine, blue skies, lots of money pouring into the City, sporting teams success. Everything looks good on a sunny October Saturday morning with temperatures in the 70s. I pushed my phone and its news apps deeper into my pocket, happy to stick my head in the sand for the rest of the day, and walked back to Bay Bridge views.