The city is a great mixture of a world metropolis, a sea port and a multicultural cohabit. Directly located at the Pacific Ocean, the town on the peninsula was founded in 1776 and accommodates 808,976 inhabitants. It is mostly known for the Golden Gate Bridge, a suspension bridge over the San Francisco Bay. In fact, there are a lot more things worthwhile seeing in this superb city.

If you intend to visit the United States one day, make sure you don’t leave out San Francisco… You should see and feel this lively town, especially in the summer months, as Mark Twain expressed it:

‘The coldest winter I’ve ever spent was a summer in San Francisco’

He is totally right in affirming that when visiting the city, you should not forget to always take a sweater with you, even if it is a sunny day.

What you should absolutely do when you are there for the first time

is to make a sight-seeing tour to get a global overview over the city. Moreover, the tour also takes you to the Golden Gate Bridge and to the other side of it, where for example Sausalito, a cute waterfront village, is located.

When I went on the sight-seeing tour for the first time it was very nice to get quickly to the different stops, like Fisherman’s Warf, Coit Tower, China Town, Financial District or the Lombard Street, the most crooked street in the world. Nevertheless, I didn’t want to pay  the $30 for the tour another time, when a friend accompanied me to San Francisco.

Fortunately, we were there exactly three month after I had made the sight-seeing tour for the first time and as I noticed there that the driver didn’t pay any attention to the ticket we were supposed to show at the bus entrance, I just showed my old ticket again, even if it was no longer valid.

I know, shame on me! But whatsoever, it did work!

Another less ‘criminal’ recommendation that I would like to make is a sea boat tour: you could either go sailing with a skipper, for example from pier 40 with ‘Rendezvous Charters‘, and sail across the San Francisco Bay and under the Golden Gate Bridge, which is a windy, but very worthwhile sightseeing experience.

Or you take the boat at Pier 39 to the notorious jail island Alcatraz, where the entrance fee and audio guide are free, but the boat tour costs about $26. As to my experience, it is probably the best, if you plan nothing special for the rest of the day after having been to Alcatraz, because I found the audio guide tour so fascinating, but at the same time saddening that I was deeply affected more than I had thought and afterwards I just wanted to opt for a calm afternoon program.

I hope my recommendations will help you to explore San Francisco and make you love it as much as I do!

In fact Las Vegas offers the largest entertainment program of the cities that I have seen so far… From plenty of bars over crazy shows to extraordinary casinos, the city is, indeed, one that never sleeps.

By the way, Las Vegas was founded in 1905 and was incorporated not before 1911, which makes the town a relatively recent one of the US. With its 558 000 inhabitants, this city is located in the desert of Nevada.

When you are in this luminous city, you have to gamble in a casino, which is a lot of fun!

You can practically do it in any of the hotels, which are all well equipped with whatever you like to play: poker, roulette, one-arm bandit or, of course, Black Jack.

My favourite one is Roulette, probably because that’s one of the simplest games. Especially as I have experienced a strategy, which works very well if you like to win some money…

But, first of all, you should think of a limit of how much you would like to win and to lose before you stop gambling, because otherwise you will continue doing it (and will probably lose everything you’ve got).

Now, choose one colour where you will constantly put your chips, for example: black. The chance that black will come up is 50 %.

Let’s start by placing the starting input of, for example a $1-chip, on black. If you lose, you will have to double the input, which means a $2-chip now, and put it again on black.

If you lose a second time, don’t worry, just continue by doubling your input; i.e. place a $4-chip now on black. It might happen that you also lose this turn, so put the next one, a $8-chip again on black.

Possibly, this time you will be lucky and win. Consequently your input has been: 1 + 2 + 4 + 8 = $15, and the total winning sum is $16 ($8 the initial input plus $8 the winning sum). Therfore you have won $1, i.e. the starting input. As soon as you have won, start the procedure from the beginning and place a $1-chip on black.

The trick of this strategy is that we do not only gamble on luck, but on the probability that our colour (black) will be the right one…

It works, try it out!

]]> http://fransizee.wordpress.com/2010/01/31/lucky-las-vegas/feed/ 2 fransizee http://fransizee.wordpress.com/2010/01/30/190/ http://fransizee.wordpress.com/2010/01/30/190/#comments Sat, 30 Jan 2010 22:39:10 +0000 fransizee http://fransizee.wordpress.com/?p=190 ]]> Welcome to my blog ‘Cities of the US’!

Click on one of the maps and you will see which cities I cover in each area of the US…

jj

Directly located near the border of Mexico, San Diego has now a population of more than 1 200 000 inhabitants. The pacific city was founded in 1769 and is situated in the state of California.

If you intend to visit this town, I would recommend to you to have a look at the attraction park Sea World. It is a fun park, which is all abot ocean fish like whales or dolphins. Whether feeding dolphins, counting the teeth on a shark or looking at extraordinary stunts in a show, it is an enjoyment for both adults and children!

What I liked most was the ‘Shamu Show: Believe’, in which trainers perform with killer whales doing dangerous exercises. The name of  the show comes from the first orca named ‘Shamu’ which Sea World got in 1960.

However, I would like to warn you if you plan to take a taxi from your hotel or anywhere else near San Diego, as we did on the way to the fun park.

The reason for this is that the three collegues and I got into a taxi and asked the driver to take us to Sea World, which was approximately half an hour away. With the help of my map (which I always had with me) I tried to follow the way to our destination.

About five minutes later I realized that the driver was taking us into the opposite direction and so I started talking in German to my collegues  about my worries (in the hope that he would not understand us). They were of my opinion and therefore I decided to ask the taxi driver where he was driving us to and if he really knew the shortest way to the adventure park.

After a moment he aswered very cheekily that of course he knew the shortest way and that was the way he was taking us. Despite my anger I did’t see any reason why to go on discussing the issue with him any longer and just asked the driver not to make any detour to Sea World.

When arriving at our destination after a 50-minute-drive, we paid (after having discussed the price without any succes) and asked the driver for his registration number (in order to inform the hotel). Unfortunately, he became even more angry and we stepped out of the taxi, from which we quickly noted his licence tag.

What an annoying experience!

(I know that one can encounter such a situation everywhere in the world, but as I experienced it in California, I would just like you  to know about it).

There are three luxurious hotels in Miami worth seeing: Delano, National and Ritz Carlton, all located next to each other in Collins Avenue at 16th Street.

If you cannot afford to stay in one of these hotels (like me), you have to try at least to get in and enjoy the day there. They are all the three very nice, which I have experienced by myself…

The Delano is the IN meetingpoint with a beautiful pool and an amazing lobby. The National owns the most magnificent pool in whole South Beach with a lenghth of 70 m and also a nice pool bar. The Ritz has a wonderful beach bar and a restaurant offering a wonderful view over the ocean.

Sometimes you can even encounter stars just having a drink at the bar or lying at the pool, just as I saw Lindsay Lohan (a wellknown US actress) in the Delano Hotel last August.

As to the facts of this magnificent city: Miami, located in Florida, has more than 480 000 inhabitants. The word ‘Miami’ comes from the Indian word ‘Mayaimi’ meaning ‘big water’. In fact, the big Miami River provides the water to the Everglades, which then flows in the Atlantic Ocean.

Let’s see how powerful the present is and whether there are traces of the past…

New York, the biggest city in the US, with more than 8 million inhabitants is even one of the biggest cities in the world. The town was founded in 1624.

To be honest, I will explore this city for you tomorrow (9th January 2010) when flying to New York (hopefully it will be possible and the flight will not be cancelled due to snow storms).

Therefore you will get the latest news as quickly as possible…

Today (11th January) I’m back again from New York City,and it was a short but very nice trip. What you should do when visiting this town: take a walk from Manhattan over Brooklyn Bridge to Brooklyn. It will take about 35 minutes if you are not in a hurry. In the winter months you’d better wear two sweaters and a thick jacket, because there is  a strong and  freezing wind on the bridge! When arriving in Brooklyn, walk to Bedford Avenue in Williamsburg, a street with stylish cafés, restaurants, second-hand shops and small fashion boutiques. Then ask pedestrians where the water front is located, which they will surely know, and walk in this direction until you come to a park, where you have an amazing view over Manhattan!

]]> http://fransizee.wordpress.com/2010/01/08/nice-new-york/feed/ 4 fransizee http://fransizee.wordpress.com/2009/12/20/horrible-houston/ http://fransizee.wordpress.com/2009/12/20/horrible-houston/#comments Sun, 20 Dec 2009 22:59:24 +0000 fransizee http://fransizee.wordpress.com/?p=129 ]]> Houston was founded in 1836 and is with 2.2 million inhabitants the largest city in Texas.

To be honest, I found the city quite boring and uninteresting because whatever you do there, you could also do it in any other city of the United States.

Even so, if you intend to visit this city, you should not walk beyond Route 59, because this area seems to be dangerous, which I experienced myself: One colleague and I were searching for a supermarket in this district and ran across a gang of teenagers.

We asked them where a store like this could be, but they just laughed at us and asked us for money. We refused, but they didn’t let us go… the colleague and I were very lucky when just a moment later other tourists appeared having apparently lost their way, too.

Therefore we could join them and return to our hotel. What a horrible afternoon!

Once you visit Seattle, you could do a whale watching tour which I can really recommend espially in the months from March to May. However if you get quickly seasick, you should probably better stay on the shore.

When I did the whale watching tour with two collegues of mine, it was a windy and rainy day in March. Even if we wore several sweaters and a rain jacket, we did not have a cap to protect our heads. Therefore we each bought a cap from the whale watching tourism office just before going on board. As soon as the boad left the harbour, the weather became more and more windy. That’s why one of my male colleagues warned me to pay attention to my cap not falling down into the water. I followed his advice and clutched to my cap. Less than one minute later a squall pulled the cap from my colleague’s head straight ahead into the ocean.

No comment !

I think it does! By the way, the waterway on the picture is the Schuylkill River, which is about 209 km long. It runs through Philadelphia, the largest city in Pennsylvania with 1.4 million inhabitants. The town was founded in 1682 and is therefore one of the oldest cities in the United States.

When thinking of the name of the city, my first thought is the movie Philadelphia, one of the first Hollywood films dealing with the topic of AIDS. Even if it is quite an old movie (from 1993), I think most of the people remember the film when thinking of the town Philadelphia.

If you intend to visit this city, you should not leave out the Philadelphia Museum of Art, founded in 1876 and built after the model of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. The Philadelphia Museum is one of the largest in the US and has a selection of over 200 galleries. Moreover, around 20 exhibtitions are presented each year, including painters like Paul Cézanne or Salvador Dalí.

When the weather permits it, take a walk through the Love Park, officially named JFK Plaza, with the famous LOVE sculpture designed by Robert Indiana. Then, sit down on one of the stone steps and enjoy the sun by looking at the skateborders making dangerous moves…

One of my favourite cities in the United States is the capital: Washington D.C. Located in the District of Columbia (therefore D.C. for those who didn’t know it), the city was founded in 1790.

Since 1800 the seat of the government resides there and in the meantime the town is also the seat of the headquarters of the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the Organization of American States as well as other institutions. Washington D.C. has now a population of approximately 590 000 people.

The reason why I like it so much is because it is a cute city with quite small houses, beautiful parks and a huge selection of museums. Therefore only going to visit Washington due to the museums would be justifiable. But there is also much more to do…

If you would like to stay in a wonderful and downtown hotel, choose the Mayflower Renaissance Hotel. When beginning the day, you could  have a sumptuous breakfast at the Café Tryst: a haven of cosiness. Afterwards, a visit to the Washington Zoo can be recommended. From the hotel it is a 30-min-walk  to get there or if you aren’t tired from the breakfast go jogging.

For lunch, there is a very nice restaurant near the hotel, the Vapiano. Coming from Germany, it is cheap and delicious at the same time and offers pizza, pasta and salads in a stylish and comfortable atmosphere.

If you want to do a sightseeing tour, I would like to recommend to you to explore the city on wheels, which means on a segway (a two-wheeled, self-balancing electric vehicle). Even if you are not so sportive, it’s a lot of fun and you get to know the city in a different way.

As to the museums, there are a lot worthwhile seeing, like the Smithsonian Institution, the Museum of National History, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum or for the aviation lovers among you, the National Air and Space Museum.

When visiting the United States, you should definitely not leave out this great city!