This weeks PhotoFriday, “Crooked,” is another one where I thought someone else must have got there before me (especially since I’m two days behind the “Friday” schedule). But, as far as I can tell, no one else has gone for “The Crookedest Street in the World.” Also known as Lombard Street in San Francisco.

(My second choice would have been potentially libellous images of banks or stock exchanges. It maybe just as well I didn’t need to go down that route.)

Please also vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, “Sky-High.” I’m entry number 229.

My previous exploits in San Francisco have been well documented (1 2 3 4 5) so I shall just get straight into the images.

This time I have no particular theme to link the pictures together. I quite like the Golden Gate Bridge peeking through the fog and the yachts. I got a better day to visit Coit Tower and the Transamerica Pyramid.

This broken branch from a tree in Muir Woods, California looks pretty Rough to me, hence I’m using as this weeks PhotoFriday challenge.

Please also vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, “Beauty.” I am entry number 261.

My first reaction was why would I want to take a picture that reminds me of work? Then I remembered this image that I took in Alcatraz. My desk at work tends not to have hand-cuffs. Actually, I tend to have so much paper littering the place that you can’t see the surface. Anyway, I thought this fit the theme of “The Office.”

Please also vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, “Spiral.” I’m entry 162.

This weeks PhotoFriday theme is “Disastrous.” Here is my entry.

I’m not sure whether it’s my imagination or my photo library that ran dry for this theme, but I couldn’t find a great image. Instead, find this more comedy picture. I’ve generally found Citi’s service to be disastrous.

This picture was taken in San Francisco, California.

Please also vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, “Mountain.” I’m entry number 70.

This weeks PhotoFriday theme is “The City.” Here is my entry.

I kind of had to do this one of San Francisco as they call it “The City.” Eddie Izzard explains:

Oakland, San Francisco, Oakland, East Bay! You?re not called West Bay, are you? No, you?re just (mockingly ) “The City.”

“Are you going to ‘The City’ today?

“I might go to ‘The City.’”

And Oakland is just a collection of houses, is it?

This weeks PhotoFriday theme is “The Beach.” Here is my entry.

When I first saw the challenge I thought of the Danny Boyle movie of the same name. Unfortunately I didn’t go anywhere near a beach when I went to Thailand, and when I went to Ha Long Bay in Vietnam it was so foggy you could barely see it was there! So instead my entry is a picture of Baker Beach in San Francisco from my first trip to California.

Also, please vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, “Fantasy.” I’m entry number 160.

This weeks PhotoFriday theme is “Fantasy.” Here is my entry. Getting out of Alcatraz must have seemed like a fantasy for many of its inmates.

Please also vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, “Purple.” I’m entry number 295.

This weeks PhotoFriday theme is “Oddity.” Here is my entry.

These jellyfish are some of the oddest things that I have ever seen. It was taken in Monterey Bay Aquarium in California.

Please also vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, Wet. I’m entry 300.

In April last year I had never visited the west coast of America, so it’s slightly odd to think that this was my third trip there this year — first to Berkeley and Monterey, and last month to Marin for work. This time I increased by “bridge count,” visited The City (as locals call San Francisco), Marin (the county north of the Golden Gate Bridge), and two universities (Berkeley and Stanford).

From there I saw the Transamerica Pyramid in the distance and decided to wander over for a closer look. As I got closer I lost it a couple of times but I persevered and you can see a shot from the base here. At ground level there was a lot of building work. Don’t know what they were doing but it wasn’t pretty.

In the Friday evening we took a tour out to Alcatraz. By the time we were heading back it was sunset and this allowed some beautiful pictures of San Fransisco itself lit by the golden, fading sun.

Heading back to the UK and seeing all the flooding in the news it’s sad to think that it’s going to be a while before we head back to the Bay Area again.