Pedaling up and around the Embarcadero took me to the Ferry Building. You can have your Coit Tower or Fisherman’s Wharf, this place represents San Francisco for me. There was a wooden Ferry House here since 1875. This building dates from 1898. It’s where people who worked in the city crossed on ferries from Oakland and Marin, to get to work each day. It’s also the place where anyone traveling across the country by train ended up. A few people still commute in by boat these days, but most drive.
When I stopped and locked up my bike here, I could hear some of the ferry goers from another era scrambling up from their benches and rushing through the doors to crossover the Embarcadero, out onto Market Street to work. A group of women walk past me, laughing and talking. The dark-haired one, Emily, is a telegrapher. Later on this morning, she’ll be in touch with her fellow op’ in Chicago, my Great Aunt Mabel. Once they finish their business with the transfers, they’ll chat on the wire about Mabel’s handsome new male-friend. Then Emily will instruct her chum to make the next move in that ongoing chess game they’ve been playing for a few weeks.
If ever there was a natural Time Portal, it’s this building.
Please click on the picture above to enjoy the beautiful details
