Bradford Street
Day 71
Neighborhoods Covered: Bernal Heights
Streets Completed: Nevada, Prentiss
I didn't pick the hottest day of the year to traipse around Bernal Heights--that would've been Sunday rather than Friday--but it was damn close. And while you (if you are anything like me) might think of Bernal as a neighborhood with some gently sloping hills and one big crest with a radio (TV?) tower rising out of the top, allow me to correct you (and myself): it's all uphill, in every possible direction.
What I thought would be a simple walk in the sliver of time I had before a client meeting wound up feeling like a hike to the base camp of Mt. Everest. SO MUCH UPHILL. Needless to say, I was sweaty and gross by the time I was done--due in part to my overzealous layering before leaving home--though I'd like to think I managed to air out sufficiently before I reached my client's doorstep. To her credit, even if I did smell, she didn't complain.
One thing I noticed while walking constantly uphill is that Bernal is exploding with renovations and development. It's literally impossible to go a block on many streets without seeing at least one house being redone, and sometimes it's several. I also passed several workers doing some sort of sidewalk repair/creation/grading, including the fellow at the bottom of the steps leading down from the topmost block of Nevada Street (fine, fine: there was a bit of downhill) who cheerfully asked me to step around the concrete he'd just poured and told me that if I came back the following day, the sidewalk would be all ready for me. It all makes me wonder what's happened out in this neighborhood to spur such a fiesta of change and renewal.
I have much more of Bernal to do (and several people who've volunteered to do it with me; Scott and Dana, you're on the hook), but I've made a solemn vow that I'll wait for a crappy, overcast day to finish off the rest of the damn hills, leaving about six or seven blocks of Cortland to stroll when it's sunny.
Neighborhoods Covered: Bernal Heights
Streets Completed: Nevada, Prentiss
I didn't pick the hottest day of the year to traipse around Bernal Heights--that would've been Sunday rather than Friday--but it was damn close. And while you (if you are anything like me) might think of Bernal as a neighborhood with some gently sloping hills and one big crest with a radio (TV?) tower rising out of the top, allow me to correct you (and myself): it's all uphill, in every possible direction.
What I thought would be a simple walk in the sliver of time I had before a client meeting wound up feeling like a hike to the base camp of Mt. Everest. SO MUCH UPHILL. Needless to say, I was sweaty and gross by the time I was done--due in part to my overzealous layering before leaving home--though I'd like to think I managed to air out sufficiently before I reached my client's doorstep. To her credit, even if I did smell, she didn't complain.
One thing I noticed while walking constantly uphill is that Bernal is exploding with renovations and development. It's literally impossible to go a block on many streets without seeing at least one house being redone, and sometimes it's several. I also passed several workers doing some sort of sidewalk repair/creation/grading, including the fellow at the bottom of the steps leading down from the topmost block of Nevada Street (fine, fine: there was a bit of downhill) who cheerfully asked me to step around the concrete he'd just poured and told me that if I came back the following day, the sidewalk would be all ready for me. It all makes me wonder what's happened out in this neighborhood to spur such a fiesta of change and renewal.
I have much more of Bernal to do (and several people who've volunteered to do it with me; Scott and Dana, you're on the hook), but I've made a solemn vow that I'll wait for a crappy, overcast day to finish off the rest of the damn hills, leaving about six or seven blocks of Cortland to stroll when it's sunny.
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