Guest Trip Report: April 21, 2022 5 Night Pacific Coast on the Disney Wonder – Day 3

This guest trip report is from Rachel, whose sailed on a 5 night Pacific Coast sailing from San Diego to Vancouver on the Disney Wonder in April 2022.  You can start this trip report from the beginning here.

Guest Trip Report: April 21, 2022 5 Night Pacific Coast on the Disney Wonder

Day 3:  San Francisco

The night before arriving in San Francisco, the concierge hosts told us that we needed to be up on the deck by 6am if we wanted to see the ship sailing under the Golden Gate Bridge.  We did want to see that so we made sure to be up there! We went to the Concierge Lounge (which they opened early just for this day) and out onto the upper Concierge deck. The hosts were making coffee and hot chocolate for people, which was great because it was early and chilly outside!

We could already see the bridge in the distance with the sunrise behind it. The photos don’t really do it justice – it was beautiful.

Before we knew it, we were sailing under the bridge and it was so cool! We stayed up there for a while as we came into the bay.

We could still see the Golden Gate Bridge on the other side of the ship now with the sun shining ON it instead of behind it.

At some point we went back inside to the lounge and grabbed some more hot drinks and a few bites to eat for breakfast. Because the lounge has such great views, we could still see the ship pulling into San Francisco.

Alcatraz was easily visible as we sailed past it and also as we were docked at the pier.

We had booked a private tour of San Francisco for the day because I could not narrow down what I wanted to see, but most of it wouldn’t take that long. So I found Small Car, Big Town Tours and we did a completely custom tour with Reed in his Mini Cooper.

Our first major stop was Muir Woods, but first, we stopped on the way for a couple of amazing vantage points for the Golden Gate Bridge on the way. We had an absolutely gorgeous day and only needed light jackets in the back of the convertible.

Then we spent about an hour (maybe a little more) at Muir Woods, which was our longest stop of the day. I had really wanted to include this along with some city sites. Reed was happy to accommodate us and got us started on the right path and then waited by the car for us and told us not to rush.

This is another case where no photos do this place justice. There were a fair amount of people there that morning, but it was not crowded by any means. We had a lovely stroll through the woods, taking our time and stopping for photos. There are bathrooms there as well.

After leaving the woods, we made our way through Sausalito on our way back to San Francisco. We didn’t stop, but Reed had a microphone that allowed him to talk to us about what we were seeing and the history of things.

We drove up to the Marin Headlands for a stunning view of the Golden Gate Bridge and San Francisco. We watched a sailing regatta for a few minutes.

Back down in the actual city, we went by Fisherman’s Wharf, saw the Painted Ladies, drove down Lombard Street, saw China Town, and several other points of interest I’m sure I’m forgetting! We got out at some and just drove by others – Reed gave us the choice each time, which was so nice.

When we felt like we’d covered the highlights really well, Reed dropped us off at Pier 39 to look around and grab a quick bite to eat before heading back to the ship.

We were pretty hungry so we grabbed a quick bread bowl of clam chowder and some kind of cheese bread. Lots of bread! We shared both and they were delicious! We had a reservation at Palo for dinner that night, so we didn’t want to spoil that, but we had basically skipped lunch, so we were hungry!

We did go down and see the seals at Pier 39 before returning to the ship. There were plenty of them out there sunning themselves. The walk back to the ship was very short and easy from Pier 39.

We made it back in time for the evening drink cart at our room. We got a couple glasses of champagne to drink before dinner. And as much as they tried to get us to have some snacks (that looked delicious), we were still saving room for our Palo dinner.

We were able to drink our champagne on our verandah as the ship pulled out of San Francisco. We got an amazing view of Alcatraz.

Then we headed to dinner in Palo. As we sat down, the ship was approaching the Golden Gate Bridge again and we had a great view from our table of that!

Then we just enjoyed our dinner – from the amuse bouche all the way to dessert. Here are some of the things we had: Tuscan White Bean Soup, Soft Potato Gnocchi (my personal favorite), Lobster Pappardelle, Osso Buco, Seared Jumbo Scallops, and both the Chocolate and Amaretto Souffles for dessert.

After dinner we didn’t do any evening activities as the show for that evening was a movie we had already seen. And we were too tired for trivia or anything else after the packed day we’d had. We spotted our monkey towel animal that evening hanging from the shelves. We were excited for a relaxing sea day the next day.

Up Next: Day 4 – At Sea