In Search of Sea Glass-Aquatic Park, San Francisco

Living on the San Mateo Coast in the Bay Area for 13 years I recently realized I hadn’t taken the time to really explore the Greater Bay Area. Sure I’d been to the major tourist areas when our out of town guests arrived. But there is so much more to do here. Being an empty nester, bored, and feeling creative, my husband and I set out one day every week as our adventure day, playing tourists in our own backyard. It usually focuses on hunting for sea glass (an obsession of mine), and gives us a starting point.

Dressed in layers with a picnic lunch in preparation for a day at the beach, it was overcast but the weather report promised no rain, so we set off to San Francisco to find sea glass.



In my search on the Internet I had found a small snippet that said Aquatic Park at the Embarcadero is a good place to find sea glass. So we headed to the Embarcadero. My husband is not one to ever take the same route twice into the city. It’s always an adventure getting there. We started near the Bay Bridge at the complete opposite side of the location to Aquatic Park. You are immediately greeted with a giant bow and arrow sculpture coming out of the ground greeting you to the waterfront of San Francisco. The Ferry Building is next and I commented that I had never been inside there. As we got closer we noticed that there was a farmer’s market and art fair going on. So we took a left and looked for parking. We found a parking garage at the Rincon Center Garage at 121 Spear Street between Mission and Howard a few blocks away that had a $5 deal for four hours at the Farmer’s Market.

We walked down Steuart Street and looked in all the restaurants and read their menus on our way to the market. Perry’s had a brunch going with half price Bloody Mary’s and we discovered on Tuesday’s they offer ½ priced bottles of wine. Perry’s is located in the Hotel Griffon at 155 Steuart Street.

So this wasn’t sea glass but our adventures are never set in stone. We ambled on to the art fair where artisans had set up across the street from the Ferry Building. They were selling a lot of locally made art; photographs of the Golden Gate Bridge, miniature watercolors of San Francisco scenery, jewelry, clothing, purses. We pursued their wares and then headed across the street to the Farmer’s Market. We needed vegetables to go with dinner on Sunday night, something for Moroccan leg of lamb.

We knew we needed lemons and oranges, which were stocked in abundance at the market, but were stumped for a vegetable. There were lots of greens: rainbow chard, broccoli rabe, bok choy, fennel and various varieties of lettuce. Organically and locally grown looked to be the theme. We found fresh cheese, herbs, fruits, meat and food vendors from local restaurants.
Having never been to this Farmer’s Market before we walked through and took a look at all the booths, getting samples and making a few purchases, Blue Cheese Dip & Dressing from Point Reyes Farmstead Cheese Company. So fresh and creamy and they gave out recipes with it. We ran into Lou Iacopi from Half Moon Bay at his stand selling his fresh vegetables. We bought Fingerling Potatoes at the Zuckerman’s Farm stand. They hail from Stockton. We wound our way through all the booths, some already closing up because they had run out of produce, and made our way into the Ferry Building.

The Ferry Building Marketplace has been completely refurbished. Filled with stores, eateries and markets we found another gem we should have visited long before. We ended up the Golden Gate Meat Company. Their selection of meat was unique from Chicken cilantro with lime and tequila sausage to perfectly aged New York steak to buffalo and elk. Their produce department like the farmer’s market outside was full of fresh produce. They happened to have asparagus that we determined would go well with our lamb. Purchases made we decided to head back to our car. After all we still had sea glass to find and we had packed a picnic lunch for the beach.

On our way to the car we passed by Perry’s again and couldn’t resist brunch with half price bloody Mary’s. With jazzy blues playing in the back ground and old exposed brick walls we sat down to a reasonably priced brunch. Eggs Benedict and an egg white and corn tortilla scramble. Both came with red potatoes sautéed with onions and bell peppers and a small bowl of very sweet fresh melons. I think we’ll be back soon to try the Tuesday night half price wine with dinner. So much for our picnic lunch waiting for us in the car.

Satiated by lunch we again headed out in search of sea glass. It was about 3:30, which was perfect because that was low tide for the day, the best time for sea glass hunting.

Parking anywhere in San Francisco is a challenge. Since we didn’t really know where we were going we took our car this time. It’s much easier and cheaper to park in Daly City and take BART in to the city. But we meandered our way through the tourist traffic along the Embarcadero until we found Aquatic Park at the foot of Polk Street at 2905 Hyde Street. There was free parking for the weekend at Fort Mason on Van Ness at the Hyde Street Pier and there was open parking. The Maritime Museum is right there at the beach. They are in the process of remodeling it. The beach sits right below the giant Ghirardelli sign that looks out on the bay towards Alcatraz.




I could see that the tide was low. I didn’t really hold out hope of finding any precious pieces of sea glass since this is a well-traveled and busy location. But being armed with extensive sea glass hunting knowledge and the fact that the tide had just gone out I had a better chance than most. We got about half way down the beach and there was a perfectly frosted piece of white sea glass. Not a coveted piece but where there’s one piece of sea glass you can be sure there is more. You could see the gravel bed right beyond our reach, churning up pieces of green sea glass. I was not dressed for jumping into the freezing water or wading in with bare feet. So I had to be satisfied with the dozen or so pieces of frosted glass we found on the sand washing up at our feet. Our objective had been met for the day and we ended up finding so much more along the way.