After a ten hour flight from the UK, I landed at San Francisco international airport.

A short car ride later, I was dropped off at my lodgings for the next few days: the lovely Palace Hotel, a characterful building with an opulent interior.

Better late than never, I made it to the speaker's dinner for An Event Apart. I had the filet mignon and a good ol' chinwag with some of my fellow speakers.

Conveniently located right across the street from the hotel, this is a good spot for a nightcap. They do good cocktails but I'm more of beer guy so I had an IPA and chatted with some of the lovely attendees of An Event Apart.

I spoke on the first day of An Event Apart right before lunch. I enjoyed it and I hope the audience did too.

In the afternoon, I strolled down to the Ferry Building to get a coffee at the Blue Bottle there. It was most excellent.

After the first day of An Event Apart wrapped up, I went for dinner with Cindy, Craig, Tantek and Andy at this Thai restaurant. I had the duck curry.

I went to the opening night party at the B and had a great time chatting with friends old and new.

When the opening party bar shut down, there was a mass exodus back to the hotel bar. I had a pint of the Pied Piper Special Bock.

Time for another nightcap at the bar across the street.

Day two of An Event Apart was, as expected, excellent. My voice, however, was beginning to desert me.

A lovely sushi dinner with Ethan and Kristina.

One short trip on the BART later and we arrived at the Typekit offices for the closing party. It was hopping and the view was marvellous.

One Uber ride later and a bunch of us were at one of the best beer bars in the country: they've got an amazing selection. Much merriment ensued.

I spent the day lurking in the back of Luke's workshop. At this point, my voice was practically non-existent.

I got my luggage from the hotel and hauled it over to the Flickr HQ to meet up with Cindy.

We picked up Matt from Twitter and headed out to the airport to get Jessica, freshly-landed from the UK.

We all wanted some comfort food and boy, did we get it here: delicious ramen.

Staying in Cole Valley, this place is the perfect spot to get the day started. Jessica and I got great big bowls of latte. Tantek came by and joined us.

A trip to San Francisco wouldn't be complete without a coffee at this hipstertastic establishment. Seriously: great coffee.

Gotta have a Mission burrito. Deeee-licious.

At this point, I had probably had enough coffee so I met up with Erin and had a nice cup of tea here. Ariel came by but Ritual was closing early so we moved on.

A great sci-fi bookstore with a cosy café attached. Ariel and I talked science here for quite a while.

Tantek, Jessica and I got the bus back to the Haight and went for some big bowls of comforting noodles. It really hit the spot: generous portions and a nice amount of spice. A good way to end the day.

Up and at 'em. Jessica and I had a nice breakfast at this cosy place run by a charming and friendly gent. Samantha came by and we had a good ol' chat about living in San Francisco and working from home. As we were leaving, we bumped into Tantek who joined us on the Muni heading downtown.

Jessica and I strolled around Union Square, admiring the gracefulness of the skaters on the ice rink and marvelling at the sheer size of the Christmas tree there.

It was surprisingly sunny for a December day. We sat outside the Samovar Tea Lounge and enjoyed some excellent tea and Vitamin D.

This is a great place to be a tourist. We wandered around, sampling the local delights: a bowl of clam chowder here, an excellent Blue Bottle coffee there.

My kind of landmark.

On Tantek's invitation, we swung by the Mozilla offices around the time of their Friday afternoon drinks'n'nibbles. Nice place.

We got the BART into the Mission to meet up with Sadie, Jim, Cindy and Matt for dinner at the excellent Heirloom Cafe (thanks for the recommendation, Tom).

After dinner I went to Lone Palm to meet up with Julie, Tantek, Ted, Erin and Mandy. I think we can lay claim to having the most spirited geeky debates in this cocktail bar that night.

It was Daniel's birthday so we celebrated with Brunch Drunk Love. The mimosas were flowing freely.

We took the BART downtown, where Cindy picked up a rental van and Jessica, Matt and I piled in (after changing into our fancy clothes). We picked up Jeb and Anne and drove across the Bay Bridge, heading north to Napa.

We had some time to kill so we stopped off at this vineyard for some wine tasting. 'Twas very nice indeed—I left with a bottle of the Fifty Fifty.

Thomas Keller's flagship restaurant was, as you'd expect, quite wonderful. A nine-course tasting menu of wonderful dishes, exquisitely prepared. There's nothing better than the combination of excellent food and excellent company. We sat down at 8pm. We finished up around midnight. We made sure we got a tour of the kitchen at the end.

After a leisurely late breakfast, Cindy, Matt, Jessica and I wandered into town. We wandered around Union Square and went suit-shopping for Matt in Macy's, where Jeb and Anne met up with us.

It was a little bit chilly but as there was no room inside, we huddled up outside Samovar for a spot of tea.

My last meal in San Francisco was a classic: pizza in North Beach's Little Italy. The pizza was great and so was the company.

One bus ride, one MUNI ride and one BART ride took me and Jessica to the airport where we bid farewell to San Francisco. All in all, an excellent week.