SF - Twin Peaks & Haight/Ashbury

Twin peaks above. HA below.

on the way to HA we stopped in Golden Gate Park for the kids to play on slides etc. A soilitary bongo was being played under the trees

Haight Ashbury is the cross Street of a district made famous during the 1967 Summer of Love based on counter culture movement and reaction against Vietnam. The area was run down in first part of sixties with vacant large Victorian properties. Hippies moved in attracted by low rents and The Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane and Janis Joplin all lived in the area during mid to late sixties.  Post 67 the dream ended as the area became crime ridden, too many drugs.not enough space or facilities for the vast influx of people who came from other cities owing to national media attention at the time. The belief in 67 really was for some that if everyone got high then then all if societies ills would be solved. Many bands came to hang out and be photographed under the haight Ashbury cross street sign like Doors, Sly and Family Stone. of course you know the Cherry Garcia flavour of Ben & Jerries is a pun on Gerry Garcia from TGD. 

so now this area trades on that past even though it is now very gentrified

The famous cross street

Memorial to a dead local

Selling herbs

When I came to Recycled Records in 1989 there were 12 thriller by MJ and ten Live at Leeds by The Who on vinyl. Couldnt be shifted at 1$ per go as everyone was dumping vinyl. Many others were sitting with 3 or 4 copies stagnantly. Then i came home with 12 different albums in hand luggage. They have ?dollar price stickers on the inside labels in case I forget which ones they are

Now vinyl was going for 10 to 15$+ and is back in vogue. Far fewer multiple copies. The guys working in there said yes business had been tough but the owner of the record business bought the property which negated the need to find rent on the shop every month. They said old hippies dont exist anymore from the original times as too gentrified now

Yes. Metal studs

This is a free machine in a clothes shop. Of course Rockers will know this is also an album title from 1970's by a certain still living artist

The only shop that wasnt a convenience store or weird clothes shop or bar or restaurant was a solitary hardware store with a few plants outside. So like Fore street in St Ives in UK the diversity of a normal neighbourhood has been lost and its now a tourist  haven. 

On the way back through GG Park the solitary bongo player had attracted quite an ensemble

Xxx