Dahlias

It is that season here! 

Independence Day Golden Gate Bridge Fireworks 2026

The 250th US Anniversary / Independence Day fireworks show in San Francisco featured fireworks shot directly from/on/within the Golden Gate Bridge, and so attracted audiences from far afield.  As we joke, it also attracted the bay's traditional fog: however, to my delight, the fog remained the high sort, and so the surface of the Bay was clear, and the deck of the bridge was completely visible.

I left my home at about 6:45pm, but that wasn't early enough to catch the neighborhood bus that would have taken me directly to my destination on a national holiday: buses were being cancelled, and the few that did arrive at rare intervals were completely full and not taking new passengers.  I took a streetcar, and then took a Lyft part of the way there, but wound up walking from California & Arguello all the way to the Warming Hut just east of the Bridge on the waterfront.

On the way, I enjoyed the Sausalito fireworks show (seen above), and marvelled at the traffic stopped on the on and offramps to the bridge, which was closed for public safety.

 

The fireworks from the bridge deck were visible!  Few went high enough to completely disappear into the fog ceiling.

Barge fireworks also were adjusted to burst low, and so were visible and enjoyable

There were even times when most of the South Tower and its own fireworks were visible!

After the brief show, the vast and cheerful crowds took hours to depart.  ("This is a vibe!" said a pleased and surprised woman passing me at Tunnel Tops.)  Traffic was at a standstill.  So... I walked all the way to the Richmond District, and eventually down to 6th and Geary, where the first bus I tried to take was too full to appeal to me.  My rideshare took a long time to arrive, by which time I could have taken a nearly empty bus, but would still have had a long walk ahead of me at the other end, so the rideshare made sense.

I was several hours too late to set up my tripod and bulky camera to take long instant exposures, but I still had a good time.  (The fog was very reflective, so I'm not convinced the instant images would have been good - contrast between the fireworks and fog would likely have been low, especially with my limited skills.) The crowd's heavy use of flashlights interfered with even my phone photos, as people flashed their lights back into the viewers while looking for friends.  I'm not especially disappointed, because I COULD SEE THE FIREWORKS, and also because the photos I am showing here look distinctly different from those of my prior clear-skied shows in an interesting way.  

It was a pleasant evening. And I got something like TWENTY ONE THOUSAND steps in.

Scenes in the formerly industrial eastern Mission

My recent prolific photo scanning projects overflowed my available storage, so I went out today to purchase an external storage drive.  While I was out, I took a walk down Harrison Street from Division to see what the area is like now.   Previously a district with light industrial businesses, it now has fashionable cafes and shops of the sort that sell letterpress cards (if you know what I mean).  

It was a lovely walk.  The wind hadn't yet picked up, and I spent too much money on books (as I tend to do).  Here are some photos representing the walk.