Because of the hilly terrain, you’ll find yourself on a bike superhighway of sorts. There’s certain sets of streets that will lead you around the worst uphills. I found myself whizzing along one of these, on the congested San Franciscan streets on a sunny Saturday afternoon. I was following the lead of Thomas, both of us biking hard with no concrete destination in mind. Thomas had outfitted his bike with a crate basket on the back and had some old school Charles White funking out the of a big speaker in his basket.

“Express yourself!” dun dun dundundun…

Thomas, and his crate with a speaker inside.

People smiled and bobbed along with the music when we stopped at a street corner. Nobody batted an eye. This is San Francisco, a profoundly positive city.

A year ago Thomas and I had never met. He was living in Wilmington, North Carolina, and I was living in Cleveland. Now, here I was spending a week with him, staying in his apartment on Golden Gate Avenue, borrowing his roommates bicycle, and following him on this authentic tour of “The City.”

I met Thomas while he was on a six month roadtrip across the country. We were first introduced through CouchSurfing. He put a request through the website, my roommate and I responded and let him stay on our fold-out futon free of charge. He actually stayed with us twice. He surfed with us for a few days initially, and then returned for a week after his car was broken into in Detroit. While in Cleveland, my group of friends and I showed him around the city, played volleyball, did a round of bar golf and tried to give him a taste of what it’s like to live in Northeast Ohio.

Now Thomas and I were gliding on these two-wheel steeds down Divasedero on our way to Dolores park. Once at the famed park I would get to learn about park icons such as the “Water. Cold water” guy and the Costco pizza guy. I even bought a pecan truffle from the Truffle Man.

CouchSurfing is part of what’s called “The Sharing Economy.” The intended export of the sharing economy is authenticity. Instead of buying an overpriced hotel and researching cliché tourist attractions, I was learning about the city from someone who lives and breathes it. I traded a double-decker bus tour of the Haight for a wind-in-your-face ride through the hills of the Presidio. Before I came, I purposefully avoiding looking up the main attractions of the city because I trusted Thomas would guide me where I needed to really go (and he did expertly).

I used other staples of the sharing economy as well. Lyft is a ride sharing service, where I open up an app on my phone and summon a Lyft driver to my location. The driver will show up usually within five minutes and then take me to my location. The payment is deducted automatically from my bank account at the end of the ride. You’re encouraged to sit up front with the driver and think of them as your friend with a car. George chatted sports with me, curious about the ever depressing state of the Cleveland organizations. Mimi told me why San Francisco was the best city in the world, in a super stereo-typical bubbly Californian manner.

Thomas and I were now sharing a lane with a bus. We rode so close to it, it seemed like crashing was inevitable. Even the bus lane here is a winding, wild path through the streets. The hot exhaust from the bus felt good in the fickle San Francisco weather. I stayed close to feel the heat on my legs. We take a wide left and get out from behind the bus. But Thomas abruptly brakes and looks concerned. “We missed some murals over there that I really like.”

“They’re doin’ it on the moon, yeah, uh

In the jungle too, uh”

So we swing down Larion street, hop up a curb and into a narrow alleyway. Every inch of the walls lining the alley were covered in colorful murals and graffiti. A few anarchist gutterpunks smoke cigarettes and drank 40s. I couldn’t decide whether this image of leather jacket wearing, mohawk sporting rebels was the most real thing I’ve seen in the city, or the most contrived.

You could argue that the sharing economy is really producing a kind of manufactured authenticity. Would taking the Muni bus system instead of using Lyft lend a more authentic experience? Possibly. And sleeping on a corner in the Tenderloin is a very sad, but authentic experience for others.

But as I am riding along with Thomas on his daily bike commute, smiling wildly as I inhale deep breaths, this feels as authentic as it can get for a mid twenties bachelor traveling on a budget.

“Whatever you do…. do it good”