San Francisco, California
Hills, hills, and more hills with bridges.
For a week in January I spent some time out in San Francisco. It was half a work trip for the O’Reilly Design Conference and half vacation to visit friends / scope out the city.
Since I had some extra time outside of the conference, I took full advantage of what the city had to offer. I walked just about everywhere, for hours each day. In just 8 days I had covered over 49 miles, which not only speaks to how much I enjoy walking, but to also how huge the city is.
My hotel was in the Union Square / Tenderloin area, Hotel Metropolis. It was cheap and decent for what it needed to be. One thing to be aware of though are all the homeless in that area. Apparently that’s where they hand out food stamps and where some of the homeless shelters are. But since they both run out and fill up before most can get what they need, the homeless resort to sleeping outside. With super mild weather year round, it makes for a constant issue.
I’ve listed out a bunch of things below for site seeing, eating and shopping. There’s of course tons more to add to the list, but with SF being as big as it is, this is a fairly decent list that kept me busy for days.
Some sites to scope out:
- Alcatraz Island (tours here)
- Pier 39
- USS Pampanito
- Lombard Street
- Audium (a theater that plays experimental sound compositions in total darkness for audiophiles)
- The Lucasfilm campus
- The Yoda fountain on the Lucasfilm campus (it’s so cute!)
- Walt Disney Family Museum (they have an animation studio inside with pretty cool equipment)
- Amoeba music
- California Academy of Sciences (especially the tower that has beautiful views of the whole city)
- The new Alamo Drafthouse location (the theater is gorgeously restored)
- Crissy Field for beautiful views of the Golden Gate Bridge
- Misión San Francisco de Asís for the architecture and history
- The Painted Ladies (aka the Full House houses!)
- Mrs. Doubtfire’s house!
Some food and bars to enjoy:
- Little Shamrock (a bar with darts and weird furniture in the Inner Sunset neighborhood)
- San Tung Chinese restaurant (the best Chinese I’ve ever had, so eat everything off the menu. Especially the fried chicken wings)
- Taquerias El Farolito (Mexican food in the Mission)
- Lone Palm cocktail bar in the Mission
- Craftsman and Wolves (their poached egg suspended inside of a muffin that’s baked is crazy good)
- Foreign Cinema (brunch spot where you can also screen movies outside)
- Classic Mission Chinese food at Lung Shan
- Dandelion Chocolate for some pretty stellar chocolate (unlike the controversial and potentially hacked together Mast Brothers Chocolate)
- Another bar in the Mission, Monk’s Kettle
- The Residence, a cocktail bar done up in old Victorian style
- Burma Love, a Burmese restaurant that’s super tasty
- One of the best bars, Zeitgeist, is a dive-y biker bar with a big backyard
- Toronado. Get a Pliny: The Elder beer. You won’t regret it.
- Benkyodo bakery in Japantown
- Soda Popinkski’s (a bar that’s like Barcade in NYC)
- Swensen’s ice cream (get the sticky chewy chocolate flavor)
And of course, shopping:
- Dijital Fix for beautifully designed sound gear
- DSPTCH for designer-y bags and accessories (it’s mainly a dude store, but I loved the clean lines, materials and dark colors)
- Mission Workshop for outdoor gear
