San Fransisco

[Nick9]

oh, stop it. Don't ruin the romantic cheesy fantasy I have about the city

[jpazli123]

Steer clear of the Tenderloin at night, which is from the City Hall to the financial District (where the tall buildings are) from about market street Nob Hill to about the Ghirardelli Chocolate Factory.

I doubt you will be anywhere near .

The City is divided up into 'Districts'. For Instance the Mission District, South of Market, etc. Mission is Latino with a heavy Mexican Influence. South of Market is where the leather bars are found.

Don't look at a map and think its going to be easy to walk everywhere. San Francisco sits on several steep hills, those straight streets defy the ups and downs of the reality of the topography.

is Gay... Very gay. Lots of Gay Bars with Gay shops.

I can't recommend any restaurants, its been over a decade since I lived there, but if you just walk up and down most streets you will fine dining establishments all over the place.

Myself, I hung out more area and The Park (Golden Gate) and that general area.

San Francisco is really, really small for a city, one can walk the whole length and/or breadth it in a single day.

I lived South of Market and would walk to the Golden Gate park, only took a couple hours, taking my time.

There is an extensive Mass Transit system, including bus and light rail. I think it was the J train that rode all the way from downtown (Near the ) all the way out to the pacific, a decent junk of that was underground.

I worked at the Metro Hotel back in the day: http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Review-...ornia.html It was pretty decent then, its 4 star now.

I also worked at the Phillips Hotel http://www.yelp.com/biz/philips-hotel-san-francisco One star, but it rents rooms by the hour. This latter has shared facilities (toilet/showers shared with everyone on the floor).

The metro is pretty pricey, the Phillips is dirt cheap....

So it depends on your budget, there is a place for every budget.

As for places to see, San Francisco has tourists information all over the net... In all honesty you can get a lot more data that way.

The Warf is a huge tourist trap - decent enough, pretty enough, but pricey and full of unruly mobs of out of towners.

As long as you steer clear of the Tenderloin area at night you should be safe enough to explore the city.

Thanks so much, this is really helpful. Tips like the topography and not very nice districts are great tips.

[MisterTinkles]

Ive been there, and I can tell you I have nothing good to say about it.

BUT

Since you want some info, I think I can help out a little bit.

I don't know where to stay, but I would suggest starting at Union Square Plaza for some sightseeing.

Here's what I did:

I parked at a parking garage on O'Farrell Street (near O'Farrell and Stockholm St.)
This was the cheapest parking garage I found...I only paid 9 dollars for the whole day, while all the other parking garages were charging over 20 dollars.
After parking, I walked down Stockholm Street to Union Square Plaza.

Its a nice small city park is surrounded by very "high end" stores and designer stores. Very nice to window shop in. There is also a 5 story Nike store there, which is awesome if you love Nike.

After that, I walked down Geary Street to Market Street, and down Market Street to the Embarcadero, which is the piers by the water. There are nice shops and stuff down that way.

I walked down the Embarcadero towards the Golden Gate Bridge, and you can see Alcatraz from the shore.
There are a lot of cheap boat rides out there if you want to go.

Once you get towards the bridge, the wharf area comes to a stop, but that's where all the tourist shops and eateries are. There is a nice Mexican place upstairs in one of the small pier shopping areas. I don't remember the name of it, but it was cheap and very good.

There is a sectioned off pier for the seals. You can see them and take pictures, but you cant go down there.

From there I walked back up the Embarcadero halfway, then took a back road past Telegraph Hill and past that talk pyramid looking building.

I didn't know too much about that area, so I didn't get to see what I really wanted to see, because the only people I knew that had any info on running around SanFran always worked when I was off....so they couldn't show me around the areas I wanted to see.

There is a mall in one of the large office buildings on Market Street. Its pretty damn nice.
There are lots of neat shops in there, and the underground train goes right in the bottom of it.
Theres also a gourmet grocery store and bakery on the bottom level.

Well, all this stuff WAS still there when I was there, but that was about 6 years ago.

But if you want to walk, its a really nice walk, and you get to see plenty of stuff.

There is a tour bus that is one of those "topless" two story British buses that mosey around the city.
I never got to take that.

Here's the mapsco area I started at....(I hope this link works)
http://mapq.st/123WqrJ

[jpazli123]

Thanks MisterTinkles, Ive been using google street view to check out places to stay and getting a glimpse of what the areas are like. Ill check out that route.