MY OPINION
ARTHUR ROSEN
SAN FRANCISCO
A couple of years ago I wrote a series of columns about flying in the Western United States. Never had time to write about San Francisco so I thought I would do it now.
The best airport to land at is Oakland (OAK). They love GA. There are 3 runways and 2 towers at OAK. One runway and tower is exclusively for the airlines. The other tower and 2 runways are for GA.
Don’t rent a car to go into the City. Traffic is miserable and there are limited parking spaces. The FBO, Kaiser Aviation, will take you to the BART train station, and upon your return call them the stop before and they will pick you up all at no charge.
To get around in the City you can take the bus, train, cable car or taxi. San Francisco is a walking city. San Francisco has excellent food, and I recommend going to breakfast at Momma’s. This is the best breakfast I ever had anywhere in the world. Kuleto’s restaurant in the Villa Florence Hotel on Union Square has excellent dinners and is not overpriced. This is a place the locals go to eat. Then of course there is China Town. ENJOY!
You can rent a car almost anywhere if you wish to go to the wine country.
One site I would highly recommend is Alcatraz. A short boat ride from the Pier and it is a wonderful morning or afternoon. The tour is fantastic.
Shopping is abundant in Union Square and Cow Hollow.
If time permits you could fly to Seattle and onto Victoria Island. Make sure to have your passport with you.
This article was published by CONCIERGE.COM and I found it to be extremely helpful.
Ten Things Not to Do in San Francisco
Perennially dubbed America's favorite city, San Francisco is high on every traveler's must-visit list. The kickback lifestyle is contagious, the food scene second to none, and the rugged coastal bluffs postcard ready. Who hasn't wanted to see the towers of the Golden Gate Bridge popping through the fog, or to climb impossibly steep hillsides aboard a clattering cable car?
But even icons have their shortcomings—tourist traps and mall brands to name a few. Some San Francisco classics live up to the hype—Alcatraz and its spectacular island setting, Chez Panisse's cutting-edge interpretations of culinary trends, the Fillmore's rock scene. But other big names, like Fisherman's Wharf, don't quite measure up. To help you avoid the common pitfalls most first-timers make in San Francisco (for starters, don't call it Frisco), here's our short list of must-nots.
But even icons have their shortcomings—tourist traps and mall brands to name a few. Some San Francisco classics live up to the hype—Alcatraz and its spectacular island setting, Chez Panisse's cutting-edge interpretations of culinary trends, the Fillmore's rock scene. But other big names, like Fisherman's Wharf, don't quite measure up. To help you avoid the common pitfalls most first-timers make in San Francisco (for starters, don't call it Frisco), here's our short list of must-nots.
1. If you're serious about fish, don't eat seafood at Fisherman's Wharf.
The old adage holds true: The better the view, the worse the food. Oh, you'll spot plenty of enticing-looking raw bars, with beefy-armed men in white aprons cracking open freshly boiled crabs, but no self-respecting San Francisco food-lover would dream of eating at any of Fisherman's Wharf tourist traps. We thought parsley-sprig and orange-wedge garnishes disappeared with the disco years, but apparently we were mistaken. It's not that the seafood isn't fresh, but in the hands of the assembly-line chefs, it's generally overcooked, badly sauced, and overpriced.
Instead: Eat at Swan Oyster Depot. For fresh-off-the-boat shellfish, queue up beside the locals at Swan Oyster Depot, a century-old landmark with just 20 stools lining a marble counter. With the exception of a creamy New England-style chowder, the entire menu is cold—oysters on the half shell, cracked crab, smoked fish and shrimp salad tossed in Louie dressing (a sort of Thousand Island without pickles). It's perfect picnic food to take to nearby Sterling Park, atop Russian Hill, where you can gaze out at the glittering blue bay as you lunch. But get there early: Once the lunch rush ends and the fish runs out, Swan Oyster Depot closes up shop. For a special-occasion white-tablecloth seafood feast, you won't find better than Aqua. On a par with New York's famed Le Bernardin, Aqua expertly blends French technique with New American sensibilities, using fresh-off-the-boat ingredients in such signature dishes as Moroccan-spiced tuna tartare and Alaskan halibut with licorice jus. Unlike at the Wharf, you won't soon forget what you ate.
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1. IF YOU'RE SERIOUS ABOUT FISH, DON'T EAT AT FISHERMAN'S WHARF
Instead: Eat at Swan Oyster Depot.
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2. If you love one-of-a-kind finds, don't shop in Union Square.
San Francisco's high-rent retail district, Union Square is by far the easiest place in town to max out your credit cards, with big names like Neiman Marcus, Marc Jacobs and Gucci. But let's face it, you can find those stores almost anywhere. Did you really fly all the way across the continent only to shop the chains?
Instead: Browse the boutiques in Hayes Valley. Get hip to the indie-designer scene in Hayes Valley, one of San Francisco's most happening neighborhoods, where inventive boutiques line a three-block stretch around Hayes Street, just west of Symphony Hall. Among our favorites: RAG Co-op rents rack space to 70 up-and-coming designers hawking denim skinnies, screen-printed tees, and the occasional vintage item. The look is very San Francisco—youthful, sporty, smart. Or take home something a bit more grown-up with a custom-made piece from Lemon Twist—choose the fabric and design, and they'll tailor it to hug your every curve. Best of all, chances are slim-to-none you'll spot someone else sporting the same frock.
3. For the best sourdough bread, don't go to Boudin Bakery.
Sourdough has a long history in San Francisco, thanks in large part to Boudin, which has been kneading bread since 1849. The place is an institution, and tourists line up to scoop chowder from the bakery's hollowed-out bread bowls. Trouble is, the bread just isn't that great. Not only could you break a filling on the tough-as-linoleum crust, but the dough is way over-soured and lacks any subtlety. Simply put, Boudin rests on its laurels and just hasn't kept pace with the city's cutting-edge food scene.
Instead: Head to Tartine. Weekend lines wrap around the block at this Mission District bakery, but they're made up of locals, not tourists. And with good reason: To find better pastry and bread, you'd have to fly to Paris. Don't believe us? Ask the James Beard Foundation, which named co-owners Elisabeth Prueitt and Chad Robertson as Outstanding Pastry Chef in 2008. The semi-sour, lightly yeasted sourdough bread comes out of the oven at 5pm Wednesday through Sunday afternoons, and it sells out in as little as an hour. If you're counting carbs and can't justify an entire loaf, come during the day and sample a dense, chewy slice of the country-style bread in one of the bakery's signature croques-monsieurs.
4. Unless you're stuck in 1968, don't look for counterculture on Haight Street.
In case you hadn't noticed, nobody has worn flowers in their hair since the 1970s—even on Haight Street, where packs of 16-year-olds in their Jim Morrison phase shop for tie-dye, and drug-addled former hippies crouch in doorways begging for spare change. The 'hood has become a parody of itself, a sort of '60s theme park with too many head shops and frat-boy bars, not to mention a Ben & Jerry's franchise occupying the storied corner of Haight and Ashbury streets. It's not all bad—there's great thrifting and shoe shopping, but you'll have to overcome the stink of patchouli to do it.
Instead: Explore the Mission District. For the real San Francisco-now experience, explore the gritty Mission District. Before the dot-com boom, the Mission was the last ungentrified central San Francisco neighborhood, historically the heart of the city's Latino community and the stomping ground of underground artists. Today weekend hipsters with day jobs in biotech have moved in, but the vibe remains decidedly experimental. Explore the Mission's famous murals in Clarion Alley with Precita Eyes Mural Tours, fuel up on $4 tacos, and then wander down Valencia Street (from 24th to 16th Sts) and pop into only-in-S.F. boutiques. At Paxton Gate you can peruse housewares like glass terraria and vintage taxidermy; Good Vibrations is ground zero for the latest in sex toys. Make love not war: That's the real way to channel the hippie Haight spirit.
5. If you're going to hop aboard San Francisco's most famous icons, don't take the Powell Street cable cars.
Lines snake around the cable car terminus at Powell and Market streets, the beginning of the two major cable-car lines (Powell-Hyde and Powell-Mason), which carry tourists to Fisherman's Wharf. While you wait—sometimes as long as an hour—you're held hostage by D-grade accordion players, panhandlers, and evangelists threatening hellfire. All this hassle for a ride on a toy train?
Instead: Take the California Street line. Take the cable car line tourists don't know about: the California Street line. There's rarely a queue for this lightly traveled route because visitors don't know what to do at the end of the line, Van Ness Avenue. But we do: Grab a picnic lunch of succulent Cowgirl Creamery cheese and crusty French bread near the beginning of the route at the Ferry Building Marketplace and hop on the cable car at the foot of California Street. Then, from the terminus at Van Ness Avenue, walk to Lafayette Square, in swanky Pacific Heights, for a hilltop picnic in the shadow of stately townhouses. Afterward, window-shop Upper Fillmore St alongside the city's skirt-and-sweater matrons. (Tip: For a great photo on the cable car, shoot east downhill as you approach Stockton Street; the Bay Bridge tower is briefly framed just right between downtown skyscrapers.)
6. If you want a taste of waterfront life, don't waste your time at Pier 39.
Unless you have an insatiable refrigerator-magnet fetish, don't rub fanny packs with the hordes thronging Pier 39. Little more than an outdoor strip mall built to revitalize the once decrepit northern waterfront, Pier 39 overflows with tourists clutching bags of tatty souvenirs destined for future garage sales. The only smart reason to come is to ooh and aah at the sea lions lazing off the pier's northwestern side, but you can do this in the evening, once the shops have closed and the pier has emptied out.
Instead: Explore Golden Gate National Recreation Area. Get picture-postcard vistas of the bay's glittering waters from the waterfront promenades of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. Wander west of Van Ness Avenue from Pier 39 along the wooded trails leading to Fort Mason, a former shipyard now home to experimental theaters and art workshops. Further west, Marina Green draws kite-fliers and sunbathers to a giant sweep of grass in view of bobbing masts of sailboats. But the big payoff is Crissy Field, a restored bay-front wetlands with raised boardwalks over the dunes, stellar bird-watching, and jaw-dropping views of the 70-story-high Golden Gate Bridge. If you've got good walking shoes on, keep going all the way to Fort Point, directly beneath the bridge, to see where Kim Novak and Jimmy Stewart dove into the water in Hitchcock's 1958 thriller Vertigo (required viewing for all San Francisco visitors). And if the fog rolls in, fret not: Aim for Crissy Field's Warming Hut, where you'll find hot cocoa and National Park rangers to help you find your way home.
7. To get a real taste of Chinese culture, don't go to Grant Avenue in Chinatown.
No tour of San Francisco would be complete without a loop through Chinatown, the largest Chinese enclave this side of the Pacific. All those green-tile roofs, dragon lanterns, and Art Deco-Chinoiserie make for some damn good pictures, but don't miss out, as most tourists do, by sticking to Grant Avenue. If you do that, you'll walk right through Chinatown and miss the real thing, seeing only tchotchke shops and overpriced electronics stores.
Instead: Explore Chinatown's alleyways. Once you've snapped the obligatory shots of the Chinatown Gate and its green-tile portals topped with wriggling dragons, ignore the call of the pagoda-style roofs lining Grant Avenue and find your way to the real Chinatown in the side alleys. Listen for the clacking of mah-jongg tiles on Spofford Alley. Follow the scent of incense wafting from temples on Waverly Place. Dig the lushly colored murals on Ross Alley (which you may recognize from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom). For locals, the real thoroughfare is not Grant Avenue, but parallel-running Stockton Street, where Chinese women stock up on fish heads and porcelain, and nary a hawker entices you to empty your wallet on cheap electronics and miniature cable cars. For dim sum, stick with the standby City View (415-398-2838; 662 Commercial St; lunch only); most other Chinatown options are lackluster. Or hop a cab and head to Ton Kiang in the Richmond District—the upwardly mobile new Chinatown—where you'll gorge on a stream of impeccably fresh dim sum served up in soft translucent wrappers.
8. If you want to take to the water, don't pile onto the ferry to Sausalito.
Nothing beats the view of San Francisco from the water, especially right after the fog breaks and the downtown skyline and the towers of the Golden Gate Bridge emerge beneath a peerless blue sky. Short of chartering a sailboat, the best way to see it is aboard a ferry boat. Sausalito used to be the prime destination, but the little bayside artist colony has been overrun by tourists who clog the pretty streets, pack the assembly-line seafood restaurants, and zap all the fun of discovery for would-be explorers. Talk about a buzz kill.
Instead: Take the ferry to Tiburon. Ride the ferry to Tiburon, a village in Marin County with a picturesque main street straight out of a Norman Rockwell painting. You'll get the same amazing shots as you sail past Alcatraz and Angel Island, and once you arrive in port, you'll have room to roam away from the herd. Poke your head into cute boutiques, snag a table for the obligatory dockside lunch at Sam's Grill (beware the seagulls swooping down on your fish and chips), and you've pretty much done Tiburon. But that's part of the charm. For full immersion in the kick-back Marin County lifestyle, snag a bay-view room at the Waters Edge Hotel and sip cocktails as the sun slips into the Pacific beyond the Golden Gate Bridge.
9. If you want to explore the San Francisco gay scene, don't cruise the Castro.
A giant rainbow flag flies over the intersection of Market and Castro streets, marking the gayest spot in the entire world. Trouble is, it's tired. Blame it on gay marriage, blame it on the Internet, but hardly anybody cruises Castro Street anymore. The bars have become decidedly mixed, with trashy suburban girls puking on their Payless pumps outside the bars, killing the cruise-y vibe. Don't get us wrong, the Castro is fun, but it's just not sexy anymore—unless your idea of hot is a rainbow-ring necklace.
Instead: seek out the locals scene. The gay scene is a moving target, and you're going to have to do your homework once you get here. Chat up local boys catching rays at the southwest corner of Dolores Park (near Church and 20th streets) on any sunny weekend afternoon, spring through fall. If you're here on a rare, hot beach day, you've got one choice: Marshall's Beach (aka Marcia's Beach), the nude strip under the Golden Gate. As of this writing, the hottest neighborhood bar is Blackbird, a former Market Street gin joint, now a slick spot for mixology and guys in tight tees. (Check out the decoupage murals made from gruesome and lurid newspaper headlines.) On Sundays, get started early with the afternoon beer bust at the Eagle Tavern; later, join the art school hotties bumping and grinding to queer DJ collective Honey Soundsystem, which spins everything from b-side disco to obscure German techno at Paradise Lounge. For classic drag, you can't go wrong on a Friday or Saturday night at Aunt Charlie's Lounge, when Gina La Divina (aka the $65,000 Silicone Wonder) and Vicki Marlane (aka the World's Oldest Living Drag Queen) host the Hot Boxxx Girls.
10. Unless you want to freeze your butt off, don't wear shorts in July.
Nothing amuses locals more than spotting tourists shivering in shorts and sandals as they cling to the open sides of passing cable cars. Unless you want to spend your first afternoon in San Francisco shopping for an ugly sweat suit you'll never wear again, pack long pants and a jacket.
Instead: Bring lots of layers. Wear layers and expect three seasons in a day—brisk fall-like mornings, warm summery days, and wintry afternoons. In summer, the weatherman's forecast is like a daily mantra: Fog and low clouds clearing to the coast by midday, with temperatures in the upper 60s and fog returning late in the afternoon. Late spring and early fall tend to be the most temperate times, but don't count on any heat waves. Year-round, the San Francisco uniform for both men and women consists of jeans, cotton tee, Merino sweater, and lightweight jacket (only in December will you need a scarf and gloves). It's a different story altogether once you cross the bay, where inland temperatures soar a whopping 30 degrees warmer in July. But unless you're packing for a side trip to wine country, leave your Bermudas at home. You'll thank us later.
