Must-see attractions in The Bay Area

  • Crissy Field in San Francisco

    Crissy Field

    The Marina, Fisherman’s Wharf & the Piers

    War is for the birds at Crissy Field, a military airstrip turned waterfront nature preserve with knockout Golden Gate views. Where military aircraft once…

  • Anglim Gilbert Gallery

    The Mission, Dogpatch & Potrero Hill

    The Bay Area hits the big time here, with gallery director Ed Gilbert continuing Anglim's 30-year legacy of launching art movements, from Beat assemblage…

  • Casemore Kirkeby

    The Mission, Dogpatch & Potrero Hill

    Ever since gold-rush miners captured their newfound wealth with ferrotype portraits, San Francisco has staked claims to artistic fame with photography –…

  • Creativity Explored

    The Mission, Dogpatch & Potrero Hill

    Brave new worlds are captured in celebrated artworks destined for museum retrospectives, international shows and even Marc Jacobs handbags and CB2…

  • Golden Gate Bridge from Baker Beach

    Baker Beach

    The Marina, Fisherman’s Wharf & the Piers

    Picnic amid wind-sculpted pines, fish from craggy rocks or frolic nude at mile-long Baker Beach, with spectacular views of the Golden Gate. Crowds come…

  • Masonic Auditorium & Temple

    San Francisco

    Rock stars and conspiracy theorists alike are mysteriously drawn to the Masonic – a major concert venue and the Masons' main temple for California…

  • Fort Mason Center

    The Marina, Fisherman’s Wharf & the Piers

    San Francisco takes subversive glee in turning military installations into venues for nature, fine dining and out-there experimental art. Evidence: Fort…

  • Beat Museum

    North Beach & Chinatown

    The closest you can get to the complete Beat experience without breaking a law. The 1000-plus artifacts in this museum's literary-ephemera collection…

  • Chinese Culture Center

    North Beach & Chinatown

    You can see all the way to China from the Hilton's 3rd floor inside this cultural center, which hosts exhibits ranging from showcases of contemporary…

  • Zen Center

    The Haight & Hayes Valley

    With its sunny courtyard and generous cased windows, this uplifting 1922 building is an interfaith landmark. Since 1969, it's been home to the largest…

  • Randall Junior Museum

    San Francisco

    While adults are asleep downhill, eight-year-olds are making scientific discoveries atop Corona Heights Park. After Josephine Randall became a pioneering…

  • GLBT History Museum

    San Francisco

    America's first gay-history museum showcases a century of San Francisco LGBTQ+ ephemera – Harvey Milk's campaign literature, matchbooks from long-gone…

  • St John Coltrane Church

    The Haight & Hayes Valley

    When the bass thumbs out the opening notes to 'A Love Supreme,' you'll know the Sunday liturgy has begun at San Francisco's legendary Church of St John…

  • Internet Archive

    San Francisco

    Follow trails of deleted White House tweets, lost Grateful Dead tapes and defunct Nintendo gamer magazines to this 1923 Greek Revival landmark. In a…

  • Jack Kerouac Alley

    North Beach & Chinatown

    'The air was soft, the stars so fine, the promise of every cobbled alley so great…' This ode by the On the Road and Dharma Bums author is embedded in his…

  • Ina Coolbrith Park

    San Francisco

    On San Francisco's literary scene, all roads eventually lead to Ina Coolbrith. She was California's first poet laureate, editor of Mark Twain, colleague…

  • Human Rights Campaign Action Center

    San Francisco

    Harvey Milk’s former camera storefront was featured in the Academy Award–winning movie Milk, and now it's home to the civil rights advocacy group…

  • Lands End

    San Francisco

    Looking out from Lands End feels like surveying the edge of the world. Nestled on the point of land between Golden Gate Park and the Presidio, the park's…

  • Filbert Street Steps

    North Beach & Chinatown

    Halfway through the steep climb up the Filbert St Steps to Coit Tower, you might wonder if it’s all worth the trouble. Take a breather and notice the…

  • Tactile Dome

    The Marina, Fisherman’s Wharf & the Piers

    Slide, climb and feel your way – in total darkness – through the labyrinth of the Tactile Dome at the Exploratorium, the city's standout science museum…

  • Southern Exposure

    The Mission, Dogpatch & Potrero Hill

    Art really ties the room together at nonprofit arts center Southern Exposure, where works are carefully crafted not just with paint and canvas, but a…

  • National AIDS Memorial Grove

    San Francisco

    This peaceful, 10-acre living memorial ringed by redwoods and graced with poetic paving-stone tributes was founded in 1991 to commemorate millions of…

  • Hosfelt Gallery

    The Mission, Dogpatch & Potrero Hill

    Trancelike states are often induced by Hosfelt, where visitors step from gritty sidewalks into dreamy, finely detailed interior worlds. Close inspection…

  • Museum of Craft & Design

    The Mission, Dogpatch & Potrero Hill

    Elephants created from sewn-together maps, benches made from repurposed shovel handles, factory-floor scenes recreated entirely in duct tape: one-off…

  • SOMArts

    The Mission, Dogpatch & Potrero Hill

    All roads in San Francisco's art underground lead to this nonprofit creative community hub under a highway overpass. Shows have featured eviction letters…

  • Vallejo Street Steps

    San Francisco

    Reach staggering heights with spectacular views along this staircase connecting North Beach with Russian Hill – ideal for working off a pasta dinner…

  • Mule Gallery

    North Beach & Chinatown

    Upstart San Francisco artists buck art-world trends and kick out brave new work at the backstreet Mule Gallery. Recent shows have featured artworks by Bay…

  • Museum of Art & Digital Entertainment

    Oakland

    If you love video games, the MADE is the heaven you go to when you die and are all out of extra lives. It's a museum of sorts, but more a sort of time…

  • Corona Heights Park

    San Francisco

    Scramble up the red rocks of 520ft-high Corona Heights for jaw-dropping, 180-degree views at the summit. Face east as the sun sets, and watch the city…

  • Crown Memorial State Beach

    Oakland

    Along the western shore of Alameda Island, Robert W Crown Memorial State Park sees flocks of East Bay locals on a sunny day. The sandy beach stretches 2.5…

  • Eleanor Harwood Gallery

    The Mission, Dogpatch & Potrero Hill

    A curiosity cupboard of major Bay Area talents. Works showcased here are entrancing and meticulous – past shows have featured Dana Hemenway's dazzling…

  • Sutro Baths

    San Francisco

    It's hard to imagine from these ruins, but Victorian dandies and working stiffs once converged here for bracing baths in woolen rental swimsuits…

  • April 2, 2016: Exterior of the Winchester Mystery House with statues and a fountain.

    Winchester Mystery House

    San Jose

    This ridiculous yet fascinating Victorian mansion is filled with 160 mostly non-utilitarian rooms with dead-end hallways and a staircase that runs up to a…

  • Fountain in Ghirardelli Square.

    Ghirardelli Square

    The Marina, Fisherman’s Wharf & the Piers

    Willy Wonka would tip his hat to Domingo Ghirardelli (gear-ar-deli), whose business became the West’s largest chocolate factory in 1893. After the company…

  • Fisherman's Wharf

    The Marina, Fisherman’s Wharf & the Piers

    Fisherman's Wharf – the Embarcadero and Jefferson St waterfront running from Pier 29 to Van Ness Ave – includes Pier 39, the Musée Mécanique, the Maritime…

  • Eadweard Muybridge statue and Palace of Fine Arts from Letterman Digital Arts Center.

    Palace of Fine Arts

    The Marina, Fisherman’s Wharf & the Piers

    Like a fossilized party favor, this romantic, ersatz Greco-Roman ruin is the city's memento from the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition. The…

  • Grateful Dead house at 710 Ashbury in Haight Ashbury.

    Grateful Dead House

    The Haight & Hayes Valley

    Like surviving members of the Grateful Dead, this purple Victorian sports a touch of gray – but during the Summer of Love, this was where Jerry Garcia and…

  • Lake Merritt

    Oakland

    An urban respite, Lake Merritt is a popular place to stroll or go running (a 3.5-mile paved path circles the lake), with bonsai and botanical gardens, a…

  • Chinatown Dragon Gate

    Dragon's Gate

    North Beach & Chinatown

    Enter through the Dragon archway donated by Taiwan in 1970, and you'll find yourself on the street formerly known as Dupont in its notorious red-light…

  • Presidio of San Francisco

    The Marina, Fisherman’s Wharf & the Piers

    Explore that splotch of green on the map between Baker Beach and Crissy Field and you’ll find parade grounds, Yoda, a centuries-old adobe wall and some…

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