Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler OT - Union Square hotels

Buses are 'ok'. They are never on time. Just go to the stop and wait for the next one. It might say 7:30, but the bus will be along when it gets there. Muni (street cars or underground) are ok. I would recommend taking cabs. Just try not to get not to get the one that has the bong rolling out from under the seat (no bs) or the one where the guy asks if you know where he can get an 8ball of meth. But to be fair I had a 2 year period where I took a cab once a day (oh i miss the .com expense account) and those are only 2 out of hundreds. Have no fear Most are either quiet or really nice.
As far as the touristy stuff goes. It's hard to say. I have lived here for 8years and not done much of it. Hit the Golden Gate bridge and walk accross. The view is amazing. Fisherman's wharf is the ultimate tourist trap, but interesting and you might get to meet the bush man.
Lombard is pretty if you really want to go you can catch a steetcar to the top.
China town is worth a walk through but also sells a LOT of SF touristy stuff (get your gifts there, cheaper than fisherman's wharf).
I have yet to go to Alcatraz. I'm saving that for when my brother comes to visit next month. Also, Angel island is a good day trip if you are the outdoorsy type (hiking or rent a bike).

Or, you can rent a car and drive up/down Highway 1. That is an amazing thing to do. It's very easy to imagine you are James Dean in your porsche driving into the sunset of a huge hollywood movie.

jr

Definitely do Alcatraz. It's well worth it, and spring for the self-guided audio tour.

Just don't ask to see the tunnels and the furnace room where Sean Connery dodged the spurts of flame.

Well, my problem is that I'll only have evenings to fill with activities, as the conference will occupy most of the daytime. I'm sure that I could walk over the bridge, check out chinatown/fisherman's wharf, and similar things in the evenings. Not sure about alcatraz though, I'd love to check it out if you can take a tour in the evening. My girlfried will need to fill the time I'm at the conference though so regardless she'll probably want to check it out.

Yeah, they have a nighttime tour of Alcatraz now. When i was out there over Spring Break I got to go on it. Maybe I'm just a dork, but I had always found Alcatraz very interesting, so in turn I really enjoyed walking around the place. And definately spring for some headphones. They are only like $5 a person, but definately worth it in my opinion. If I remember correctly the tour left around 7ish. And to make life easier, go ahead and buy tickets before your trip online so you won't have to deal with the swarn of people at Fishermans Wharf trying to buy tickets.

Definately walk across the bridge. Its incredible! Also, if you're into views, eat a meal at The Cliff House Restaurant. It overlooks the Pacific and the views are awesome! The food is pretty decent as well I suppose. Right up the hill from it is Sutro Baths, which was probaly pretty amazing back in the day, but it's more rubble(sp?) than anything now, but if you eat at the Cliff House you may as well walk up the street and see it.

China Town is pretty interesting. It's basically a bunch of tourists walking around going in all the stores haggling with the people that work in them. Pretty interesting and worth at least a walk through one day. And you have to eat in China Town at least once!

There's lots of otehr stuff to do. I was a pretty big tourist while I was there, and I had a lot of fun!

OK so I have a huge favor to ask from some kindly SF'ite. I plan to attend the Skinny Puppy show at "the Grand" on 07/01 since I'll be out that way. My guess is that a very small percentage of people on this board would find skinny puppy to their liking, so don't take this as a music recommendation of any sort.

Anyway, if I buy 2 tickets on ticketmaster I have to pay:

2*$25 + 2* $6.50 + $14.50 = $77.50!
(that's tickets, service charge, and mailing cost)

However, the tickets are available at some place called "The Independent" for $26 each, only cash purchases. So they can't sell them to me over the phone.

Herein lies the favor. If this "Independent" place is close to someone's home or work, would they be so kind as to pick me up two tickets and mail them to me? I will mail said favor giver a self addressed stamped envelope and a check for $60, so they make $8 for their kindness. Not a fortune I know, but not bad for 5 minutes work either. If willing please PM me.

life shifts up and down everybody knows it's wrong why don't you care? now do it seem fair? it's not in the rhyme or reason so it goes with every season crawl to top fall through bottom first hand love is really rotten slice of life find what's plenty inch towards a sanctuary

A preview! I'm jealous.

Bren R.

If by "a preview" you refer to their upcoming album "Greater Wrong of the Right"...it's supposed to be out the 25th, which is a solid month before I will see them. But you can still be jealous

Nah, meant my lyrical preview.

Bren R.

gotcha....yeah I'm pretty stoked about this trip. Bringing my girlfriend along with me for the ride was probably the best decision I could have made. Otherwise it would be me, alone in SF for a week, trying to find ways of occupying my evenings. Plus it doubles as a birthday present to her

From the sound of it we'll be able to fill our evenings pretty well. So far we've got one night wandering chinatown (the lady loves chinatowns...be it philly/new york/boston/etc...), one night for the alcatraz evening tour (how much is that BTW?), one night for the SP show, one night for general sightseeing/bridge walking, that leaves me with two nights to fill... Thoughts anyone?

ringmir-

pardon me for being blunt.. but, if you got 2 free nights in SF with your girlfriend in a hotel, and you are asking US for advice on what to do..? i think you are in the wrong forum..

of course, at this stage in my life, after a hard day of being a tourist, all i wanna do is sleep!! man, i got problems..

bigjohn