Would appreciate opinions on the walking tours offered by the San Francisco City Guides group (Public Library). I understand they are free, so the price is right, but would like to hear from others who have already taken the tours. Informative/strenuous/boring? Other recomendations? Thanks for any information.

Sinehat, Here is a fantastic SF walk...The Barbary Coast Trail.

KQED, the local PBS station did a great special called "Sin, Fire and Gold" There's an interactive website you should take a look at: http://www.kqed.org/w/sinfiregold/map.html

The website has a book and guided trail map you can order in advance.
http://www.barbarycoasttrail.com/trail%20guides.htm

We took the Chinatown tour with City Guides and it was a lot of fun, and we learned so much about the neighborhood. We will definitely do a tour with them again. The guides are all volunteers, which means they are all really interested in the history of SF and want to share it. At the end they ask for a donation to help offest costs, and I saw most people giving $5 or $10.

I've done several and enjoyed them all enormously, especially Haight-Ashbury.

Grasshopper is right. I was in town by myself for a week on business and picked up the book of the Barbary Coast walking trail. I learned a lot about the history of the city and it changed a stroll down the street into a very interesting walk through a very remarkable part of history.

Check the links at http://gocalifornia.about.com/msubtour.htm . Might have to go down a couple of levels, but there's a fair amount of tour info there.

Thanks for the replies and information. Good tips.
Bill