yk

Hello! My 10-year-old son and I just returned from 1 week in San Francisco for April school vacation.

Why San Francisco
I was really late into checking for airfares for April vacation week. Airfares to anywhere during school vacations are sky high (they tend to run 2-3x the normal price). I had wanted to fly to Amsterdam for Vermeer exhibition but I got vetoed. Looking on Google flights, I saw that flying to SF (nonstop on Alaska Airlines) was cheaper than most other US destinations. When I suggested that to my son, he was excited as he has always wanted to see Golden Gate Bridge. It would have been his first time, though I have been to SF more times than I can count.

As I was booking our flights, a friend offered me his upgrade coupons. In the end, I was able to upgrade our return flight (on the red-eye) only. I ended up using my AA miles (on Alaska flight) for our outbound.

Pre-trip preparation
We got out a couple of SF guidebooks from the library so my son can read up on it. We also got several kids books on SF, including "What is Alcatraz" and "What is the Gold Rush" to get some background history. Besides from pre-booking our hotel and rental car, the only other thing I pre-booked were tickets for Alcatraz cruises and for California Academy of Sciences. I did that because the former can sell out, whereas the latter offers a discount if you purchase in advance. I downloaded the MUNI Mobile app on my phone.

Getting Around
I dislike ride-shares and prefer using public transit if possible. For our first 4 days we either walked or took MUNI. Muni is free for my son except for cable car rides. I either bought single tickets ($2.50) or day pass ($5 w/o Cable Car, or $13 w/cable car). For our last 2 days I rented a car from downtown San Francisco and returned it directly at the airport. The rental car is for visiting Marin Headlands and also friends who live in Alameda and San Mateo. Since our red eye was at 11pm, it just seems easier to drive there than to return to downtown location and get to SFO on BART late at night.

Day 1 (Monday)
Monday is Patriots Day in Boston which is a holiday for most of us. In order to get seats using miles, we had to fly out on the 7am, which got us to SFO before 11am. We took the AirTrain to the BART station. I was initially concerned about buying tickets (I downloaded the clipper app), but there are old-fashioned ticket machines at the airport station so you can just buy an old-fashioned paper ticket from there. (BART is not part of MUNI so I can't buy BART tickets on the Muni Mobile app, but you can buy them on the Clipper app). There are no discounts for youth (at least not for visitors youth). No issues buying 2 1-way paper tickets to Montgomery from the machines.

Our hotel is the Orchard Garden Hotel on Bush Street (hotel review at end of TR), right next to the Chinatown gate. It's just a few blocks walk from Montgomery BART station.They let us check in early. After a bit of refreshing, we headed to chinatown in search of lunch. I was planning to get lunch from a Hong Kong-style cafe called Cafe New Honolulu, but turns out they are closed on Mondays. A man who happened to be standing right outside told us there's a similar HK-style cafe around the corner on Clay Street, so we went there instead. It's called G & Y which is just off Stockton on Clay Street. It turned out a good rec as the menu has exactly the kind of Hong Kong style cafe comfort foods I was looking for. I had a beef brisket/wonton noodle soup while my son got ham macaroni soup. And a very good quality HK-style milk tea to go with it. Lunch was $29. While in Chinatown I bought some fruits for our stay.

Weather was quite favorable (sunny 50sF) and we went for a walk towards Coit Tower (not too many attractions are open on Mondays) via Lombard Street (not the crooked section though). The tower elevator was out of service so we hiked up another 13 floors to the top (admission $13). The view was nice but the windows are pretty small so you can only look out at one specific direction at a time. Don't forget to check out the beautiful murals on the ground level however.

Afterwards we took the Filbert Steps down. Thank goodness we did it this way because that was a lot of steps!!! I don't recommend going UP Filbert Steps cuz you won't have any energy left to climb the tower afterwards. The steps take you through some beautiful gardens and people's backyards. Coming from New England where everything has barely sprouted, it's so refreshing to see all this greenery and flowers such as clivias and Angel's trumpets all blooming.

We made our way down to Embarcadero to take the historic F-line Street car towards SF MOMA. One of my friends got us free tickets. My son is not a fan of art but he agreed to be there for one hour. We didn't arrive until 4pm anyway and the museum closes at 5pm. There is an installation by Olafur Eliasson which we really had fun at. We also caught the last 10 minutes of Ragnar Kjartansson's The Visitors (which I've seen parts of it in Boston before).

We left SF MOMA at closing time (5pm), walked back to our hotel for a brief rest, then back to SOMA area again for ramen dinner at Ippudo. We shared a couple of their bao buns, some edamame, and a bowl of ramen noodles. Dinner was $41.

Since we were in that neighborhood, we went inside Westfield Mall for my son to see and ride their curving escalator. Finally, we stopped at Trader Joe's next door to stock up on breakfast items (cereal, yogurt, milk). This is where the hotel mini-fridge comes in handy.

~ end of Day 1 ~

yk

View from Coit tower

Murals inside Coit tower

SF MOMA


Bao Buns at dinner

yk

Day 2 (Tuesday)

We had breakfast in our hotel room — basically a yogurt parfait with cereal, yogurt, milk and fresh fruit. We had a pretty early start as we want to ride the cable car before the lines get too long. We got to the Union Sq terminus a bit after 9am and it was a fairly short line. We got to sit in the open seats on the Powell & Hyde line. At $8pp it's not inexpensive, but the Powell & Hyde line takes about 20 minutes end-to-end and it is really quite fun. It wasn't 10am yet so we took some pics of the cable car and the area. Sunny and no fog, we had a nice view of Golden Gate Bridge.

The SF Maritime National Historic Park (run by National Park Service) opens at 10am. The website had some conflicting opening hours; it turns out that while the park is open daily, the visitors center is only open Fri-Sun. Whereas the Maritime museum nearby is open Wed-Sun. given it's a Tuesday, we could only visit the park, which is just fine. There are 6 historic ships docked on the pier but you can only board 2. There were no park rangers inside the park except at the entrance (Entrance fee $15, but we got in for free because my son has the 4th grade Every kids Outdoor pass). Anyway, maybe they have more activities and rangers available during summer season and/or weekends. I have to say however, that I was quite surprised by how few tourists we encountered on our weeklong trip; I had expected SF to be much more crowded (with overseas tourists now that covid is no longer a major deterrent to travel).

My son enjoys doing the Junior Ranger activities, and about an hour later we were done and he earned his junior ranger badge. From there we walked along the piers looking for a place for lunch. I was hoping for seafood but my son jumped at the chance to eat at The Crepe Cafe on Jefferson Street (next to In N Out burger). I have to say, the crepes were pretty good! And they have outdoor tables and chairs in the back. Lunch was $30.

We continued our walk along Embarcadero to Fisherman's Wharf, where we found USS Pampanito, a WW II era submarine. We got in for free with my reciprocal membership. We were the only persons on board for the most part. You scan a QR code at the admission booth, which loads up an audio tour on your phone. I highly recommend it as it was very informative. We enjoyed the visit immensely. (the audio tour is about 40 minutes long).

Next to USS Pampanito is Musee Mecanique, which, more accurately speaking, is a vintage arcade. It's free to enter but you have to pay for every game you want to play inside. We spent a few dollars and moved on to Pier 39. Pier 39 is a huge tourist trap though not that crowded on the day we visited. We browsed some shops and went to check out the Sea Lions. Afterwards there was a busker doing a circus act so we watched that for some time too. Hard to believe we actually spent 2 hours at Pier 39. We got on our favorite historic F-Line street car and got off at the SF Railway Museum. Admission is free as it is really just a one-room museum, though it has tons of info panels for one to read, about the history of street cars in San Francisco. The museum is also a gift shop. We were there for maybe a half hour before catching the next Street Car back to the stop on market Street near our hotel.

That evening my cousin and her husband took us out to dinner at R & G Lounge in Chinatown, hands down the best meal we've had on this trip. We ordered the crab meat & fish maw soup, their signature s&p crab, special beef dish, and honey spare ribs.

~ End of Day 2 ~

yk

Cable Car turnaround at Hyde Street Pier

Inside SF maritime national historic park

USS Pampanito

Sea lions at Pier 39

Riding the historic F-line streetcar

Signature crab at R&G Lounge

TDudette

Great photos! Looking forward to more, yk.

HappyTrvlr

Your report makes me want to return to San Francisco especially if you were our dining guide!

yk

Day 3 (Wednesday)

After another "in-room" breakfast, we set off for Bus 5 heading to Golden Gate Park. We got to the SF Japanese Tea Garden around 9:30am. Unbeknownst to us, admission that day was free until 10am! It is so picturesque there. Cherry blossoms were past, but azaleas are in full bloom. 45 minutes later, we headed over to deYoung Museum next door. I think I mentioned that my son does not like art museums, but he agreed to go in to see the Ansel Adams exhibit. Even though I have reciprocal membership, they won't let me use it for the Ansel Adams, so I had to pay full price ($45 for the 2 of us). We also ascended the observation tower for some city views. Afterwards we looked through some of the permanent galleries before heading out to the sculpture garden for the James Turrell skyscape. That was a bit disappointing because the colored lights inside the dome were not on.

We ate lunch at the deYoung cafe, which has a very nice outdoor, partially shaded patio. My son had a chicken salad sandwich, I had tomato basil soup. (Lunch $45).

Our advance tickets to California Academy of Sciences (directly across the street from deYoung) has an admission time of 12:30pm-2:30pm. The later the time slot, the cheaper it is. I think this is a good time slot becuase 1) most of the school groups/field trips are almost done by then, and 2) 4.5 hours is enough time to visit the museum. Our 2 tickets totaled $72. While expensive, the tickets included everything inside, including planetarium movies (you can watch as many as you'd like; you just need to reserve the free tickets ahead of time), the Rainforest, the aquarium, and alll the exhibit halls.

We started with the Rainforest enclosure, then down to the Aquarium. We watched one of the Planetarium movies. Back to Aquarium and checked out all the exhibit halls.We even went up to the living roof. My son is super interested in sciences and he has immense patience reading all the displays. Altogether we were there for 4 full hours.

It was just before 5pm and we had some time to kill. I suggested we go check out the SF Botanical Garden, not realizing it charges admission. When we got there, we decided to pass as we only had one hour until closing. So we continued southward to Lincoln Way where we picked up Bus 7 to Filmore, then change for Bus 22 to JapanTown.

https://www.sfmta.com/maps/muni-service-map
(The MUNI transit map is fairly easy to decipher)

My son wasn't that hungry when we arrived at Japantown, so we walked around the shopping center a bit. We ended up getting ramen from Hinodeya (I had no idea they had just opened an outpost in Union Sq). He still wasn't that hungry so we shared a dish of edamame and a bowl of ramen (with extra noodles on the side). Dinner was $30. While we were checking out the mall earlier, we spotted a dessert place (Uji Time) that serves taiyaki ice cream, so we went there after dinner and shared a sesame taiyaki ice cream ($8). From Japantown we took Bus 38 back to Market Street near our hotel.

~ End of Day 3 ~

yk

Japanese tea garden

Azaleas in bloom

View from deYoung observation tower

Ramen dinner

dfrostnh

Another great trip report. It's great that you and your son travel so well together. Photos are great.

Paqngo

Yk- I really enjoy going to Golden Gate Park. The azaleas are beautiful. I will have to look at going to see the Ansel Adams exhibit. What a fun trip!

yk

Day 4 (Thursday)

After another in-room, homemade yogurt parfait breakfast, we set off around 9:30am and walked through Chinatown towards the Cable Car Museum, which opens at 10am. It is free admission and extremely fascinating! I did not realize it houses all the mechanics of the cable car systems, and you can see the wheels turning each of the 4 cables that run on the 4 separate lines. (I know there are only “3” lines but they separate the hyde and mason from the combined powell street which has its own cable).

There is a ton of displays to read, with lots of history of the cable car origins and the many different companies and lines that once flourished in SF, and also how it was saved by local residents in the 1940s when the mayor proposed to get rid of all cable cars in SF to be replaced by buses and street cars. We were there for an hour, and we walked up the street half a block to take a look at the “car barn” where they park all the cable cars.

We then walked over to Chinatown for lunch. We stopped at a chinese bakery for some egg tarts, and then, being touristy, we checked out the Golden Gate Fortune Cookies Factory. I highly recommend skipping this… i know ahead of time it’s a tourist trap, but honestly save your time and money. You stand in line and once you are inside the (very small) shop you have no more than 1 minute to make your decisions and buy the products (at a highly inflated price) and you have to leave, given how small the space is and how many people are behind you in line. All you can see inside is the different products they carry, and a lady sitting in front of the cookie machine making them.

Afterwards, we went back to the original HK-style cafe that I wanted to go back on Monday (it was closed that day), Cafe New Honolulu at 888 Stockton Street (a super auspicious number). I was hoping to get braised oxtail over rice but they were out of oxtail. I settled for a bowl of fish congee while my son got HK-style French toast (is that an oxymoron)? Lunch was $30

We walked 2 blocks over to Kearny Street to catch Bus #8 which goes to Pier 33, where we have tickets for our ferry to Alcatraz. I believe the ferries weren’t sold out so they were letting ticket holders of later ferries to get on earlier ones. Ours was for 1:35pm but we got on the 1:05pm.

Once we got off the ferry on Alcatraz Island, a National Park Ranger asked passengers to gather around to listen to a few instructions and rules. My son waited for everyone to disperse afterwards so he could ask for a Junior Ranger activity booklet. We walked up the steep road to the cell block, where you pick up the audio guide (included in ferry ticket; if you don’t want the audio guide, there is a way you can request a refund for part of your ferry ticket). I don’t recommend that, because the audio guide is very well done, with just the right amount and length of commentary; otherwise you don’t really know what you’re looking at. The audio guide is about 40 minutes I believe?

Besides the cell block, there are other locations on the island to visit; we pretty much went to every building and site that is open that day. During this time of year is seabird nesting season so certain areas were roped off. We were amazed by the number of cormorants nesting on the island… there must be thousands and thousands of them, each one with a little dug hole in the ground. We also saw snowy crane birds which are beautiful creatures but they make the funniest sounds! We also checked out the gardens of Alcatraz, which have just gorgeous flowering plants and also some giant century agave with flower stem maybe 20’ tall!

We spent almost 4 hours on the island (the recommended visit length is ~ 3 hrs) and my son got his junior ranger badge for Alcatraz island. After we got back on Pier 33, we rode the F-line Street car to Hyde Street Pier for dinner. We picked Capurro’s Restaurant for some Italian that night. Maybe a post-pandemic phenomenon? We were told to place our order with the bartender, who entered on a device, and then we pay right away before we seat ourselves. Basically there is almost no waitstaff besides bus boys who bring the food over to us when it’s ready. (the night before at Japantown, we were told to scan a qr code for menu, and order from the website and pay beforehand). I suspect this is a cost-saving way for restaurants as they don’t need to hire as many staff (and perhaps it’s difficult to hire staff anyway).

My son got the kids pasta with marinara sauce; I had crab meat with angel hair. Dinner was $40.

We were pretty full afterwards but we also wanted to check out Ghirardelli Square next door, so we walked around the block for a bit first. One of the main space is under renovation and won’t reopen until this summer. Still, they have 3 separate shops in the Square, and we visited the “biggest” one, which has a cafe plus a shop with an area of “fill your bag” with many many different flavors. Absolutely dangerous if you are a chocolate lover! Thankfully most of the chocolate are dark chocolates and my son wasn’t tempted.

However, our SF paper map that we got from our hotel has a Ghirardelli coupon — buy one sundae and get a free bar of chocolate. So we split an ice cream sundae there, and got a free bar of chocolate to bring home to my husband.

We could have taken a bus home from Hyde Street Pier but I thought why not ride the cable car one last time? It was after 7pm and even though the line wasn’t long, we waited forever, as they were only running one car every 15 minutes. In retrospect we really should have saved the money and took the bus back. Before we headed back to our hotel, we went to a nearby 7-Eleven to buy a sandwich in anticipation for the next day…

~ End of Day 4 ~

yk

beautiful morning stroll through chinatown

Cable Car Museum

Lady making fortune cookies

on approach to Alcatraz with Golden Gate bridge in the background

Inside one of the cells

snowy crane

Garden of Alcatraz

yk

Day 5 (Friday)

I rented a car for our last 2 days so we can head outside of the city easier. I rented from Hertz and the closest location is “Westin St Francis” at Union Sq. But when we got there we couldn’t find the rental counter. After asking the staff there, they said the location is actually another block away at the garage on Mason Street. Even they don’t understand why Hertz puts them as the location (apparently we weren’t the first and won’t be the last to ask this Q)!

After we got our car (thankfully not an “upgraded minivan” like our last trip), we headed out to the Fort Point National Historic Site at the foot of Golden Gate Bridge. Even though I have been to SF many times before, this is my first visit there. It is a fort dating back to the 1800s, but still extremely well-preserved. The views from them of Golden Gate Bridge is very impressive. Some of the interior were refurbished with furniture, some has information panels on its history. Don’t forget to go up on the roof for the view! We were there for almost 2 hours (much longer than anticipated) as my son completed another junior ranger activity.

Afterwards we tried to stop at the Golden Gate Visitors Center nearby, but the parking lot was full with tons of cars looking for open spots, so I gave up and drove on Golden Gate bridge to get to the Marin Headlands. The Marin Headlands NPS visitors center is closed; we kept on driving over to Point Bonita Lighthouse. The lighthouse has limited opening hours so make sure you check beforehand. On this friday it is open 12:30-3:30pm.

We parked slightly farther at a lot and walked 1/3 mile to the trailhead. Note that the Lighthouse trail is fairly steep downhill to the lighthouse, so you have to trek up on the way back. We found a spot to sit down for our lunch picnic with a beautiful view of the bay, golden gate bridge, and downtown San Francisco. Lunch was 7-Eleven sandwich, chinese bakery, and some potato chips. When we got to the Lighthouse, my son was delighted to find the Marin Headlands junior ranger activity booklet there, so he spent quite a bit of time doing it at the lighthouse and picked up his 4th and 5th junior ranger badges. (one is Marin headlands, another one is a special 50th anniversary Golden Gate badge). Otherwise it would have been a much shorter visit. In any case, the view is amazing on this sunny, clear day. We were lucky the entire week Karl the Frog was away on vacation somewhere!

After Point Bonita lighthouse, we have some time to kill but didn’t want to drive to another place, so we hiked the very easy Batteries Loop trail directly from our parking lot. It’s called Batteries loop because it passes through multiple gun batteries. But it also has very nice views of the ocean, and I am most taken by the flowering ice plants that grow all over the cliffs.

We decided to call it a day by then and drove back to the city. Our hotel doesn’t have a garage so we parked at the nearby White House Garage which is 1.5 blocks away (the other option is Sutter-Stockton garage, 1 block away). We rested for a bit back in our hotel room before walking to North Beach to meet with 2 friends for dinner at Barbara. These 2 were friends from middle and high school; it was great to catch up with them. My son had fettuccini bolognese, I had spaghetti vongole. Our share of dinner was $50. We looked for a place for dessert afterwards but decided we were too full. When my son and I got back to the hotel, we split another chinatown bakery bun as dessert.

~ End of Day 5 ~

yk

Approach to Fort Point NPS from parking lot

View of GGB from roof of Fort Point

Lunch view on Point Bonita Lighthouse trail

Point Bonita Lighthouse

View of the shoreline from Batteries Loop

Flowering ice plants as far as the eye can see

ninasdream

yk- thank you for your TR, really enjoying hearing about your trip, and the beautiful photos. I can't believe how big m-yk is...and how many badges he earned!

You had quite a different visit than I had in September. But like you, I couldn't believe how expensive museums were and entry fees to gardens and other attractions. I too passed on a few when I arrived within an hour or so of closing.

Good job on covering so much ground.

yk

Day 6 (Saturday)
Our last day in SF! After breakfast and packing up, we checked out of our hotel and headed to the White House Garage to retrieve our rental car. The overnight rate was $42, which I thought was fairly reasonable (we parked for ~ 18 hours). We then drove across Bay Bridge to Alameda. This is my first time on the Alameda Island; it has such a vastly different feel than San Francisco itself. Our destination is USS Hornet, a WWII era aircraft carrier. I must say, I have no idea of this place despite multiple trips to SF before. And none of the guidebooks I read mentions it either. I only found out when I was checking my reciprocal museum membership to see what places are listed.

My son was super interested in visiting; after all, he had a great time visiting USS Yorktown in Charleston SC just 2 months ago. When I googled to find out how many aircraft carriers one can visit in the US, I could only find 5. And we will be visiting the Intrepid in NYC in June, so that means we will have seen 3 of the 5 in a span of 4 months.

Anyway, USS Hornet is the same Essex class as USS Yorktown; they were probably manufactured within a few months of each other. The visit is not as extensive as Yorktown; on USS Hornet you can visit 3 levels; if you want to see more, you have to pay extra for guided tours. We didn't really have that much extra time so we just did the self-guided visits on the 3 levels (flight deck, hanger deck, and the immediate level below). Still, we spent almost 3 hours. Apart from servicing in the Pacific theater during WWII, one of the final missions USS Hornet took was to recover the Apollo 11 after it returned to Earth, so that was quite cool. From the flight deck of USS Hornet, we have a nice view of the city of San Francisco, and luck would have it, today is the first day there was TONS of fog at Golden Gate Bridge. We were super lucky to have avoided the fog or any cloudy weather the entire time.

We left at 1pm to drive to the other end of Alameda for lunch with friends at Speisekammer. I had curry wurst and my son had their schnitzel tenders with fries. After lunch, we drove over the San Mateo-Hayward bridge to visit my middle school/high school friend and her family. She came out to dinner with me the night before but today we got to see her whole family. The afternoon is pretty low key; we went for a walk in downtown San Mateo; the kids played frisbee and soccer in their Central Park, before we went to dinner at a Cantonese Restaurant nearby called Blue Sky Cafe. It serves casual family-style Cantonese food which is just perfect for us. Soon after it was time to depart and we drove to SFO, returned our car, and got on our 11pm red-eye back to Boston. I think I mentioned that a friend gifted us upgrade coupons on Alaska Air so my son and I sat in First Class. But FC in Alaska Air isn't anything too special — just bigger, wider seat and more legroom and more recline. There is no leg rest and definitely not lie-flat, so it is still hard to sleep. Of course, it was still better than sitting in coach, considering the flight was completely full.

~ End of Day 6 ~

yk

USS Hornet

View of downtown San francisco from USS Hornet flight deck

5 junior ranger badges earned on this trip, including the special 50th anniversary of Golden Gate Park

Final Cantonese dinner

oldemalloy

Great trip, yak. Your son is lucky to be able to see so much and you are lucky to have a great travel companion. Thanks for taking us along.

yk

We stayed at Orchard Garden Hotel on Bush Street. The hotel group has 2 hotels in SF with almost identical names: Orchard Hotel and Orchard Garden Hotel. Orchard Hotel is just down the street, also on Bush Street.

I liked it a lot; it is right next to the Chinatown gate, although the actual Chinatown (meaning, the actual shops that locals go, rather than tourist shops) is a good 10-min walk away on Stockton Street. The area is super safe, and easy walk to Market Street for BART, F-line street car, various bus lines, and also cable car turnaround. Also it is a 15-min walk to Ferry Building, 10-min walk to SOMA, 15-min walk to North Beach. I find it a very central location.

Our room (2 double beds) is very spacious for a hotel right in the heart of town. We were given room on the 9th floor (out of 10) and at the very end of the hallway facing the back. Our room has windows on 2 sides and only one shared wall with another room. There is no nice view to speak of, but OTOH, it means extremely quiet! No street noise and very minimal hallway noise. I'm a very light sleeper but i slept very well due to how quiet it was. The only time we heard street noise was a garbage truck coming through around 10pm one evening.

The room has a mini-fridge, coffee maker and in-room safe. In-room wifi is free and works great. The room has a large glass carafe and they encourage you to get filtered water from the 7th floor water dispenser (they call themselves an eco-friendly hotel). The decor inside is slightly dated but nonetheless clean and light. Lobby is fairly small but we almost never saw other guests. They have a restaurant in the lobby that serves breakfast (a la carte). Prices are pretty steep ($20/dish) so that's why we bought foods and stored them in the in-room fridge. At the lobby there is also a basket of fruits and snacks that are complimentary for guests. There is also a fitness room and a business center, both of which we did not use.

As mentioned in previous posts, the hotel doesn't have a garage but there are 2 garages within 1-2 blocks: the Sutter-Stockton garage, and the White House Garage. Parking rates are about the same for both places.

Overall I have zero complaints and I also got a very decent rate (booked directly with the hotel) so I'm happy to recommend this hotel!


Our spacious room with 2 double beds

MichelleY

Thanks for the trip report. I have been curious about this hotel. Sounds nice.