San Francisco area - suggestions for visitors
(updated July 2024)

Visitors often ask for suggestions on what do see in the San Francisco Area.  Here are some of our favorites, in no particular order. 

 If you discover something is permanently closed, or have something fun to add, please contact me, Sue Kayton, kayton@alum.mit.edu

CAUTION - car break-ins are very common in the city of San Francisco, but not a problem in the surrounding cities.  If you park a car where it is within view of the public in the city of San Francisco, do not leave any valuables in sight.  If it is identifiable as a rental car, do not leave ANYTHING in the car, not even the registration or rental contract.  For rental cars, leave the doors unlocked, or a thief will smash the windows to steal possible valuables from the trunk.  Most San Francisco residents who park their cars on the street leave them empty and unlocked at all times to prevent broken windows.

WEATHER -The Bay Area has many micro-climates.  In the city of San Francisco itself, it's often cold, windy and foggy, especially in the summer.  Mark Twain famously quipped, "The coldest winter I ever spent was the summer in San Francisco."  The tourist areas sell a lot of sweatshirts, warm hats and gloves to tourists who show up in shorts and T-shirts.  The weather in San Francisco is most pleasant in the fall when the heavy fog and wind tend to moderate.  While it's 52 degrees and windy in downtown San Francisco, just a few miles inland, it can be over 100 degrees.  Dress in layers and be prepared for anything.  It almost never rains from late April through mid-November.  Rain is infrequent even from November-April. 

PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION - All Bay Area public transit use the Clipper Card.  You can use a physical plastic Clipper Card, you can use GooglePay or Apple Pay on your smartphone.  It works on BART (the subway), Caltrain (commuter rail), buses, cable cars, light rail, SMART, and other mass transit throughout the entire area.  Note that it does not work on Amtrak.

TOLL ROADS and TOLL BRIDGES.  If you are driving, you may want to get a FasTrak transponder to pay for bridge tolls and highway toll lanes.  Note that bridges no longer have human toll-takers.  You either pay with FasTrak, stop at a kiosk before crossing the bridge, or get a very expensive bill from the rental car company.   FasTrak also works in Southern California, but neither region accepts the incompatible EZPass or iPass in common use on the east coast and in the Chicago area.  You can use carpool lanes on the freeways with a FasTrak transponder - free with the minimum number of passengers, or pay if you have fewer people.  Taxis are almost non-existent except at airports.  Uber and Lyft operate almost everywhere.

Atlas Obscura has this list of unusual things to see and do in the area. 

The San Francisco Chronicle newspaper has this top-20 list.  (This website may be behind a paywall)

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Explore by location
    San Francisco city
    Peninsula (between San Francisco and San Jose)
    San Jose and further south
    East Bay
    North of San Francisco
    Multiple locations

Explore by category
    Museums and historical sites
    Outdoors and nature
    Amusement parks, theme parks and zoos
    Miscellaneous