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49 Geary
Pity collectors silently nibbling endive in austere Chelsea galleries - at 49 Geary, openings mean unexpected art, goldfish-shaped crackers and outspoken crowds. Four floors of galleries feature standout international and local works ranging from Felix Gonzales Torres' constantly replenished heap of silver candy at Fraenkel Gallery to sculptor Seth Koen's crocheted minimalist lollipops at Gregory Lind. Beat the crowds on weekdays for quieter contemplation.
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77 Geary
The most intriguing art is usually found in what looks like the wrong place, and this unmarked entryway with the long hall and slow elevator is no exception.
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826 Valencia
'No buccaneers! No geriatrics!' warns the sign above the vat of sand where kids gleefully rummage for buried pirate's booty. The treasures are theirs for the taking, if they offer to barter for it at the front counter - a song, perhaps, or a knock-knock joke.
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African Orthodox Church Of St John Coltrane
When the bassist plucks the opening notes of 'A Love Supreme,' you'll know the Sunday liturgy has begun, but you never know when it will end. The jam session and religious testimony often continues for hours, with audience members joining in on their own instruments.
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Alamo Square
The finest restaurants in town can't provide views as spectacular as the picnic tables atop Alamo Square Park facing Postcard Row on Steiner St, a row of pastel Victorian 'Painted Lady' houses with gingerbread detailing and frosting flourishes that will leave you craving dessert. The city skyline looms in the background, and from the corner of Steiner and Fulton Sts you can glimpse City Hall.
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Alcatraz
Alcatraz: For almost 150 years, the name has given the innocent chills and the guilty cold sweats. Over the years it's been the nation's first military prison, then a forbidding maximum-security penitentiary, then disputed territory between Native American activists and the FBI. No wonder that first step you take off the ferry and onto 'The Rock' seems to cue ominous music: dunh-dunh-dunnnnh! Ferry prices can vary significantly: shop around.
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Anthony Meier Fine Arts
The toast of international art fairs, Anthony Meier specializes in abstract thinking from major museum artists and emerging talents, from Richard Tuttle's shape-shifting abstract assemblages to ethereal sculptures made entirely of transparent tape by San Francisco's own Rosana Castrillo Diaz.
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Ap Hotaling Warehouse
'If, as they say, God spanked the town/For being over-frisky,/Why did He burn His churches down/And spare Hotaling's whiskey?' The snappiest comeback in SF history was this saloon-goers' retort after Hotaling's 1866 whiskey warehouse survived the 1906 earthquake and fire, which many considered divine retribution for Barbary Coast debauchery.
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Aquarium of the Bay
Watch sharks circle overhead, manta rays skate shyly by and seaweed sway all around, as conveyer belts guide you through glass tubes right into the Bay. Not for the claustrophobic, perhaps, but a thrilling fish-eye view of San Francisco that leaves kids and parents wide-eyed and humming Little Mermaid tunes.
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Aquatic Park
Eccentricity is mostly staged along Fisherman's Wharf, but here it's the real deal: extreme swimmers dive from the concrete beachfront into the blood-curdling waters of the Bay in winter, weirdos mumble conspiracy theories on the grassy knoll of panoramic Victoria Park, and wistful tycoons stare off into the distance and contemplate sailing far away from their cell phones.
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Asian Art Museum
Until some mad San Francisco inventor finally succeeds in inventing the combo time-machine-teleporter, the Asian remains the best way to cover 6000 years and thousands of miles of astounding terrain in a single afternoon. A trip through the galleries is a treasure-hunting expedition, from racy Rajasthan palace miniatures to Osamu Tezuka's legendary Japanese manga drawings of Astro Boy - just don't go bumping into those priceless Ming vases.
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Audium
Sit in total darkness as Stan Shaff plays his hour-plus compositions of sounds emitted by his sound chamber, which sometimes degenerate into 1970s sci-fi sound effects before resolving into oddly endearing Moog synthesizer wheezes. The Audium was specifically sculpted in 1962 to produce bizarre acoustic effects and eerie soundscapes only a true stoner could enjoy for two solid hours in the dark - you know who you are.
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Baker Beach
Down craggy bluffs, past windswept Monterey pines and cypress, and swaying beach grasses, beckons a mile-long stretch of sandy beach, with fishing spots galore and full-frontal nudity at the north end (mostly among the gay male set). You're still in the city, with spectacular views of Golden Gate Bridge and the Lincoln Golf Course to prove it. On sunny weekends, crowds descend like lemmings in love.
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Balmy Alley
Inspired by local Diego Rivera and WPA murals and outraged by US foreign policy in Central America, mission activist artists in the 1970s set out to transform the political landscape one alley at a time. Balmy Alley became a site for inquiring minds, with historic early works by muralist groups such as the Mujeres Muralistas (Women Muralists) and Placa (meaning 'mark-making') transforming garage doors into artistic statements.
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Beat Museum
The Beat goes on, and on - OK, so it rambles a little - at this truly obsessive collection of SF literary scene ephemera c 1950-1969. The banned edition of Allen Ginsberg's Howl is the ultimate free-speech trophy, and the 1961 check Jack Kerouac wrote to a liquor store has a certain dark humor, but some items are head-shakers: did those Kerouac bobbles and yo-yos ever really go into mass production?
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Beniamino Bufano's St Francis Statue
A winsome statue of San Francisco's favorite saint by its favorite sculptor - so what's it doing in a parking lot? Technically this was only a model for his massive black granite St Francis in Grace Cathedral, but there's something so SF about this version with exposed toes hanging ten like a surfer. When looking for wharfside parking, divine guidance is mighty handy.
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Bob Kaufman Alley
What, you mean your hometown doesn't have a street named after an African American Catholic-Jewish-voodoo anarchist Beat poet who refused to speak for 12 years? The man revered in France as the 'American Rimbaud' was a major poet who helped found the legendary Beatitudes magazine in 1959 and a spoken-word bebop jazz artist who was never at a loss for words, yet he felt compelled to take a Buddhist vow of silence after John F Kennedy's assassination that he kept until the end of the Vietnam War.
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Buena Vista Park
True to its name, this park founded in 1867 offers sweeping views of the city beyond century-old cypresses to the Bay and even Marin County, depending how far you're prepared to hike up the steep hill. Technically the park closes at sunset, but the romantic views sometimes inspire after-hours cruising. Vista Ave West, curving up the hill and around the park, features some fine old houses.
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Cable Car Museum
Grips, engines, braking mechanisms... If terms like these warm your gearhead heart, you will be completely besotted with the Cable Car Museum, housed in the city's still-functioning cable car barn. See three original 1870s cable cars and watch as cables glide over huge wheels - as awesome a feat of physics now as when the mechanism was invented by Andrew Hallidie in 1873.
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California Academy Of Sciences
Finally the California Academy of Sciences is getting the museum suited to its fascinating collection of natural wonders and the occasional freak of nature: a grass-domed building by Renzo Piano, which promises to give the landmark de Young museum competition for architectural attention.
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California College Of The Arts
A generous endowment and big-name curators allow the Wattis Institute to take on ambitious, sweeping shows like 'Americana: 50 States, 50 Months, 50 Exhibitions,' which runs through 2012 in a high-concept road trip from Alabama to Wyoming. Once you've gotten your art-star kicks on Route 66, head across the courtyard and upstairs to PLAySPACE, an experimental exhibition space curated by rising stars in the college's curatorial studies program that has featured intriguing shows of art games and advertising spoofs.
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California Historical Society Museum
More flashbacks than a hippie at a Grateful Dead show, with wall-to-wall ephemera including Gene Anthony's photographs of the 1967 Be-Ins at Golden Gate Park that kicked off the Summer of Love. Recent shows include a harrowing display of artifacts and vintage photos from the 1906 earthquake, and 'Past Tents,' a show on California camping in the pre-Gortex era.
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Cartoon Art Museum
Comics fans need no introduction to the permanent collection here - please, like you need a wall tag to spot John Romita's truly amazing Spiderman cover drawings, or Edward Gorey's sketches for Gashlycrumb Tinies , starting with 'A is for Amy who fell down the stairs/B is for Basil assaulted by bears…'?
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Castro St Fair
This is the yin to the Folsom St Fair's yang. Instead of black leathers, think white sweaters. Instead of whips and chains, think country & western dancing and hot dog booths. The Castro St Fair was started by gay political icon and city supervisor Harvey Milk in 1974 as a way to put the nascent gay community on the map. The fair succeeded beyond his wildest dreams, and an estimated 150,000 people now show up. Proceeds fund a variety of queer- and AIDS-related nonprofit groups. The fair is an all-day event, with nonstop bands, emcees and speakers. The primary activities are endless cruising and shopping, the latter being the favorite activity of the somewhat more conservative gay men and lesbians who attend. Yes, there are gay white male clones out looking for action, but by and large the event is more middle of the road than SoMA's Folsom St Fair.
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Catharine Clark Gallery
Years from now you'll say you saw it here first. Catharine Clark has an astronomer's ability to detect art stars in the making and chart radical new directions. No material is too political or risqué here: witness Travis Somerville's altered-photo altars of smiling suburban California high school students in KKK hoods, or Masami Teraoka's paintings of geishas and Venus goddesses banding together like superheroines to fend off wayward priests.
