Hard to believe it's been over twenty years since I lived there.
I still return as often as I can, which is never often enough.
This isn't really a "guide" in the usual sense— there are already plenty of of those.
Instead, I've combined photographs I've taken with old postcards I've collected,
and assembed this portrait of The City by the Bay.
Here is the way I see San Francisco.
It may or may not be the way someone else sees it.
Oh, well. That's what makes it idiosyncratic!
Enjoy!
(Click on any of the topics below)
An overview of the entire downtown area, featuring dozens of links to click on. Each link brings up of picture of what's at that location.
Ever have trouble telling the Golden Gate Bridge from the Bay Bridge? This handy comparison will end your confusion forever, at least about which bridge is which!
Once nicknamed "The Slot," Market Street remains the busiest, most eclectic street in San Francisco.
VIRTUAL TOUR
You'll see it all as you stroll from the Embarcadero to Van Ness Avenue --without ever leaving your chair!
Don't bring your swim trunks. North Beach isn't a beach at all, but rather one of San Francisco's best-known neighborhoods: home of first-rate Italian restaurants and third-rate strip joints.
Ground zero of the San Francisco $hopping district.
Charming tourtist attraction or dangerous, overcrowded ghetto?
You decide!
A thousand acres of greenery in the middle of The City, and currently going through some major changes.
For over a century, it's been "where SanFrancisco begins." (or ends, I guess, if you happen to be coming from the other direction...)
After decades of exile behind the Embarcadero Freeway, San Francisco's Ferry Building has come back in a big way.
Time and time again, the postcard photographers have returned to the spot where the cable cars turn around.
Most people have seen "the world's largest firehose nozzle" atop Telegraph Hill. But the real show is inside.
Places and things it's too late to go visit.
Random looks at The City, past and present
A set of classic black & white views of The City, and the folder they came in.
Vacation pictures from somebody's trip to San Francisco. (My wife Carla found these at an estate sale.)
From the same estate sale: A very color-faded set of slides from some long-forgotten giftshop.
Gone but not forgotten, Herb Caen's column was a part of every San Franciscan's morning.
After a long hiatus, a downtown classic has reopened its doors.
No, these pictures aren't from some old Warner Brothers gangster movie. They're just supposed to look like that way!
Afternoon TV hero to millions of Bay Area kids during the sixties.
A cautionary tale to anyone considering driving to The City with me, as told by my friend Perry Lake..
Perry Lake returns to San Francisco to search out the real-life locations described in Fritz Leiber's classic horror novel.
Spotlight on a San Francisco hotel with its own idiosyncratic character.
All San Francisco, all the time!
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Text and photographs (excluding those in public domain) ©2005, 2006 - all rights reserved