A lot of stuff has already been mentioned but I’d add two:
-The SS Jeremiah O’Brien – WWII Liberty ship offering tours and information about the Liberty ships. Very interesting. Sit on the deck and aim the guns at Oakland 
It’s docked not far from Fisherman’s Wharf.
-Musee Mechanique – an assemblage of mechanical antique arcade amusements. It lives at Fisherman’s Wharf.
That one! Thanks, both of you!
Photographs just don’t do it justice.
I take a lot of people here and it completely surprises the heck out of them that this place exists. It is a little-known gem!
My biggest recommendation comes from being a huge foodie. Saturday mornings at The Ferry Building is the place to see local, famous chefs, nosh on astonishingly great food and a gorgeous view of the Bay.
Speaking of chocolate, er, I mean, food… what’s the opinion on Ghirardelli? When I was there, it was the place to get chocolate.
Better than Hershey’s, but not a top-quality chocolate.
If you go to San Fran-cisco…I think you are required to adorn your locks with blossoms. Or something like that.
Avoid. Tourist Trap!!! Nothing is made there any more – it is all manufactured elsewhere and shoved down the throat of tourists wandering Ghirardelli Square…
There are some really great places to get chocolate in the city. My personal recs:
Bother. Of course, when I was there, there was a Sharper Image store nearby, which was probably a premonition of the future.
Mind you, as a tourist, it will be matt_mcl’s right to go to tourist traps…
Yum! I mean, how interesting!
Nothing constructive to add, just that I went to SF for the first time last year, and it was one of the best weekends of my life. And my great-grandmother shares a birthday your your grandmother. She would be 129 this year.
And someone told me that is was 75 and sunny there last Christmas.
If you will have a car, and a day, then the Monterey Bay Aquarium is fabulous. You can also do the 17 Mile Drive. If you can, spend two days doing this, staying overnite locally, ending the trip with a walking tour of Carmel.
It isn’t that SF is so cold, but here’s what can (and does) happen- the day will start out cool but sunny. You bring out the shorts and a t-shirt. Dusk comes, the temp drops 10-20 degrees and a nasty cold wind comes off the bay. All of a sudden it’s “brrrr” time. If you wear shorts, maybe it’s actually time for those zip-off ones, and always pack a fleece vest and a windbreaker.
Note that parking is nasty in SF, and enforcement is fierce.
the Square itself is nice enough, in architectural terms, but it’s full of crappy tourist shops selling overpriced shit.
As for the chocolate itself, it’s perfectly decent (although far from gourmet), but it’s not like you can only get it in San Francisco. I got some caramel squares yesterday in my local Vons. Perhaps the biggest ripoff are the Ghirardelli stores, because the prices they charge are outrageous. There’s one just near Union Square, on Stockton, but if you walk around to the Rite-Aid on Market Street you can get the same chocolate for just about 40% less than in the company store.
A friend was at a zoo there recently, and she loved it. She thought the pengins were awesome. Does anyone know what zoo that might be?
That would be the San Francisco Zoo, famous for a number of tiger attacks…
The zoo is located in Golden Gate Park which, I think, is fairly spectacular. A lot of people coming to San Francisco don’t realize how much real estate the park takes in the city. Take a look at this map.
Um… the zoo is at the southern end of the city, across from the beach. It is some distance away from Golden Gate Park. Map
Unfortunately, as that map shows, the zoo is NOT located in Golden Gate Park ;). It’s down the road a bit off Sloat. Nitpicking only so someone doesn’t get disappointed walking the park and fails to find the zoo.
However the park does have bison :).
ETA: Too slow again.
The MBA also has penquins, oddly, and a far better exhibit, imho.
Oh, and a crime note- be careful about your iPod/Droid and laptop. There’s a wave for crime where someone unlocks their iPod, and then a thug grabs it and knocks the victim over. Note only have you lost your tech device, but there could be stuff like bank accounts and whatnot there. Be aware of your surrounding,s do not do this on the street on when using Muni at a stop.
Are certain neighborhoods better than others? I told a guy there that I was staying in Union Square, and he warned me keep a tight grip on my wallet. I never felt unsafe there, but a few blocks west on Geary, where I was staying, felt really dicey to me.
The Tenderloin area, which is right around there, can be pretty sketchy, although it’s far less dangerous than it used to be. San Francisco has, especially in its tourist areas, gentrified in a similar way to Manhattan, and while you have to exercise the usual level of big-city vigilance, i don’t think i’ve ever felt unsafe there.
My wife recalls growing up in te city in the late 1960s and 1970s, and she says that the Mission back then was a very dodgy area, whereas now it’s really pretty tame for the most part. There’s still some drug dealing going on around 16th and 17th streets, but the whole area if fine during the day, and i’ve never had any problems after dark either.
Sorry about the map/park thing.
And it is funny about the Tenderloin. I know it gets a bad wrap and, yes, walking through it one does see a lot of sketchy-looking people, but as a large-breasted, single white chick, I have never had any problems just because – I think – I keep my eyes forward, I walk with intent, and seemingly have an air of knowing where I am going. It is the tourists who are floundering around and looking lost that are at risk, IMHO.
Yeah, that’s about where I was.