Well, I did a search on what I was sure must have been done before, but I couldn’t find anything, so I am asking you all.
A couple of friends and I are planning a day trip to SF, and we are looking for things to do when we get there. We usually just go to the peir and hang out there, but we want to do something new. Any ideas?
I’ve heard San Fran is an easy place for tourists to visit because it has AIDS on every street. heh heh.
Ride the trollies, they are fun.
Great Asian Art Museum.
We spent a weekend there are stayed in Cow Hollow, a fun little neighborhood if you are looking for atmosphere.
Get off the pier - you can get that tourist trap atmosphere anywhere. OK, maybe not that particular one…
If you’ve never done the Alcatraz thing, its probably worth the time and money. But it does mean you have to go to that pier.
What do you like to do, exactly, aside from hanging out on piers?
What I like to do is spend a good part of the morning at City Lights Books, on Columbus and Broadway, then wander up Telegraph Hill, stopping for coffee or beer at the old Beat hangouts, and poking around the musty ol’ shops.
I end up on top of the Hill, where I wander around the base of Coit Tower, enjoying the great WPA-era murals for an hour or so.
Then I head back down into North Beach, towards Washington Square, for a late lunch and more beer at Capp’s Corner, at Green and Powell.
Yeah, don’t go to the pier.
The Asian Art Museum is in Golden Gate Park, which is huge and has many other attractions, including an aquarium, a beautiful arboretum, a lake with boats that can be rented and much more.
There’s also Chinatown. I used to love wandering the streets there, looking at all the wild groceries for sale and stopping someplace for dim sum.
I’ve been three times, and each time I’ve got to Chinatown for dim sum. Different restaurant every time, but equally fabulous every time. I can recommend it highly enough. If you don’t plan to go into Chinatown, you can also have dim sum at Yank Sing on Battery Street, near the Embarcadero One building. Mmmmmm…
Actually, I can**'t** recommend it highly enough. Grr.
http://www.grin.net/~mirthles/web/sanfrancisco_latest.html - San Francisco: an idiosyncratic guide for the goth-geek-freak-hipster-nerd
I only had one day, but I made as much of it as I could.
I visited the Cable Car Museum (not a lot to it) and walked around Nob Hill and followed the streetcar tracks down through Chinatown to the Wharf and was touristy. Mostly I watched the sea lions make fools of themselves and each other at pier 59.
If I ever go back, I want to at least get to the Exploratorium, see Coit Tower, and just because I’m a drooling JWZ fanboy, drink at the DNA Lounge, which is a nightclub he owns. (Maybe not open yet.)
If you don’t have a car while you’re there, (and parking appears to be a total bitch) you can rent a bicycle or motorcycle, there’s a couple places.
Go across the Golden Gate bridge at least once, just so you can say you’ve done it.
There are also cybercafes if you need to get your Dope-fix while you’re there. I tracked one down somewhere in an industrial neighborhood downhill of Nob that, on reflection, was probably SoMa and I didn’t even know it. The Idosynchratic Guide above mentions that Kinkos has net access, for $6 an hour.
Ghirardelli’s restaurant is good if you can afford the cost of the food. Someone else was paying when I went there. (G)
Get yourself one on those tourist maps that have all
the cool places around the peninsula highlighted, and go nuts.
One last thing. If you live at 5000 feet in Colorado
like me, going to SF is like becoming a pro athlete without trying. I was walking up and down the SF hills all day without breaking a sweat and only breathing a little bit hard. The dense air down at sea level sure is nice. I
should have rented a bicycle, but I had my heart set on a motorcycle and wasn’t interested in compromise.
-Ben
Thanks for all the great advice. I live right near SF. Like 60 miles to the north, so i have plenty of time to go back. Thanks for all the tips 
I’m visiting SF for a week starting next Friday, and I know what I’m doing on July 1: watching Barry Bonds and Mark McGwire smack some bombs at Pacific Bell Park. See you at the game!
Well, a lot of the cool stuff has already been mentioned, but a few more:
*Hang out on Haight street. Pretend you’re a damn dirty hippy.
*Go to the Musee Mechanique, then have lunch at the Cliff House. (The Musee is a collection of old arcade games from an amusement park of decades past, and it’s amazing, especially for the younger set. It’s right below the Cliff House.)
*SF MOMA (Museum o’ Modern Art) is pretty cool, and is within walking distance of much of downtown. That’s good, because parking is hellish.
Be sure to wear some flowers in your hair.
Blast you, Blackwell. Beat me to it. 
Yeah, damn you, Blackwell. I was going to say it, too.
Unmentioned: Seal Rock. It’s on the Coast Highway about where SF ends. A hokey little tourist trap overlooking a rock that seals beach on.
Sentimental hooey you don’t care about - this is where I got a stuffed seal doll when I was two that I still have. After twenty years, Sealy looks like a real seal. The Velveteen Rabbit was spot-on, apparently.
I don’t know what you’re going to do…but don’t leave your heart there.
jarbaby
The Exploratorium is really worthwhile. Try to call a couple of days ahead to make reservations for the Tactile Dome.
Ah, but I AM a damn dirty hippy 
Oh! Oh! GOTTA do the tactile dome! I love that thing. It is SO COOL. !!!
If you live close enough to return on a somewhat-regular basis and would like to check out a cool neighborhood, how about Potrero Hill? If you have a car, the views from 18th Street and points above are phenomenal. Don’t miss Farley’s coffee shop and the BBQ joint across the street.
Also, SF’s second-crookedest street is in Pot Hill – it begins its descent at 20th and Connecticut, I think.
don Jaime: I’m afraid Seal Rock isn’t populated by seals anymore. Actually, it never was, much - The critters that hung out there were mostly California Sea Lions ( with the very rare additions of the occasional Steller Sea Lion or Harbor Seal ) . But at any rate they’ve all moved into the SF Bay and haul out on the piers now ( I forget which one, exactly - It’s a specific number that was largely unused with the decline in the commercial fishery ). They shifted several years ago during an unusually heavy herring spawn in the bay. Now that the touristry commission has caught on that they’re a big tourist draw and stopped trying to drive them away ( unsuccessfully ), they’ve become a fixture there. I would imagine that it’s a lot more comfortable on a nice wooden pier on the nice, calm bay, than on some turbulent rock out on the Pacific coast.
heraldgwena: Nonetheless, I back the idea of going out to the Cliff House ( where Seal Rock is ). Go in the late afternoon on a weekday, when the tourist crowd is waning and it’s mostly just locals. Play in the Musee Mecanique ( I agree with ColonelMoose - it’s a blast ), then go upstairs, get a table by the window, order an Irish Coffee, and watch the sun set. Perfect way to end the day .