Gorgeous view of the city in this park/permanent festival! Any beautiful day of the week you will find so many picnickers, hula hoopers, cute dogs, gay boys in their skivvies, ganja cookie salespeople, crazy weirdos and can collectors, it feels like a neighborhood concert is going on! My kind of place, for sure.

Murals! where? everywhere! walls, streets, signs, windows. keep your eyes peeled. I walk a lot in San Francisco and always seem to find new murals in the least expected places. They are a constant source of inspiration, and make me wish I could paint worth a damn.

If you can get past the bourgie factor and/or you work down the street like I do, you will come to love this place. It has some of the best food in the city, a Blue Bottle coffee, and an observation deck from which you can watch the ferries come and go, emitting their weird beeps and disgorging tourists. The people who work here are great too (whether or not I dated a baker from the Acme Bread kiosk because of a Craigslist missed connection will be left to history).

Creative Chinese Cuisine.

#1 in the city for old book smell and creaky wooden floors. Too small to find anything specific you’re looking for, good enough that you’ll find something else instead.