Walking San Francisco

In Walking San Francisco, Tom Downs has created an exceptional guide to exploring the best of the City ''on the ground,'' from North Beach to Lands End, Bernal Heights to Golden Gate Park. Take one of these specially designed walking tours, and you'll not only get great exercise but also soak up the history, culture, and vibe of the City by the Bay. It's like having a savvy tour guide at your side, showing you where to find great mojitos, and pointing out a rare worker-owned strip joint. Two special tours sample the best bars in North Beach and the Mission District. Locals and visitors alike will appreciate insider tips and entertaining asides in the 30 walking trips. Each tour contains a clear neighborhood map and critical public transportation and parking information. Route summaries make each walk easy to follow, and a ''Points of Interest'' section outlines each walk's highlights.

Hundreds of public stairways traverse San Francisco's 42 hills, exposing incredible vistas while connecting colorful, unique neighborhoods, and veteran guide Adah Bakalinsky loves them all. Her updated Stairway Walks in San Francisco explores well-known and clandestine corridors from Lands End to Bernal Heights while sharing captivating architectural, historical, pop culture, and horticultural notes along the way. This revised and expanded edition has been thoroughly updated and includes two additional walks, new maps, and new color photographs. The two new walks presented are: The Blue Greenway Walking, a new history, which follows the Embarcadero and weaves along the present day contour of the Bay into the future parklands and new neighborhood of San Francisco; and Jazz Takes A Walk in the Sunnyside neighborhood where the undulating geology of San Francisco invites one to hear the dance in the walk. A comprehensive appendix lists every one of the City's 600-plus public stairways. Long-term residents and tourists alike have used the book for over 25 years to adventurously uncover San Francisco's unexpected details.

San Francisco's famous citywide scenic driving route has been reinvented for a new generation as a green, healthy walking adventure. This turn-by-turn guide takes visitors and natives alike on 17 different up-close walking tours, passing by and through the city's major sights, fascinating neighborhoods, and breathtaking vistas.

A guide to the Barbary Coast Trail, San Francisco's official historical walk.

Trees of San Francisco introduces readers to the rich variety of trees that thrive in San Francisco's unique conditions. San Francisco's cool Mediterranean climate has made it home to interesting and unusual trees from all over the world - trees as colorful and exotic as the city itself. This new guide combines engaging descriptions of sixty-five different trees with color photos that reflect the visual appeal of San Francisco. Each page covers a different tree, with several paragraphs of interesting text accompanied by one or two photos. Each entry for a tree also lists locations where "landmark" specimens of the tree can be found. Interspersed throughout the book are sidebar stories of general interest related to San Francisco's trees. Trees of San Francisco also includes a dozen tree tours that will link landmark trees and local attractions in interesting San Francisco neighborhoods such as the Castro, Pacific Heights and the Mission - walks that will appeal to tourists as well as Bay Area natives.

Hundreds of public stairways traverse San Francisco's 42 hills, exposing incredible vistas while connecting colorful, unique neighborhoods -- veteran guide Adah Bakalinsky loves them all. Her updated Stairway Walks in San Francisco explores well-known and clandestine corridors from Lands End to Bernal Heights while sharing captivating architectural, historical, pop culture, and horticultural notes along the way. A comprehensive appendix lists every one of the city's 600-plus public stairways. Long-term residents and tourists alike have used the book for over 25 years to adventurously uncover San Francisco's unexpected details.

In this expanded and revised edition, Don Herron's " Dashiell Hammett Tour" guides you over the fog-shrouded hills stalked by Sam Spade, the Continental Op, and other legendary characters created by San Francisco's most renowned mystery writer. See every place Hammett is known to have lived in the City and the majority of locales from his master mystery, " The Maltese Falcon." Prowl the back alleys where the Op fought hard-boiled criminals with a blazing .38. Shadow Sam Spade in his quest for the fabulous figurine of a mysterious black bird. See the dead-end alley where Spade's partner, Miles Archer was done in by Brigid O'Shaughnessy. A consise biography introduces the tour, and an annotated bibliography provides further information about Hammett and his works. Maps are included for self-guided tours by foot or machine.