I didn't read through the whole thread, but I used to love going over to Sam's in Tiburon on a beautiful Saturday. Sit outside and sip cocktails while looking across the Bay at the city. I miss that

There's a place on West Portal called Submarine Subs. They make some really good deli sandwiches. My personal favorite is a super (large) pastrami, everything on it with avocado. It's about $8.

Things my wife and I do every trip to San Francisco:

Get drinks at the Beuna Vista - Irish Coffee when it's cooler, Martini's when it is warmer.

Eat at Scoma's - love the Clam Chowder.

Go to the Farmers Market.

Get an Ice Cream at Ghiridelli's

Walk through Chinatown and go through dozens of flea-market type shops and jewlery stores with mostley the same crap. Find a divey chinese food place there and try it out.

Spend an hour looking at all the Scotch in the liquor section at the cannery, and pick out a bottle I have never tried before.

Eat at my wife's favorite restaurant Spiazzo Cafe


Go to northbeach for some good Italian food.

Wander down Fisherman's Wharf

Eat Dim Sum at Yank Sing.

It's not cheap, but this is by far my favorite (not too fancy) business lunch in SF.

quick question: I am thinking of taking my wife to sf for her birthday weekend in july. many of the hotels on expedia are 2-3 blocks from union square, is this an ok area to stay? I'm mainly interested in easy public transportation access, and not a super ghetto area.

East of Union Square is good, as is south. As you move north (assuming it's not Nob Hill, which will often be separately designated as its own neighborhood) you'll start hitting Chinatown. 2-3 blocks west isn't a particularly good neighborhood. Lots of homeless but if that doesn't bother you it's perfectly safe.

In SF there's transportation all over, but Union Square is a nice area, right by the piers and not far from Market Street.

Union Square is a great place for tourists to stay, near shopping, public transportation, cable cars, China Town, North Beach, etc.

It of course depends on the final hotel. There's nothing outright bad I don't think, but there are places that are better than others.

the hotel is the francis drake. we're not planning on spending much time in the hotel at all so mainly I was looking for a good location and fair to decent conditions.

anyone have any thoughts on this hotel in general, or alternatives I should consider? there were some nicer hotels earlier in the thread, but I don't think they'd be worth it for us.

also, anyone have any recommendations for a really nice mexican restaurant. I know there are tons of great taquerias recommended in this thread that we plan on hitting, but something for a nice sit down dinner. ideas?

That's a decent hotel. Also look at Hotel Nikko, about 3 blocks away. Friend of mine stayed there when he visited and he thought it was really nice. They also have a pretty good Japanese steakhouse there.

turnip, there's a great mexican place in San Bruno called Don Pico's. Hard to get to by public transit from SF though. There is a BART station in SB but it is nowhere near Don Pico's, maybe arrange a cab from there? This is all probably too much work but hope it helps anyway.

On the top floor of the Drake is Harry Denton's Starlight Room... kind of a cool place to chill and have a drink with a nice view of the city.

Hopefully the fog clears for you.
It's been pretty awful recently.
Definitely bring a coat.

anybody have any other dance recs outside of dna, 1015, and mighty? Prefer hiphop but doesn't have to be. Could be club or lounge. just no yuppie 80s dance offs please.

couple questions. is the farmer's market open on friday as well as saturday, and if so is it as good? I'm thinking of getting us a picnic lunch there then going to angel island to walk around, but it seems like this might be a better friday activity than saturday because of crowds, is this the case or no?

btw, this thread has been a gold mine for finding great recommendations for ideas.

Try a Tuesday.

http://www.ferrybuildingmarketplace....ers_market.php

P.S. The days and hours of operation for the Farmer's Market vary by season.

turnip,

The Ferry Building farmer's market is not open on Fridays. It is open on Tuesday and Saturday mornings, and Thursday evenings during the summer. Friday is def better than Saturday for walking around Angel Island, but I've never seen it get too crowded. There are plenty of stores inside the Ferry Building where you can pick up (somewhat overpriced) stuff for a picnic lunch.

When are you in town?

thurs - sun of next week. is there a time out sf, or something like the village voice? btw we are planning on hitting the slanted door also, very excited to try it after hearing great things from pretty much everyone I've ever talked to.

one more question, is sushi groove south better than the russian hill sushi groove?

turnip,

Two of them, SF Weekly and SF Bay Guardian. Online at sfweekly.com and sfbg.com.

Check opentable.com for Slanted Door reservations. If you can't find something there that works, don't worry, you have two good backup options. One is to go to the restaurant and sit at the bar. The other is to go to Out The Door at the San Francisco Shopping Center downtown and go sit at a table there (not from their front takeout window) where they have a good subset with most of the best stuff from the full Slanted Door menu.

t,

Yes, Sushi Groove South is better ambience, less tightly packed (though still pretty close quarters), far easier parking, and just an overall much cooler place. The food is the same.

d,
thanks for the tips, I got slanted door at 9pm through opentable. reason I was asking about sushi groove is the south location is on opentable but not taking reservations right now for some reason, but the russian hill location is. sounds like south is better so I'll just give them a call.

Gotta add Medjool to the list of fantastic places to enjoy a sunny / boozy afternoon. The roof deck is about the best place to enjoy great whether in the city with reasonably priced drinks and an eclectic crowd.

Snipe,

The medjool roof deck is phenomenal. I've only been there on evenings, and it is super nice early, but gets way too packed later at night.

Bambudhha lounge on sundays. outdoor grass/pool/dj. nice looking space.

I went to a place called Scoma's that was pretty good. Also around Xmas the salmon were running up the stream at Muir Woods so it was cool watching them jump upstream.