Ask HN: What do/see in SF | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: What do/see in SF

30 pointsfratlas17 comments

Travelling to SF for an interview - I'll be staying around Soma/Hayes. What are some cafes/restaurants/sights/weird shit to check out while I'm there? Trying to get a sense of what it would be like to live there

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Catch the BART out to Lake Merritt in East Bay, wonder around and head to one of the many great bars / restaurants on 19th / Telegraph.

Go to North Beach, check out Spectacles + City Lights bookstore. Grab a pizza at Tonys (sit at the bar), then walk it off up to Coit Tower.

Bart to 24th in the Mission, wander down 24th St and grab a coffee at Haus on corner of Folsom. Find a taco joint for $1 tacos. Climb up Bernal Heights then drop down into Courtland Avenue for a beer.

As a data point, I agree with this itinerary. Especially visit haus coffee, when I first moved to the Bay Area, it served well as a home away from home

Haus is starting to get pretty crowded now that more people are finding out about this hidden gem.

Do you mean Specs' Twelve Adler Museum Cafe? I couldn't find anything called Spectacles in N Beach. Thanks for the recommendations!

> "What are some cafes/restaurants/sights/weird shit to check out while I'm there?

You will find your weird shit in the Tenderloin. SF is perhaps the most depressingly Dickensian city in the world. Before seeing it I'd never imagined a city with so many billionaires would let its residents suffer so.

Go to an event at PianoFight.

https://www.pianofight.com

Their tinder disrupt series are pretty funny.

Get a burrito in the mission, try to avoid stepping in human shit.

El Farolito right by the 24th Street and Mission BART station is worth the wait in line. Carne asada super burrito!

Check out Haight Ashbury, it's where the whole hippie thing started and honestly it never stopped there. there's also a ton of cool, weird stores along the road.

I used to visit Haight / Ashbury with my stoner friends every time we visited SF. When I had the opportunity to move to SF for a job, I almost didn't take it because I thought the Upper Haight was representative of all of SF. I hate that area, and most of the people that bum around there totally suck.

> Trying to get a sense of what it would be like to live there

The past few times I went for an interview to a new location, I first went to a meetup / group. Asked folks (who have lived and have no stakes in your interview) what they like and don't like. Also, walked few blocks around interview spot in the evening and morning for as long as I could to get a better feel of the area.

My recommendations:

Cafes: Caffe Trieste (North Beach)

Restaurants: The Ramp (Dogpatch), Sunday morning brunch at Thai Temple (Berkeley), Fish (Sausalito)

Sights: Twin Peaks, Coit Tower, Berkeley hills (Grizzly peak)

Weird shit: The Saloon (North Beach), Ruby Room (Oakland), parties at 20 Mission (Mission), Li Po Cocktail Lounge (Chinatown)

Neptune Society Columbarium. Look it up!

Ironically, The building overlooking it is a gerontology inpatient clinic...

Visit the Prelinger Library prelingerlibrary.org

Lawrence Hall of Science at Berkeley.

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