Stairways of SF: Yerba Buena Cove and Telegraph Hill

schmoo

This Thanksgiving we weren't able to fly back to be with our familes, so we took advantage of the empty city and quiet streets to try something new.

Fellow Dgrinner and good friend aktse lent me a (very locally popular) book about staircases in San Francisco, just chock full of great local history and hidden paths. There are 27 hikes in the book but we just turned to the first page, made sure our batteries were charged, packed a few snacks, and off we went.

Love the Translink cards for getting around on the muni! (I guess this counts as a stairway)


Our starting point: 1st & Market




One thing I learned is that not all of San Francisco was above water 200 years ago. And how many businesspeople walk over this plaque every day and not realize that it's there?


Shell Corner:


130 Bush Street. The narrowest building in San Francisco. It is supposedly three steps from the front door to where you hit the back of the elevator.


Love the daytime fog


Leidesdorff Street isn't remarkable, but the incredibly prolific businessman it's named after makes me feel like a slacker.


And here are a bunch of shots of the Transamerica Pyramid:




It's very cool to read a plaque like this and realize that you would have been standing underwater 150-ish years ago:


This building in the FG was where they held the first Jewish services. Three Stars of David embellish the fire escapes:


Balance Street doesn't even look like a street. It looks like a dead end:


This forum is about dimly-lit back alleys, right? Here we go.


We emerged at the edge of Chinatown, and the first set of stairs:




The second set, Vallejo Stairs, was more scenic in a different way:


We ran into the wild parrots on the Calhoun steps, but that's more wildlife and not street. So skipping onwards...

The beautiful, famous Filbert steps:




Amazing houses, amazing greenery:


I'm very glad we were headed down and not up these steps! We had to cut the hike short but we caught the F train back home. I'm sure this view is familiar to many who have visited SF:



I have more photos and slightly better descriptions in the gallery here, but thanks for looking! Most of these shots were shoot-from-the-hip documentary for my own purposes, but feedback is always welcome.

ian408

What a wonderful way to spend a day wandering through the city. Did you take the dog?

Richard

I really enjoyed these, Schmoo. Takes me back to the days when I used to walk over that plaque without ever reading it .

Cuong

I enjoyed this history lesson.

Cuong

ivar

Very nice, Schmoo I love these kind of walks. It's such a fun way to spend your day :smo

Tango

I liked your "Leidesdorff Street" image even though I have never been there....

rainbow

Great idea! You show some photos of the city that others would not think twice about.

S F is a great walking city. My friend and I use to run DOWN some of these hills with stairs, but on the flat sidewalk (cuz it was fast, easy, and thrilling) and have to stop on the small flat curb at the bottom before we ran into the street.

Hope you had a great day!

schmoo

Thanks, guys! I am sure that most cities have guidebooks written by locals similar to this so that you can also do something like this and show us pics.

i'd love to have done something like this for Baltimore, except I am pretty darned sure that the number of muggings and shootings would go up. :uhoh

rainbow wrote:

Great idea! You show some photos of the city that others would not think twice about.

S F is a great walking city. My friend and I use to run DOWN some of these hills with stairs, but on the flat sidewalk (cuz it was fast, easy, and thrilling) and have to stop on the small flat curb at the bottom before we ran into the street.

Hope you had a great day!

You are nuts! But that sounds fun, although I wouldn't be willing to test the quality of coverage of my health insurance trying that.

ian408

schmoo wrote:

You are nuts! But that sounds fun, although I wouldn't be willing to test the quality of coverage of my health insurance trying that.

Or the willingness of a Muni driver to actually stop for a pedestrian

schmoo

ian408 wrote:

Or the willingness of a Muni driver to actually stop for a pedestrian

I gotta say I haven't seen that yet, but I don't hang out much around the busy tourist areas. It's more that cars try to zip by the trains by the skin of their noses and sometimes they don't succeed.

Oh and no we didn't bring the dog although we totally should have. Maybe next time!

ian408

schmoo wrote:

Oh and no we didn't bring the dog although we totally should have. Maybe next time!

When you guys get down this way, you'll have tons of walking friends

Awais Yaqub

Great photos !

PaulThomasMcKee

I love stuff like this...thanks for sharing! As others have commented, what a great way to spend a day!

Mr_Beach_Bum

You just inspired me - in Pittsburgh we have "city steps" on hillsides... I've always thought they would be an interesting subject. Looks like PGH and SF have some similarities: the streets turn into steps then back into streets... Nice series!