Things to do and stuff to eat in the Bay Area

Hey there, out-of-towners! Are you looking for some fun things to do while you're in the Bay Area? Well, of course there are tons of things to do, so I'll mention a few favorites.

San Francisco:
There are a bunch of obvious tourist musts in this town such as Fisherman's Wharf, Chinatown, Coit Tower (which houses some cool WPA murals), Alcatraz, etc. Any guidebook can give you the scoop on these places, so I'll focus on some of the places I especially like.

Golden Gate Park--at the east end of the park near the so-called Panhandle, is the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood of hippie, summer-of-love fame. This is still kind of a fun and funky neighborhood to walk around in, especially if you like going to record stores and radical bookshops. Caribbean/Cuban restaurant Cha Cha Cha at 1801 Haight is a fun place to eat in the Upper Haight. At the west end of the park is beautiful Ocean Beach, where you can visit the Cliff House and see seals on a rock in the ocean.
Inside Golden Gate Park you can visit the De Young Museum: Newly renovated very cool building in Golden Gate Park, this museum has a wide variety of art exhibits. Nearby is the beautiful Japanese Tea Garden, where you can wander around and then sit and drink tea.

The Mission--this is a great neighborhood to walk around in especially if you are in search of an excellent burrito. The best place for a stroll is Valencia Street between the 16th St. BART (Valencia is one block West, parallel to Mission St.) and the 24th Street BART stations. This has become the hip area of town with tons of restaurants and shops.

Palace of Fine Arts--Beautiful building designed for the 1915 Panama-Pacific Exposition. This is mostly fun for the view. It is near the Presidio. Next door is a fantastic science center called the Exploratorium. You can drive from here to Fort Point, for a nice view of the Golden Gate Bridge. You can also drive over the bridge to Sausolito, which is full of cutesy shops and galleries.

SFMOMA--Great modern art museum, which in August will be featuring exhibits on photographer Lee Miller (on whom my friend Becky Conekin is an expert) and on Frida Kahlo. Across the street is the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts and there are a bunch of other museums in this neighborhood.

Oakland:
Oakland is much less touristy and has fewer exciting spots than San Francisco, but it's a great city and has a lot of nice features nonetheless. If you want to hang out in the East Bay, here are my recommendations:

The Rockridge District--this is a great neighborhood right near a BART station. Tons of shops and restaurants. My absolute favorite burritos are here at Cactus Taqueria.

Redwood Regional Park--Right next door to Joaquin Miller Park, Redwood Park has beautiful trails through tall Redwoods with views of San Francisco! Some trails are not at all strenuous, such as the Sequoia Bayview Trail.

Chabot Space & Science Center--This is a good place to take kids and has awesome planetarium shows for all ages. Plus, my good friend Eric Havel works here!

Lake Merritt--This is lake borders downtown Oakland and is a nice place to walk around or go for a run. My favorite thing on Lake Merritt is Children's Fairyland, but keep in mind that you need to have a real-live kid with you in order to enter (it's not sufficient to be a kid at heart, although maybe it should be).

Live Music: I know some of you might be interested in going out after the Friday dinner, so if you want to see live music, you could go to see the Spanish Harlem Orchestra at Yoshi's Jazz club. Another fun venue in Berkeley is Ashkenaz, that plays a lot of world and folk music.


Berkeley:
Focal point of Berkeley is the University of California. This is a beautiful campus to wander around. The area around campus, which is bordered by Bancroft Avenue, has a number of coffee shops and other stores, especially on Telegraph Avenue. An especially nice coffee hangout is Caffe Strada, which often has an international clientele, because International House is right up the street. Blondie's Pizza on Telegraph has been selling huge tasty slices since I was in high school and I've often enjoyed a giant salad and homemade bread at Cafe Intermezzo for lunch.

Downtown Berkeley: Shattuck Ave. and University Ave. is the center of the downtown, just a couple blocks south of campus. This area features a few good places to eat such as Jupiter on Shattuck, a good place for pizza and beer with an outdoor garden and a number of good Indian restaurants on University Ave.

Gourmet Ghetto: Further north on Shattuck you come to an area around one of the prize gourmet restaurants in the Bay Area: Chez Panisse. Chez Panisse is pricey and hard to get a reservation, but there are other good places to eat around there too such as the Thai restaurant next door, Cha Am, and Cafe de la Paz for latin food. The other great shops in this neighborhood are the Cheese Board, which is a gourmet coop, Black Oak Books, and Masse's Pastries.

Lawrence Hall of Science: On the hill above the Berkeley Campus is, yes, another science center, with great and varied exhibits as well as a lovely view of the bay.

Tilden Park: This huge park, not too far from the site of the wedding, has many great hiking trails and some fun features such as a miniature train that you can ride.

By the way, the best coffee in the Bay Area is Peet's Coffee, so if you see one of these branches forget Starbucks and head right in to Peet's.

So these are just some of the places to go. I'm sure others of you have suggestions too, so please help out the out-of-towners and add your favorites in the comment section.
Thanks!