Famous for having some of the steepest streets in North America, San Francisco has more of one thing than most cities: steps.
According to the city’s tourism office, San Francisco boasts over 900 public stairways that take people up and down the city’s iconic slopes – and some of them have become attractions in their own right thanks to their artistic designs.
Highlights include the 16th Avenue Tiled Steps, featuring a colourful mosaic of an underwater world, and the Lincoln Park Steps, adorned with floral patterns in warm yellow, red and green tones.
For those looking to explore San Francisco’s large and small public stairways, the urbanhikersf.com website offers an extensive “SF Stairmap,” where various staircases are marked as points on a map for easier navigation.
For the past two years, San Francisco has also been staging SF Stairway Month. Every October, the neighbourhood initiative Civic Joy Fund stages several free guided walks and lectures celebrating these unique features of San Francisco’s urban landscape.
For one of the most expensive cities in the world, there’s also another benefit of the stairways: they’re free! Another thing that tourists can get without extra expense is walking tours.
The city offers a wide range of free tours led by volunteers through many of the city’s hip and historic neighbourhoods, as well as many that focus on niche themes.
There are, of course, walks through the famous Haight-Ashbury area, the Castro district and the Gold Rush City. Visitors can also take the tour to learn more about how the city’s cable car lines changed the landscape of San Francisco by making hilly neighbourhoods accessible.
Other tours explore the city’s murals, a Japanese tea garden and the Russian Hill Stairways. The newest tour focuses on climate change and also gives you a magnificent view of the iconic Golden Gate Bridge and runs through Crissy Field, a former US Army airfield that has been converted into a park.
Walkers on the two-hour tour learn about how climate change is affecting the city and about the risk posed by rising sea levels.
Some 70 tours are available and you can register for free online through SF City Guides. SF City Guides, set up in 1978, has more than 300 volunteer guides and is mainly sponsored by the San Francisco Public Library.
If you approach Lincoln Park from the east, you will see this beautiful staircase. Alexandra Kenin/Urban Hiker SF/dpa-tmn