I left my heart in San Francisco (twice)

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A view of Grant Street in Chinatown in San Francisco. (THE ASSOCIATED PRESS)

If you go

Getting there: There are any number of ways to get to San Francisco from Ottawa, but I’d try to stay on an Air Canada route because the service and planes are better than any U.S. carrier.

Getting around: In about 25 minutes, the BART will take you from the airport to downtown for about $8 depending on your stop. Better than a $50 cab ride.

At the airport information booths or at numerous locations downtown, buy a Muni passport for transport around the city. They’re the best deal in San Francisco. They cost $14 for one day, $21 for three, $27 for seven days and are good on buses, cable cars and on the vintage Market Street streetcar line that runs from Fisherman’s Wharf to the Castro District. Considering a single cable car ride rings in at $6, the passport pays for itself in no time. The passport is not good for the BART.

Where we stayed:

Beresford Arms: Historic building, clean and friendly. Rates from $100. 701 Post St. (at Jones), San Francisco. 1-415-673-2600.

Sea and Sand Inn: On the water in Santa Cruz. Rates vary with the season and day of the week. 201 West Cliff Dr. Santa Cruz. 1-831-427-3400.

The Fairmont San Jose: Downtown San Jose, various rates. 170 South Market St. 1-866-984-7712.

Where we ate:

Colibri Mexican Bistro: Central Mexican food. 438 Geary St., San Francisco. 1-415-440-2737.

Yang Sing: Hong Kong-style dim sum, yummy but pricey. 49 Stevenson St. (between 1st and 2nd St.), San Francisco. 1-415-541-4949.

Leopold’s: German bistro, comfort food. 2400 Polk St. (between Union St & Filbert Street). 1-415-474-2000. Borobudur Restaurant: Indonesian fare. 700 Post St. (at Jones). 1-415-775-1512.

Swan Oyster Depot: Chowder, oysters, seafood cocktails, since 1912. 1517 Polk St., San Francisco. 1-415-673-1101.

L’Osteria del Forno: Northern Italian, small space. 519 Columbus Ave., San Francisco. 1-415-982-1124.

Riva Fish House: Seafood, huge portions, great views. 31 Municipal Wharf, Santa Cruz. 1-831-429-1223.

The Greek Authentic Cuisine: Immense portions of Greek food. 435 Front St., Santa Cruz. 1-831-466-9990.

Mezcal Bistro & Bar: Oaxacan regional cuisine, specializing in homemade moles (sauces). 25 West San Fernando St., San Jose. 1-408-283-9595.

In-N-Out Burger: A California classic offering excellent burgers and fries. 641 Leavesley Rd., Gilroy.

Lai Lai Restaurant: A traditional family-run Chinese restaurant. 334 Broadway, Millbrae. 1-650-692-8898.

FOR Herb Caen, the voice of San Francisco for 58 years in the Chronicle (and briefly the Examiner), no city could match his.

He mocked Oakland. "The Bay Bridge has to end somewhere," he sniffed. He dismissed San Jose. "Nobody goes there."

It’s simply ‘San Jose — Next 51 Exits.’ " And he belittled Los Angeles. "Isn’t it nice that people who prefer Los Angeles to San Francisco live there?"

Caen’s love affair with Baghdad By the Bay, his nickname for San Francisco and the title of his newspaper column, wasn’t perfect. There was always one piece or another he wanted fixed.

But not by much.

"One day if I do go to heaven," he memorably wrote, "I’ll look around and say, ‘It ain’t bad, but it ain’t San Francisco.’ "

San Francisco does that to people, even to those who should be able to resist the temptation.

"The Bay Area is so beautiful," said Billy Graham, "I hesitate to preach about heaven while I’m here."

When my wife and I went recently, it was my first visit since the 1984 Olympics. I wasn’t sure what to expect. I was afraid my memories of San Francisco had become romanticized over the years and I’d be let down.

I needn’t have worried. It hadn’t faded a bit.

"You know what it is?" asked John Steinbeck.

"San Francisco is a golden handcuff with the key thrown away."

For four days, San Francisco was our starting point in a U-shaped circuit that would take us around the Bay Area, to Santa Cruz, across to San Jose, and then back to the city.

We travelled up, down and around its seven hills — and left with the sad realization we were just getting to know it.

You don’t have to break the bank to pay for accommodation in San Francisco, which will be a surprise to anyone who has ever visited Boston or New York. San Francisco might be the most affordable big city in the U.S.

We did a fair bit of research and booked one hotel a few blocks off Union Square for about $200 a night, before stumbling on one that appeared to be too good to be true: the Beresford Arms, at Post and Jones, three blocks from Union Square.

It was just over $100 a night. That made me suspicious. But every review we read on TripAdvisor (which had it ranked 68th out of 242 hotels) was glowing.

To be sure, it’s not like one of the new chain hotels that ring Union Square. It’s an older building on the edge of the Nob Hill district that’s in the National Register of Historic Places. But it’s wellkept and friendly, offers free Wi-Fi, a continental breakfast and a wine-and-cheese reception in the afternoon.

We’d stay there again. That said, there are a number of nice hotels that offer good rates in the Union Square area, which is a good place to camp because it’s close to the cable-car turnaround and the BART (short for Bay Area Rapid Transit, the region’s extensive subway system).

We liked the look of the Hotel Nikko on Mason Street, which has a jazz club called the Rrazz Room, and the Hotel Monaco, a Kimpton Hotel on Geary Street.

It’s not difficult to eat well in this city, surrounded as it is with the bounty of land and sea, and we did eat very well.

Our first night there, we walked a couple of blocks to the Colibri Mexican Bistro on Geary Street, which had been recommended by one of my wife’s colleagues. It specializes in central Mexican food and it’s a bustling place. In retrospect, we were lucky to walk in off the street and get a table.

We made a meal of appetizers — sopes surtidos, paunches de cochinita pibil, quesadillas and fish tacos — and left trying to figure out when we could return.

The next morning, we had what was the best dim sum of our lives — albeit the most expensive — at Yang Sing in the Financial District. Starving by the time it opened at 10 a.m., since we were still on East Coast time, we stopped just about every cart that came by.

There were more than a few highlights: the Shanghai soup dumplings, stuffed crab claws, Peking duck (they serve individual portions), honey walnut shrimp, and shrimp dumplings. It turned out to be the most expensive meal we had in San Francisco: $76, before tip. But if it were in Ottawa, I’d go every week.

It especially pays to explore San Francisco’s neighbourhoods. One night we headed up Polk Street toward what our (new) Frommer’s dayby- day guide told us was an Italian restaurant at the corner of Union. Alas, the guide was wrong (as it was on more than one occasion). The Italian restaurant was long gone. Instead, we were staring at Leopold’s, a German bistro that was clearly a lot more popular than the Italian restaurant had been. Lucky for us, as it turned out.

I had wiener schnitzel with warm potatoescarole salad and lingonberry sauce; my wife had braised beef short rib with Gruyère-cheese mashed potatoes and braised red cabbage. With plenty of good German beer on tap, what more could you want?

When we were finished, we walked three blocks and caught a cable car back to our hotel.

You can do cool things like that in San Francisco.

On our last night, we went to Borobudur, which has a reputation as one of the city’s better Indonesian restaurants. It’s an unassuming place, but there’s a reason the place is usually packed. We had a beef rendang, spicy sautéed string beans and spicy java noodles with chicken, all excellent.

We had only one mildly disappointing meal and not because the food was terrible. At L’Osteria Del Forno in the North Beach area, we just felt like the staff couldn’t have cared if we were there or not.

But if you can’t — and don’t — eat well in San Francisco, it’s your own fault.

The Powell-Mason and Powell-Hyde cable car lines are the most popular, as you’ll discover when you see the queues at the Powell Street turnaround, where both lines begin. (A tip is to take the Market Street F Line streetcar to Fisherman’s Wharf and ride the cable car back. It’s easier to get on at the Wharf.) But the California line, which goes east-west from the Embarcadero BART stop on Market to Van Ness, is vastly underrated. It’s a beautiful ride.

While you’re on it, get off at Polk and California (the penultimate stop), and walk one block north to the Swan Oyster Depot (1517 Polk St.), a lunch counter of 20 or so stools that’s been in business since 1912. Get there well before noon, but even if you have to wait, it’s worth it for the chowder oysters and seafood cocktails.

And the Anchor Steam on tap.

After a multimillion-dollar renovation about 10 years ago, the Ferry Building Marketplace (at the Embarcadero and Market) is a mouthwatering collection of restaurants, gourmet food stalls and producers of meat, produce and seafood. On Tuesdays and Saturdays, there’s a farmers market. It’s an easy walk or ride on the Market Street streetcar. It’s also where you can get a ferry to Sausalito.

Make sure you stop at the Cowgirl Creamery’s Artisan Cheese Shop and Tasty Salted Pig Parts. On another afternoon, while my wife went to the Mission District to visit the Mission Dolores, San Francisco’s oldest building (officially known as the Mission of San Francisco de Assisi, built in 1791), I stayed on the streetcar to its end in the Castro District and then took a couple of buses to San Francisco’s most famous intersection, Haight-Ashbury. Just to say I was there.

It doesn’t look like much has changed. The stoners are still there, which is both funny and sad, but it looks as if some of them are using stuff that’s a lot more potent.

It’s entertaining, though.

There are a lot of funky little shops and what could be best music store in the U.S.: Amoeba Music (1855 Haight St.). At the entrance to Golden Gate Park, it’s at least as big as half a football field.

Just as good as Amoeba is Rasputin Music (downtown on Powell Street), five floors of densely packed music and video.

They’re throwbacks in an age where music stores are disappearing. Both have numerous locations in California, including a block from each other in Berkeley.

There are also more than a few interesting walks in this eminently walkable city: south on Polk Street from Union, Union between Van Ness and Mason, Telegraph Hill and Coit Tower, and North Beach.

The tourist crush is strongest in the Union Square area, but it’s also a good place to shop, with all the major stores and a number of art galleries.

On my first visit to San Francisco decades ago, I vaguely remember Fisherman’s Wharf still retaining a feel for its history, not entirely unspoiled by tourism. I might have been wrong.

Today it is one T-shirt shop after another, one crab shack after another. If Herb Caen were alive, he’d be railing about what it has become.

It’s tawdry, is what it is.

If you want a T-shirt, it’s a great place. If you’re thinking it’s a better Granville Island, you’re going to be disappointed.

As soon as our streetcar arrived there, we were looking for a way out.

I didn’t have such a violent reaction to Sausalito, the Marin County seaside community near the north end of the Golden Gate Bridge, maybe because the 25-minute ferry ride (about $20) was pleasant on such a sunshiny morning and I took a lot of good pictures.

But Sausalito, though very beautiful physically, is the same thing as Fisherman’s Wharf, albeit decidedly upscale: a couple of ice cream and T-shirt shops. We stayed an hour, as long as it took the ferry to make its round trip.

We debated giving up two days in San Francisco for a visit to Santa Cruz. If only for the sea lions barking alongside the Santa Cruz pier, it was worth it. Our hotel was right on the beach, so we spent our nights listening to sea lions barking and the waves rolling in.

Santa Cruz is a pleasant seaside community with a lot of good restaurants and a lively downtown.

We stayed for only two days and could have stayed longer. But isn’t that always the way it is? After leaving Santa Cruz and cutting across the fruit fields of Watsonville (strawberries and raspberries), the artichoke fields of Castroville (the Artichoke Capital of the World) and the garlic fields of Gilroy (the Garlic Capital of the World), we arrived at a California classic: In-N-Out Burger. These are all over California and are invariably packed.

All I know is I wouldn’t be opening a competing burger chain in California.

— Postmedia News