What to do in San Francisco with less than 24 hours

My trip to California was SO much fun. It felt like we did a crazy amount of things that we were there for like 2 weeks instead of just a few days. Northern California is so much fun! We flew into Oakland airport even though we were staying in Sacramento, but it was way cheaper to fly into Oakland, and since we had to be at the airport at like 5:30 am, the only thing that could make us feel better was spending the day in San Fransisco.

Here is my guide on what to do when you have less than 24 hours in San Fransisco.

Start out in the morning with a breakfast at Mama's.

OMG. Mama's is amazing. It was possibly the best place that we ate, on the whole trip. They make everything there in their little restaurant, including their jam. Everyone loved what they ordered, but everyone loved what Hal and I ordered the most. Hal ordered the Northern, an olemette, and I ordered the Pan Dore, a french toast with baguette and lots and lots of butter. We all loved it so much that we asked how they made it and recreated it the next morning. Delicious.

After that we walked down to the church just down the street where my father in law's sisters were married. I couldn't see most of the outside because it was under construction, but inside it was amazing. It was so beautiful. All I got was a picture of the doorway, but even that was pretty.

After the church we went to see Lombard street. I had never heard of this street before, but apparently other people had, because it was the most touristy area that we went to that day. If you don't know what it is, it's a street on a hill that is too steep to just drive down, so they had to make the road curvy. The houses along this street were super fancy!

After that we drove around looking at painted ladies..

Alamo Square was one of my favorite places! It was a beautiful big park, and on half of the park is a dog park. Yay, I love doggies, but they didn't pay attention to me, so I was bummed. Around this area of town there are so many painted lady style houses! Really, they're all over San Fran. My Father in Law brought up a good point, San Fransisco pretty much burned to the ground 100 years ago, which allowed them to rebuild the city in this way, and to have the city very victorian like this. Although they lost, I'm sure some amazing buildings, it's cool that the city has the feel that all of these houses create.

After this we went right back by Mama's, to China Town. So I would suggest to go to Alamo Square after China Town. China Town wasn't exactly what I thought it would be. I don't really know what I was expecting, but Hal won't stop making jokes about the live turtles that we saw flailing on their backs awaiting their doom. I had turtles for years, ok! It's not funny. We were in the non-touristy, market part of China Town where we didn't see a single white person. The grocery shops were cool and filled with so much fresh produce. My mother in law said we had to see the gate, the entry way into China Town. We saw a lot of China Town walking around trying to find the gate.

Suggestion: if you see a Chinese Bakery...Don't go in there. Don't do it. Chinese + Bakery = :(   (anyone see that on 30 Rock?) Oh man, they had the most disgusting "moon pie" ever, and the most disgusting sugar cookie ever. The only thing that was ok was the boba tea, but yeah...not good.

We left China Town to go shopping. We only went to a few stores in a short amount of time, but it was a very successful trip, thanks to Zara, Aldo, and H&M.

By this point we were all starving again, so my brother in law who goes into the city a lot took us to a few places in the Haight Ashbury area. We chose Ploy II, a Thai restaurant. If you didn't have someone tell you about this place you would never find it. It's just a blue door sandwiched in-between shops. It's a really cool place though. It's an old flat that they have turned into a restaurant and the people who run it are adorable. But oh man, the food was delicious!! So if you're going down Haight Street, look for this:

After this we walked down to the edge of the Golden Gate Park. Which holy cow, I had no idea that it was so big! It's huge. We drove along the outskirts of it to find the house where my father in law grew up (he grew up in San Fran, how cool is that?!) The park was just beautiful.

The Haight Ashbury area is the place to people watch. There are a crazy amount of boutiques and vintage shops and really just a crazy huge amount of people. I was pretty excited because we saw 3 of the puppies that we want while walking around!

And this was the end of our less than 24 hours in San Fransisco. It was SO much fun. We were able to see and do so much. It was fun even to just drive around the city with my mouth open staring. It was so different from our last trip there. San Fransisco is one of the most beautiful cities I've been to. Seriously, go there on your vacation!