San Francisco

While San Franciso's economy is linked to it being a world-class tourist attraction, its economy is diversified. The largest employment sectors are professional services, government, finance, trade, and tourism. Its frequent portrayal in music, films, literature and popular culture has helped make the city and its landmarks known throughout the world. San Francisco has developed a large tourist infrastructure with numerous hotels, restaurants, and top-notch convention facilities.

While it's been a long time since people considered Montgomery Street in the Financial District to be the "Wall Street of the West", San Francisco remains one of the principal banking and finance centers of the west coast of the United States. Many major financial institutions and banks are based in the city or have set up regional headquarters here.

San Francisco's proximity to Silicon Valley has made the city increasingly attractive for high-tech companies. In recent years, San Francisco has also been making itself a center of biotechnology.

The University of California, San Francisco is one of the city's largest employers and is dedicated solely to the education of health and the biomedical sciences. Also in the University of California system is the Hastings College of the Law, a major law school located in downtown San Francisco. The San Francisco State University is another major public university that offers a broader range of studies than the UC colleges in the city. Rounding off the city's public colleges is the City College of San Francisco, a two-year community college.

San Francisco also has numerous private colleges and universities, some of them large, such as the University of San Francisco located in the Richmond district, and some of them smaller and much more specalized.

sports

San Francisco has several professional sports teams, although the spread-out nature of the Bay Area means there are also teams nearby in San Jose and Oakland.

The San Francisco Giants are the city's Major League Baseball team, playing their home games at the lovely AT&T Park in SoMa. The other major league team in San Francisco is the San Francisco 49ers, the city's National Football League team, who play their games at Candlestick Park on Candlestick Point in Southeast San Francisco. Both teams command huge fan bases.

As far as college sports go in San Francisco, there are the University of San Francisco Dons, who play various college sports including baseball, basketball, soccer and volleyball at their campus in Western Addition. The San Francisco State University Gators play various college sports including baseball, basketball and soccer at their campus near Lake Merced.

harbor tours

One of the best ways to see San Francisco is from the waters of San Francisco Bay. There are many companies offering harbor tours of varying durations and prices but they all provide marvelous views of the bay, the bridges, the island of Alcatraz and the city.

Only specific island tours are allowed to land at Alcatraz, but the typical harbor tour will circle the island at a slow crawl, giving you plenty of opportunity to photograph the now-inactive prison from the water.

Also consider taking a ferry from San Francisco across the bay to Tiburon, Sausalito, or Alameda. Same views for a fraction of the price.

Most tours leave from docks at Fisherman's Wharf near Pier 39. Tickets can be purchased at kiosks along the waterfront walk. Buy tickets a day or two in advance during the summer high season.

Boats usually leave roughly hourly starting around 10AM and ending around 5PM. Multi-lingual guides are available on some tours. Prices range from $20-$40, more for sunset, dinner, or whale watching tours.

Even on a sunny day the bay can be chilly, so be sure to bring a sweater as well as sun screen.

Some boats have snack bars on board, but bring your own water and treats to avoid paying high costs or going without. There are now limited refreshments and a souvenirs shop on Alcatraz.

local music

San Francisco is a hotbed for underground music; a highly diverse array of musical styles is represented e.g., rock, pop, experimental, weird folk, and avant-jazz. Shows occur every night, with as many as fifteen small shows occurring each Thursday through Saturday night. Much of this activity is not always well covered in the mainstream media; useful community-driven resources for finding about local shows include Dar Dar Dar (http://dardardar.org/) and the Transbay Calendar (http://transbaycalendar.org).

Half-Price Ticket Booth

San Francisco has a Half-Price Ticket Booth located right in the middle of Union Square, where tickets for most San Francisco theater performances can be purchased the day of the performance for half-price. Run by Theatre Bay Area (http://www.theatrebayarea.org/), all service fees collected from the sale of tickets by TIX Bay Area (http://www.theatrebayarea...) goes right back into the theater community.

Go to a concert, a play, a jazz or a folk-song performance

There are performances most days to choose from by the san francisco opera (http://sfopera.com/), the san francisco symphony (http://www.sfsymphony.org), in herbst theater where the u.n. charter was signed (http://sfwmpac.org/herbst...), in the old first church (http://www.oldfirstconcer...), and for musicals in the orpheum or the golden gate theaters (http://www.bestofbroadway...), all located in or near the civic center. the museum of the legion of honor (http://www.thinker.org), located in lincoln park overlooking the golden gate north end of 34th ave, has organ concerts which can be heard in many of its galleries, saturdays and sundays at 4pm, as well as music performances in its florence gould theater by the san francisco lyric opera (http://www.sflyricopera.org). for the fall and spring jazz festivals look into the sfjazz calendar (http://www.sfjazz.com). san francisco also has many jazz clubs, best found by browsing the web an excellent site is sfstation.com (http://www.sfstation.com). contemporary bands are featured at the fillmore auditorium (http://www.thefillmore.com) and less frequently at the large bill graham civic auditorium in the civic center. there is an annual blues festival in late september, at various locations (http://www.sfblues.com), and at least two great bluegrass music festivals each year — during february (http://www.sfbluegrass.org/) around the area and late september or october (http://www.strictlybluegr...) in golden gate park. many, but certainly not all, events are listed by the city box office (http://www.cityboxoffice.com).

Ballet

Of the world class variety can be seen for only $10. san francisco ballet (http://www.sfballet.org/) sells standing room tickets with excellent views from the back of the orchestra for their shows at the war memorial opera house in civic center during the afternoon of each performance as well as two hours before showtime.

Plays

Are performed at the geary by the american conservatory theater (http://www.act-sfbay.org), curran, and the marines memorial theatres (http://www.marineclub.com...), and at the small new conservatory theater (http://www.nctcsf.org) near the civic center.