San Francisco

San Francisco packs enormous variety onto a compact, hilly peninsula. The Golden Gate Bridge is the icon, often draped in dramatic fog, while historic cable cars still clank up impossibly steep streets and the former island prison of Alcatraz sits out in the bay. Bohemian, beautiful, and endlessly walkable, the city rewards curiosity around every corner.

The pleasure is in the neighborhoods, each a world of its own. The Mission brings murals, taquerías, and sunshine, Chinatown and North Beach sit side by side with dim sum and Italian espresso, and the Haight still trades on its 1960s counterculture roots. Add a world-class food scene and the tech energy of a city that keeps reinventing itself, and there is far more than a first visit can hold.

San Francisco's weather defies expectations, with cool temperatures year-round and that famous summer fog rolling in off the Pacific. The warmest, clearest months tend to be September and October, and layers are essential whatever the season.