Hi I will be traveling to the bay area from the UK in Febuary 11. Can anyone suggest locations apart from the obvious ones
Tony
Hi I will be traveling to the bay area from the UK in Febuary 11. Can anyone suggest locations apart from the obvious ones
Tony
Not sure what you consider obvious, but my favorites include:
Golden Gate Park, Japanese Garden, Strybling Arboretum
Land's End, Sutro Bath ruins
Fort Point, China Beach, Palace of the Legion of Honor
Marin Headlands, various fortifications (especially Battery 129 complex), Battery Spencer
Muir Woods
The Ferry Building
Cantor Gallery at Stanford University
Hakone Gardens, Filoli
Alviso Marina
if you're driving while you're there, I'd recommend taking a trip down the coast as far as you can manage. For an easy day trip, head down highway 1 to Half Moon Bay, and take your time to stop wherever you see something interesting. Continue on down to San Gregorio State Beach, and then take Route 84 back up over the mountain to Woodside. Head on in to Palo Alto, visit the Stanford University campus, wander around the downtown and have a great dinner at Il Fornaio. If you have time and are so inclined, stop by Keeble & Schuchat and get your fill of camera gear.
Throughout the peninsula there are a series of parks called "open space preserves". They're a series of parks which encompass a wide range of terrains from redwood forest to grassland. They're quite low on the radar screens of most people, so there's a good chance you'll be the only person in the park while you're there.
For a longer trek taking the entire day, you can drive down to Carmel and visit Point Lobos State Nature Reserve. Although it's a bit of a cliche for photographers to visit Point Lobos (it was Edward Weston's stomping ground), it is ABSOLUTELY worth it.
Also, in San Francisco, stop by the Gallery building at 49 Geary. There are some amazing galleries in the building (5 floors of art galleries).
February can also be a nice time to visit Point Reyes Nat'l Seashore and Tomales Bay. The food at the Station House in the town of Point Reyes Station is excellent. Also, LF photographer Marty Knapp has a nice gallery there in town.
--P
Preston-Columbia CA
"If you want nice fresh oats, you have to pay a fair price. If you can be satisfied with oats that have already been through the horse; that comes a little cheaper."
If you're going to spend a day in SF, park the car and get a clipper card and use public transportation to bum around. If you have an iPhone there's apps to help navigate.
If it's a sunny weekend day: Market St. & Powell (SF on top Powell St. BART station) and see the "street" scene, the street performers and such.
Mission district: colorful Latino region - it's warmer there than the rest of the city. Go to Mission and 24th (24th St. BART station) and walk east on 24th. Eat Mexican food.
For a cliche shot of SF go to Alamo Square around sunset, look east and find the Painted Ladies (famous Victorian houses) and get a picture of them with city skyline in the background.
...Mike
Not your typical bay area fare:
Mare Island Naval Shipyard. If you like old industrial stuff this is pretty cool---granite dry dock, old cemetary, 50's air raid shelters overgrown with shrubbery.
Night photography along the waterfront (be careful of baddies. Take a BIG friend along)
The Delta.
The huge cemetary town (Colfax? Colma? My memory fades!) The population of this necropolis outnumber the living by like a million to one(or something like that)
If you're a hunter try tracking down and photographing any remaining little nieghborhood arab markets---they used to be plentiful (but now you've got to hunt for 'em)
I've always wanted to explore the municipal staircases with a 4x5. There is a good one going down (or up if you're in better shape than I) Telegraph Hill---you can see it from the base of Coit Tower---it feels rather like being a voyeur, descending through people's back yards.
The statuary in Golden Gate Park. Yeah GG Park is "typical SF" but no one seems to pay attention the statues.
"I would feel more optimistic about a bright future for man if he spent less time proving that he can outwit Nature and more time tasting her sweetness and respecting her seniority"---EB White
The cemetary town is Colma. It is just south of San Francisco. If you are going to eat Italian in Palo Alto I recommend Osteria.
The problem with Feb. is it could be warm and sunny or cold and rainy. Not sure what you are interested in but there are some great redwood forests south of San Francisco. The open spaces were mentioned earlier. The Mid Peninsula Open Space District (http://www.openspace.org/) manages huge variety of areas along the Peninsula.
The biggest problem with the Bay Area is the incredible number of places to go, no matter what you are interested in shooting.
What are you interested in shooting? Are you going to be in San Francisco or an outlying area? Will you have a car? Are you willing to travel? Let us know and between all of us we can narrow it down to a couple of dozen places
And now for something entirely different, the Brisbane Bayshore Roundhouse Ruin.
Check it out on the internet. 100 year old railroad technology. Actually you can see it pretty well on Google maps. The round thing between the modern railroad tracks and bayshore BLVD. Google it. KFry
Hi all thanks for all the replies. I'm only in SF for 1 week so i've got a limited amount of time. I shoot landscapes, buildings I don't do people in LF. The MOMA building looks interesting also the Japanese Tea Garden and Muir Woods
Tony
I would second both Muir Woods (ridiculously close to San Francisco for a totally different world), and Point Lobos (if you're up for a few hours drive, it's wonderful). Nearby Garrapata (I can never spell that right) Beach is also great, and just down the road from Point Lobos.
I'm personally biased, and will tell anyone to take a trip out to Yosemite whenever possible (hence the concise message in my signature below). It's about 4 hours from San Francisco, so probably best to do overnight if you were to go at all. Obviously more time is better, but even an overnight trip would be worth it, in my opinion. If you've come this far, you're almost all the way there anyway. That's my best advice, if you can spare the time.
Back in San Francisco, one of my favorite places to shoot the Golden Gate Bridge (cliche or not, I loved shooting the bridge) is from the southwest, along Marshall's Beach. I found it to be a great sunset location.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks