San Francisco is a city of icons and surprises: the Golden Gate Bridge, a food truck serving crème brulee, Alcatraz, shops filled with locally made arts and crafts, Chinatown… It’s the place to go to knock a few “must-sees” off your lifelong list and then go exploring for the unexpected, hidden gems.

With breezes coming in from the San Francisco Bay and Pacific coast, San Francisco stays cool most of the year. Summers are mild and sometimes a little chilly, but pleasant. While you may want to wait to walk the Golden Gate Bridge until the fog burns off to get the best views, you won’t find it much of a sacrifice once you start exploring the unique coffee shops, funky shops, and fun museums (like the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the California Academy of Sciences) the city has to offer.

San Francisco boasts the most restaurants per capita in the United States and many locals dine out frequently because of the quantity and high quality of the restaurants. There’s no one thing to eat in San Francisco. The key is to go with something that sounds good and perhaps something you’ve never tried before. Moroccan, Japanese, Iranian, Italian, Ethiopian…you’ll find it all here.

Many restaurants in San Francisco take care to serve locally raised meats and locally grown produce. Chefs are drawn there by the regions reputation for high quality ingredients and long growing season.

Be sure to check out Chinatown, it is the oldest Chinatown in the United States. Here, you’ll find some of the best Chinese food outside of Asia and a seemingly endless string of interesting shops. Pop into an herbalist for a lesson in Chinese medicine or visit a fortune cookie factory to watch how they are made and maybe even sample one while it’s still warm.

San Francisco has several large and diverse shopping districts plus hundreds of out of the way treasures for shoppers to discover. From high-end brands like Jimmy Choo and Chanel to handmade sweaters to tacky (but fun) souvenirs, it’s all here.

For department store and high end shopping, Union Square, Union Street, and Chestnut Street are the most popular choices. Chinatown is known for cheap souvenirs and bargains as well as excellent Asian grocery stores and some of the best food shopping in the city. For the funky, dramatic, and vintage Haight Street and Hayes Valley are good bets.

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