Guide: 24 Hours in San Francisco

TRAVEL

My stay in San Francisco started on Christmas Eve. I arrived in San Jose and my friend drove me up to San Francisco that night. Right when I got to my hostel we basically passed out. We had a whole day in San Fran on Christmas day and spend another night there just to sleep for our early morning road trip to Napa Valley. Essentially, we had an entire day to explore San Francisco. I honestly felt like two nights and a day was the perfect amount of time to do everything on our list. Also, if you only have a day here, you can follow this guide. You will probably end the day super exhausted, but it will be all worth it in the end:)

Where Did I Stay?
I stayed in USA Hostels. Which I thought was reasonable for the price. CLICK HERE for my Yelp review of the place.

Our Schedule

6:00 AM-9:30 AM: 
On Christmas day, we woke up at 6:00 AM because we wanted to go to the Golden Gate Bridge as early as possible. We wanted to avoid people. We got ready, ate breakfast at the hostel, and we were out the door by 7:30 AM. To know where the best location is to take pictures and the route we took CLICK HERE. I would allocate at least two hours to explore and walk across the Golden Gate Bridge.

9:30 AM- 10:30 AM
After spending about two hours at the Golden Gate Bridge, we called an Uber and went to Painted Ladies. If you look at the map of San Francisco, Painted Ladies is farthest south of everything else on our list of places to visit. Therefore, we thought it would make the most logical sense to go there next. We spend around an hour sitting in front of the Victorian homes and we snapped photos. CLICK HERE to see photo ideas.

10:30 AM-12:00 PM
 Afterwards, we called an Uber to go to Chinatown to get lunch. We got dim sum and pastries. There were so many places to eat in San Fran, but it was Christmas and we didn't have a lot of options and we knew we could depend on Chinese restaurants to be open. Also, we liked that Chinatown was a walking distance to Lombard Street and Fisherman's Wharf.

Good Mong Kok Bakery

1039 Stockton St.

San Francisco, CA

AA Bakery & Cafe

1068 Stockton St.

San Francisco, CA

12:00 PM- 3:00 PM
After lunch in Chinatown, we walked through the Russian Hill (which was a horribly steep walk) to get to Lombard street. From Chinatown to Lombard Street it was a 33 minute walk. This walk was worth it because it was so pretty and we captured so many nice photos along the way. Lombard Street was not that impressive and very crowded, so we didn't stay too long there. Afterwards, we walked to Fisherman's Wharf which was a 20 minute walk. The Fisherman's Wharf had a lot of cute shops, restaurants, and we saw the pier. After we explored all these areas, we took a cable car back to our hostel.

Lombard Street is the most crooked street in the world!

This pier is so dainty and adorable! Look at the nets and ropes. I literally fell in love with the color combo.

The cute cable cars is a must-do when you are in San Francisco.

3:00 PM-3:30 PM
Once we got off our stop, we walked through Union Square where we got these awesome cable car photos! The cable cars are actually running, but if you wait around they let you take photos with the cars that are stopped! You should check it out. By this time we were so exhausted that we went back to our hostel for a nap. When we woke up we ate dinner and went to sleep early to be prepared for our early morning road trip to Napa Valley. CLICK HERE to see what I did in Napa.

When we woke up early the next morning, we walked to Mr. Holmes Bakehouse. CLICK HERE to see my blog post dedicated to this place.

Mr. Holmes Bakehouse
1042 Larkin Street
San Francisco, CA

I felt like 24 hours was enough time to spend in San Fran! I did everything I wanted to do and so can you!