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A chic environment in which to enjoy some of the city’s best cuisine and wines. California-French in inspiration.

A Victorian playhouse has been restored in lavish high-tech coolness, incorporating a captivating blend of Art Nouveau and Dali-esque Modernism. And where else can you see trapeze acts on a Saturday night or puff cigars in a private billiards room? If you want to fit in, wear designer gear.

Now that Crissy Field’s restoration is complete, the Golden Gate Promenade (see Alioto’s) is an inspiring run. And, of course, Golden Gate Park offers endless opportunities for jogging. If organized running is your thing, try the Bay to Breakers or the San Francisco Marathon.

One of the best drives in town, with great views of Fisherman’s Wharf.

Another of San Francisco’s precipitous heights, one side of which is so steep you’ll find no street at all, only steps. The most famous feature of this hill is the charming Lombard Street switchback – “The World’s Crookedest Street,” – which attests to the hill’s notoriously unmanageable inclines. As with Nob Hill, with the cable car’s advent, Russian Hill was claimed by the wealthy, and it maintains a lofty position in San Francisco society to this day. It supposedly took its name from the burial place of Russian fur traders, who were among the first Europeans to ply their trade at this port in the early 1800s.

A delightful shop specializing in all that is colorful and whimsical from Old Russia. You’ll find the famous nested dolls in a variety of styles.

Women’s basketball team.

Take the bus up and hear the engine churning on its painfully slow ascent.

Neo-Gothic in conception, with an Italianesque façade, this church is also called the Italian Cathedral and the Fisherman’s Church, since many Italians who originally lived in the neighborhood made their living by fishing.