Four themes cover most of what’s worth walking in San Francisco, and each one sticks to a single corner of the city rather than trying to cover all of it at once. History and architecture: Chinatown Enter through the Dragon Gate at Grant Avenue and Bush Street, then work toward Waverly Place, the “Street of Painted Balconies,” and the Tianhou Temple, founded in 1852. Ross Alley holds the Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Factory at 56 Ross Alley, cookies still folded by hand for a small photo fee.

San Francisco’s sights spread across hills, a park and a waterfront rather than clustering downtown, so seeing the essentials means moving through several districts, not staying in one. The Golden Gate Bridge, on foot or by bike Walking or cycling across the bridge is free in both directions, sunrise to sunset on the pedestrian side; only the southbound vehicle toll costs anything, at $10.25 with FasTrak or $10.50 pay-by-plate (goldengate.org has current toll and sidewalk hours).

The most romantic hours in San Francisco tend to be free or nearly free; the paid experiences mostly matter for how they end the evening. A slow walk along Crissy Field The Crissy Field promenade runs along the bay with sailboats passing and the Golden Gate Bridge as backdrop, easiest at golden hour before the evening fog settles in. It costs nothing and connects directly to the Presidio if you want to keep walking.

Several days in San Francisco splits naturally into the historic core, the park, the waterfront, and one trip out to Marin, in roughly that order. Days 1-2: the historic core and the Embarcadero Start at the Ferry Building Marketplace, then cross into Chinatown through the Dragon Gate at Grant and Bush, working north to Waverly Place and Ross Alley’s fortune cookie factory. North Beach, once home to the Beat poets, sits a short walk further, with City Lights Bookstore and the climb up the Filbert Steps to Coit Tower.

What works for a family in San Francisco depends less on age than on how much walking a given kid tolerates before the day falls apart, so the plan below groups activities by how much energy they take. Low-energy: the Exploratorium At Pier 15, the Exploratorium runs over 650 hands-on exhibits on light, sound, electricity and human perception, plus a separate-fee Tactile Dome that older kids crawl through in total darkness.

Not everything within driving distance of San Francisco actually fits in a day; the list below sticks to what does, without a 4am start. Muir Woods and Sausalito, 45 minutes Old-growth coastal redwoods, some over 250 feet tall and 800 years old, sit just north of the bridge. Every visitor arriving by car or shuttle needs a pre-paid, timed reservation booked at gomuirwoods.com ; none are sold at the gate, and there is no cell signal on site to book one after arriving.

Before picking what to do in San Francisco, it helps to know what has a deadline and what doesn’t; only a handful of the city’s activities actually require advance planning. The one deadline: Alcatraz Alcatraz City Cruises, sailing from Pier 33, is the only authorized way onto the island. The Day Tour runs $47.95 adult and includes the cellhouse audio tour narrated by former inmates and officers; summer and holiday dates sell out three to six weeks ahead.

The most romantic version of Los Angeles moves slower than the tourist highlights: a picnic under the stars at the Hollywood Bowl, a gondola for two on a quiet canal, a bluff over the ocean at sunset. All of it fits into an evening or a single afternoon. The Hollywood Bowl, with your own picnic The Hollywood Bowl’s 17,500-seat hillside amphitheater hosts the LA Philharmonic under Gustavo Dudamel from June through September.

Los Angeles County spans over 4,000 square miles, and the single biggest planning mistake is mixing Downtown, Hollywood and the Westside into one day. Grouping the city by region, a day at a time, is what actually works. Day 1: Downtown Start at the 1939 Union Station, walk to Grand Central Market for lunch among its 40-plus vendors, then ride the $1 Angels Flight funicular up Bunker Hill (50 cents with a TAP card).

Exposition Park holds two major family museums within a five-minute walk of each other, both free to enter, which makes it the easiest place to start a family day in LA without buying a single ticket in advance. Exposition Park’s free museums At 700 Exposition Park Dr, the California Science Center’s permanent galleries on ecology, air and space are free with no ticket required; IMAX documentaries run $9.79 for adults and $7.

Griffith Observatory and Santa Monica sit inside the city, so they are not really day trips; a genuine day trip from Los Angeles clears the metro area entirely. These four hold up to a single day without an overnight bag. Catalina Island High-speed Catalina Express catamarans reach Avalon from Downtown Long Beach and San Pedro in about 60 minutes. Round trip fare runs roughly $84 to $92 for an adult, plus a mandatory $10 wharfage tax, putting the real total near $94 to $102; children 2 to 11 run about $75.

Los Angeles is 88 separate incorporated cities spread across a basin and valley system, so the single best planning move is picking activities that sit near each other rather than chasing the whole map in one day. Here is what actually clusters well. Downtown: markets, funiculars and free museums Grand Central Market at 317 S Broadway has run since 1917 and now holds over 40 independent food vendors, open daily 8am to 9pm with food running $5 to $22.