San Francisco Driving Tour: From the Gold Rush to the Golden Gate

San Francisco is known for its high tech financial center, iconic bridges, Victorian-style homes, immigrant communities and lush parks. But its stories of the visionaries and rebels behind some of its famous landmarks make a visit much more memorable.

On this driving tour, you’ll travel along San Francisco’s waterfront to both its lesser and better-known attractions before crossing the iconic Golden Gate Bridge. Professional tour guide and city insider, Brad Prickett, will be your guide. Along the way, he’ll reveal the backstories behind the city’s sites, and share interviews with historical figures to create an experience with far more depth and variety than you’d find in a stack of travel books. Drive at your own pace while listening to tales of the gold rush founders, the scandalous Samuel Brannan, innovator Levi Strauss, Alcatraz escape attempts, Fort Point soldiers, and Al Zampa of the Half Way to Hell Club.

Highlights you’ll see on this tour include:

• The San Francisco Ferry Building
• Coit Tower on Telegraph Hill
• Levi Strauss Headquarters
• Pier 39’s sea lions and shops
• Ghirardelli Square
• The city’s “crooked” Lombard Street
• Alcatraz prison from afar
• The Palace of Fine Arts
• Presidio National Park
• Fort Point military base
• The Golden Gate Bridge

The tour is designed to take roughly two hours in typical city traffic. We’ll point out plenty of spots that are worth exploring along the way, including a few places you can stop for lunch. If you visited them all, your tour could last all day! You could also pack a picnic to enjoy in one of San Francisco’s waterfront parks.

Whether you’re here for a visit or you’ve lived here all your life, this tour aims to give you a sense of the forces and events that created this city, admired world-wide for its progressive and innovative spirit.