I lived in San Francisco for many years without a car. If you are doing touristy stuff at the Wharf, you won't need a car. Take the Bart train into the City and get a hotel near one of the stations, like the Embarcadero or Montgomery (Union Square.) Then Uber or take the bus or the streetcar (everyone takes the bus in SF) to Golden Gate Park and other city sites. Rent a car downtown to drive to place like Muir Woods, Sausalito, Ocean beach, Santa Cruz down Highway 1 if you have the chance.
There is a significant homeless population, but not crime

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We stayed at the Fairmont. Perfect location to all the tourist traps you mentioned.

https://www.fairmont.com/san-francisco/

+1 We really like the Fairmont and found the location to be convenient.

The regular Fairmont or the Fairmont residence Ghirardelli square

The Fairmont in Nob Hill. It was more centrally located to where we were going and what we wanted to do.

Anonymous wrote:SF is less dangerous than DC.

The smash and grab thing happens everywhere in the BaY Area. You can not leave anything in the car. Don’t even try to hide things. Park your rental car at the hotel or if it’s at the end of your trip just return it. Take Uber around the city. If you want to go see Stanford or one f the tech campuses (not sure whether they are doing tours again) take Caltrain.

Best activities for kids - childrens discovery museum, fisherman’s wharf, Golden Gate Bridge park, SF zoo is actually really nice, De Young museum and gardens, Alcatraz, Angel Island

Best places to stay love the St Regis, great location!

So can you not leave your luggage in your car around Point Reyes , Santa Cruz, Monterey? Palo Alto? Berkeley?

It makes it hard to change locations if you can’t leave things in your car if you make stops along the way

SF is less dangerous than DC.

The smash and grab thing happens everywhere in the BaY Area. You can not leave anything in the car. Don’t even try to hide things. Park your rental car at the hotel or if it’s at the end of your trip just return it. Take Uber around the city. If you want to go see Stanford or one f the tech campuses (not sure whether they are doing tours again) take Caltrain.

Best activities for kids - childrens discovery museum, fisherman’s wharf, Golden Gate Bridge park, SF zoo is actually really nice, De Young museum and gardens, Alcatraz, Angel Island

Best places to stay love the St Regis, great location!

SF is a sh*thole now. I would stay out of the city and just drive in and out. The homeless and addicts have ruined the city.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We stayed at the Fairmont. Perfect location to all the tourist traps you mentioned.

https://www.fairmont.com/san-francisco/

+1 We really like the Fairmont and found the location to be convenient.

The regular Fairmont or the Fairmont residence Ghirardelli square

How have travel / rental cars been at SF airport? Hearing spring break horror stories elsewhere

Anonymous wrote:We stayed at the Fairmont. Perfect location to all the tourist traps you mentioned.

https://www.fairmont.com/san-francisco/

+1 We really like the Fairmont and found the location to be convenient.

Anonymous wrote:We have some lodging reserved in Yosemite in June and were going to spend a few nights in SF beforehand. Now rethinking that since it sounds like SF has gotten worse w the car break ins etc? We’ve been before just a few years Ago

I live in downtown San Francisco. I've been letting my DD go to school by herself and around the city with friends since 5th grade. No problems. Use street smarts.

Cavallo Point and drive

Anonymous wrote:I’m sorry, but my family and I were just there and we did NOT stay in SF. We rented a car w/CA tags, garaged and it STILL got broken into near the Embarcedero.

We stayed at Rosewood Sand Hlll and drove everywhere. In
SF, My teens only wanted to see Alcatraz. They joked about crime and we ended up being robbed. We drove to Santa Cruz one day, Big Sur and redwoods, Stanford and Stanford Mall, Din Tai Fung in Santa Clara, Rosicrucian Museum in San Jose, and up to Clif honey tasting near Napa (quite a drive, but fun).

Have a safe trip. It’s sad that we were so disgusted by SF, I know it wasn’t always like that.

Your car was broken into because people could look in the windows and see things to steal. That's on you. You should have taken everything out.

We have some lodging reserved in Yosemite in June and were going to spend a few nights in SF beforehand. Now rethinking that since it sounds like SF has gotten worse w the car break ins etc? We’ve been before just a few years Ago

We stayed at the Fairmont. Perfect location to all the tourist traps you mentioned.

https://www.fairmont.com/san-francisco/

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We just left San Francisco after a 4 day stay. We stayed at the Holiday Inn Fisherman’s Wharf. They valet your car, and we didn’t use it while there—just walked everywhere. Saw plenty of homeless people and drug use, but no crime. It felt perfectly safe. We have also stayed in Union Square, and I agree that’s a good location as well.

Drug use is a crime.

Right? This made me LOL

Is that because you and the PP are extremely pedantic? To spell it out for you, when people worry about crime in a city, they typically mean the sort of robberies and assaults reported by some PPs that could harm or severely inconvenience a traveler or their family. Some drug use is a crime and some is not, but you should certainly expect to see drug use of the legal sort (weed is everywhere) and possibly illegal (some junkies use in public) if you visit tourist areas in SF, and you will absolutely see homeless people, including some passed out on sidewalks. Neither we nor any of our friends who have visited recently have seen any violent crime, and it is not prevalent in the daytime in most tourist areas.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We just left San Francisco after a 4 day stay. We stayed at the Holiday Inn Fisherman’s Wharf. They valet your car, and we didn’t use it while there—just walked everywhere. Saw plenty of homeless people and drug use, but no crime. It felt perfectly safe. We have also stayed in Union Square, and I agree that’s a good location as well.

Drug use is a crime.

Right? This made me LOL