As some of you will already know from reading my Alcatraz review (shameless plug), my new hubby and I started off our honeymoon in San Francisco. Planning our trip was lots of fun and we knew that we would have to book in advance if we wanted to visit Alcatraz because in the summer months it can be booked up for a whole week before.
Looking online at a couple of sites meant we found www.sightseeingworld.com. This company not only offered tickets for Alcatraz, but package deals which meant that we would also be able to take hop on/hop off tours of San Francisco and a special one to the Golden Gate Bridge.
***What Do They Offer***
Well, obviously we zoned in on San Francisco but there are a number of cities you can choose from and this company works on a worldwide scale. So whether it's the castle in Edinburgh or whale watching and snorkelling in Maui, there really is something for everyone.
The offer we decided on was the Double Decker & Alcatraz combo tour for $61 each. This means that you can book your seats on the ferry and select a preferred time for Alcatraz, go on one of the tour loops to the Golden Gate Bridge and Presidio, which also stops at the Museum of Fine Arts, and have 48 hour passes for the hop on/hop off City Tour, which starts at Fisherman's Wharf and loops all the way to Union Square and round to Pier 33 via Chinatown.
As we were only spending two nights in San Francisco we thought this would be an excellent way to see as much as possible without having to think about trams or buses etc.
***Ordering The Tickets***
We found this very easy to do. It's all paid in Dollars so first of all I would suggest checking your credit card company out to see if they charge commission on overseas purchases. We have one with the Post Office that we got specifically for our trip, as they do not have any charges for purchasing abroad. This turned out to be a massive help for us, as we paid for nearly everything in this way whilst in the States.
When you go to the booking form you are asked all the usual questions, such as name and address, hotel you are going to be staying in and how many tickets you want on a specific date.
You are then asked for your billing details on this secure site and following those being given you can instantly print out your vouchers for your tickets. The tickets for Alcatraz arrive in your online mailbox separately and can take a couple of days to come through although you do get sent a confirmation email telling you these details.
The whole process was very simple and I felt very happy dealing with this company.
***The Tours***
It tells you on your e-tickets for the bus tours that you have to take them to the office at Jefferson Street, which is in the Fisherman's Wharf district, just round the corner from where the tours commences on Leavenworth. The office opens at 9am and you hand over your details to receive maps of the tour areas and your boarding passes. Separate tickets are not needed for the Alcatraz section of the tour, as the actual tickets needed are the ones you print out at home.
The staff in the office were really chatty and helpful, giving us all the information about the times of the Golden Gate Tours, which run 3 times a day and informing us that the Downtown Loop runs every half hour from 9am - 6pm.
***The Golden Gate Tour***
As our trip to Alcatraz wasn't until the afternoon, we decided to take the Golden Gate Tour first. It was lovely and sunny in the centre of Fisherman's Wharf but we knew it could turn chilly near the bridge as smog is a big problem when it comes to that area, so we took light jackets just in case. We were also hoping to get up top on the open-top bus so we thought they would be a good idea and to be honest I'm glad we did, as it did get a little bit cold in some areas.
When we arrived at the bus stop, we were amazed to find that the bus had an advertisement on the back for Jimmy Chung's Chinese Buffet. For anyone who hasn't heard of this chain, they are situated in a few towns in Scotland and we have one in Dundee, which is very close to where we live. We were pretty stunned and then noticed on the side of the bus that it was in fact a City Sightseeing Bus from Stirling. Well of course I had to ask the driver for details and he said that the owner of the company had them shipped over especially from Scotland, as they were great buses. Imagine that - we felt so at home.
We climbed up to the top of the bus and waited patiently for the tour to begin. I'm not going to go into too many details of what we were told along the way because I feel it might spoil it for any of you who end up over there and on one of these buses but I will say that we learned all about how the rich people ordered a lot of their houses by mail order and that the amount of fancy attachments on the house showed how much money they had to spend. They are classed as mansions but we felt they looked more like normal Victorian style houses all lined up together. We also saw the ship that was used on the set of Mutiny on The Bounty. The tour guide was amusing along the way and told us many stories of the history of the Cow Hollow area on the way to the Palace of Fine Arts where a fifteen-minute stop was planned.
The Palace of Fine Arts is a beautiful set of buildings that were originally on land owned by the Presidio Army Base. Built in 1915, it has stood the test of time well with its amazing Roman rotunda and spectacular views across the fountain filled lake. It also has a museum nearby but unfortunately time did not let us have a look in there.
Off we went again into the Presidio area and headed out for the Bridge, which was not named for the colour of it, but because of the area it stands in. It was the largest suspension bridge in the world when it was finished in 1937 and the two towers really are impressive to go under, even if from a distance the tips were immersed in fog.
We were able to stop for another 15 minutes at the vista point across the bridge to take pictures and just to be truly amazed by the size of this beautiful piece of structural engineering.
The guide was brilliant at giving us lots of information on the workers that helped build the bridge, telling us of the casualties and difficulties along the way.
The rest of the tour took us round the other side of Presidio and the Pacific Heights region where lots of interesting facts were given to us and special buildings and points of interest were shown to us. The tour was very good and the guide had the right mix of information and humour to keep us listening all the time.
***The Downtown Loop***
Unfortunately after visiting Alcatraz we didn't have time to do the whole of the downtown loop tour and as we were leaving in the morning we couldn't take advantage of the 48-hour pass. This was a shame, as we didn't get to view the Chinatown area as much as we had hoped although we did get to see it from the tram we had taken in the morning from Union Square to Fisherman's Wharf. There are many stops on the tour but we chose to stay on and listen to the same tour guide from earlier.
The bus starts again at Leavenworth and makes it way round past Fisherman's Wharf and the Barbary Coast areas before moving on to the Embarcadero Shopping area of the city. It then takes you round by City Hall and the Civic Centre before stopping at Union Square where you can find stores such as Macy's, Saks and the Westin St Francis Hotel, where we were staying.
The areas we missed out on were the Financial District and Chinatown, North Beach and Lombard Street, which is also known as San Francisco's Crookedest Street as it winds its way down the hill. We had already caught a glimpse of this street whilst on the tram earlier in the day. The tour ends up at Fisherman's Wharf where there are lots of delights from shopping at Pier 39 to catching the ferry across to Alcatraz at Pier 33.
***My Thoughts***
Value for money was something I felt we really got with this package. The site was easy to book from, reliable in their information and the staff on the tours were really helpful.
Despite not being able to take the full downtown loop, we didn't feel as though we missed out on much and we were on the go from 9am right through til about 5.30pm, which was enough for us, as we had only arrived in San Francisco the night before and we knew jetlag was catching up with us. I am a bit sad that we had to leave the next morning before getting a chance to explore a little bit more but it gave us a good look around and if we are lucky enough to visit in the future, then we will know which areas to explore a bit further.
Tours like this are great if you haven't been to a city before and you know practically nothing about it. The company seems to be very well organised and I would certainly consider using them again in the future for other tours that they offer.
I've concentrated on the bus tours for this review as I didn't want to repeat the information from the Alcatraz one but it was all included in the price too.
