This is where it all began – coincidentally in 1776, the year the thirteen English colonies on the other side of the continent declared independence from their mother country. Though now a park spectacularly sited by the bay, back when, the Presidio (shown here with the Golden Gate Bridge above it) was the fort established by Spanish explorers, and after the city was won in the Mexican-American War was continued as a base by U.S. military until 1994 till it passed to the National Park Service. Its oldest extant structure, Fort Point, dates back to 1861, and there is a very good visitors’ center telling the story over the centuries. It now forms part of Golden Gate Park, whose long main section is actually a few blocks south, a positively delightful mix of greenery, gardens, wooded areas, lakes, and cultural institutions such as San Fran‘s oldest museum, the De Young, a superb collection of American art going back to the Spanish colonial period, as well as treasures from Asia, Oceania, and pre-Columbian Mexico. Other park highlights include a gorgeous Japanese Tea Garden, the San Francisco Botanical Garden, the Victorian-era Conservatory of Flowers, and the California Academy of Sciences, with its aquarium, planetarium, and natural-history museum.
Read more in my post San Francisco in an American Original.
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