San Francisco has a firmly entrenched place in history and popular culture, whether that be the iconic car chase in "Bullitt" or the evolution of “Silicon Valley”. There is no getting away from the fact that San Francisco is a diverse and exciting place, precariously perched on the San Andreas fault.


Undoubtedly one of the three (the other two being the Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz) most iconic features of San Francisco is the last manually operated cable car system in the world. Even today it forms an integral part of the city’s intermodal transport system.

Seeing some commuter use, it is predominantly a tourist attraction with only 3 of the original 23 routes remaining, two of which run from the centre down to the waterfront at Fisherman’s Wharf.

San Francisco is built on a number of steep hills. Those to the north of the centre towards the Bay include Russian Hill, Nob Hill and Telegraph Hill.

Today these are desirable and upmarket residential areas with large houses, many of which command stunning views of the bay.

Although not a native of the City, one of San Francisco’s more colourful residents was Jack Kerouac, arguably the father of the “Beat Movement”. His seminal autobiographical work “On The Road” describes a group of friends travelling across the US towards San Francisco.

Situated at 255 Columbus Avenue is Café Vesuvio, a coffee house frequented, back in the day, by the leading figures of the “Beat Generation” including Kerouac, Bob Dylan, Dylan Thomas and Francis Ford Coppola.

Nearby to Café Vesuvio is the copper-green ‘flatiron’ Columbus Tower (aka Sentinal Building). Much of the building is occupied by Francis Ford Coppola’s film studio “American Zeotrope” and as a possible homage to Café Vesuvio the ground floor houses Coppola’s ‘Café Zeotrope’.