GET OUT NOW!
Forget about doom loops for a few hours, and take a long spin around town. Circumnavigation never felt so good.
21 hours ago
With so much of our lives co-opted by virtual spaces and online “engagement,” I’m spending more and more time on my bike.
San Francisco is a great place for it: there are long, flat, lazy rollers and beach cruises; sweaty hill climbs up to glorious vistas followed by breathless, swooping downhills; meandering dérives through the city’s many, diverse neighborhoods; and gnarly singletrack rompers in the parks and open-space preserves. This town’s got it all.
Being on a bike has been central to my emotional, mental, and physical health for my entire adult life. In my first three years in San Francisco, I rode the “Sunset Express” through Golden Gate Park to Ocean Beach every day, rain or shine, fog or blue sky, just to be there when the sun hit the horizon.
I commuted up and down Market Street from the Sunset and the Western Addition, joined Critical Mass in a carnival of community and social change that ultimately brought bike culture and rights to hundreds of cities around the world, and in my rock’n’roll decades, I never had to wait for a 2 a.m. Muni Owl bus after a late show at venues such as Bottom of the Hill, Bimbos, and the Kilowatt. With music still ringing in my head, I wound my way home through empty streets, absolutely free, feeling the temperatures change from neighborhood to neighborhood and the scent of night-blooming jasmine sweeping over me.
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In the depths of the pandemic, bike riding again became a vehicle for preserving health and sanity. I could keep those pre-diabetic A1C numbers in check, and escape to open spaces with no one else around before cabin fever got the best of me.
From the constraints of these conditions, I have strung together a set of my old commuter and pleasure-riding routes for a San Francisco circumnavigation that has reacquainted me with the wide confines of a city I’ve come to call my own.
Ride with me. Let’s go!
Choose your own park adventure
This is a big ride, so a little planning helps. Bring your pump, patch kit, a layer or two (of course), sunblock, extra water, and food. If you can, carry it all in a pannier or on a rack; fanny packs and backpacks are fine, but it’s better to roll through the breeze with nothing weighing you down.
You can start wherever you live, and just head to the nearest bike-friendly shoreline byway. Living in the Sunset, I like to start at the top of Golden Gate Park and roll down to Ocean Beach along JFK Promenade, now home to the magnificent Doggie Diner heads that make the park a veritable Easter Island of weird cultural subversion. No need to hammer the pedals as you roll over sprawling murals on the street, and past outdoor pianists tickling the ivories in front of the Conservatory of Flowers.
Past the Rose Garden, take the spur road on the left up to Stow Lake; I like to get in two laps there, just to get the blood up, and take in the sunlight on the water. From there, roll back to JFK.
Heading west, after you roll under Crossover Drive, you have three options: Mingle with the traffic on JFK past the Buffalo Paddock; peel off on the bike path on the south side of Hellman Hollow, which brings you to the Polo Field and the Bercut equestrian area; or hang a left on Transverse Drive and a quick right on Overlook Drive to roll car-free down to Middle Drive West, MLK Drive, and finally Ocean Beach.
On the weekend, the Great Highway is closed to cars, and it’s a lovely, long, family-friendly roll south past dunes and ocean vistas. During the week, take the multi-use path just east of the highway to avoid traffic.
At the south end of the Great Highway, take a left on Sloat Boulevard past the SF Zoo all the way to 20th Avenue, a steady but not steep grade with traffic that might require your self-assertion and some brisk pedaling.
At 20th Ave., go right. Before you reach Stonestown, hang a left on Ocean Avenue for one of the city’s least heralded and totally wonderful neighborhood commercial stretches. It starts once you cross 19th Avenue — it’s never a bad idea to grab a banh mi at Dinosaurs near Junipero Serra — and continues as you parallel the K Ingleside Muni all the way to City College.
Watch out for twitchy drivers, a spaghetti tangle of Muni tracks, and potholes, which is worst at Balboa Park Station.
Once you’re past that mess, and still on Ocean, you’ll cross Alemany. Take a right on the slanted start of Persia Street, cross Mission Street and head uphill. At Pacita’s Salvadoran Bakery on your right get some cookie-style pastries that are perfect for dunking, and gear up for one of the biggest ascents of this ride, as Persia turns into Mansell Street and climbs up, up, up, into and through McLaren Park.
McLaren is a gem of a park, SF’s second largest, and you could spend days roaming its different nooks, crannies, and corners.
This time, we’re just passing through. Be sure to switch over to Mansell Promenade on the left as you approach the crest of the hill, and then coast all the way past John F. Shelley Drive on the left, a playground and tennis courts, and some freakin’ spectacular views on your right as you approach University Avenue and the park’s northeastern border. Cross Mansell — there’s good signage and street engineering for this — and get up to the picnic area at the top of the sweep of serpentine grasslands overlooking Visitacion Valley, San Bruno Mountain, and the post-industrial shoreline.