
Ask HN: I'm in SF for the weekend. What places can I tour that tout their tech? - nojvek
Like tech museums, startup office tours e.t.c ?
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justizin
Go to the Exploratorium, the California Academy of Sciences, The Marine Mammal
Center, Muir Woods.

Learn about something that doesn't use GitHub. ;)

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leonardt
+1 to this, the Cal Academy of the Sciences has an awesome earthquake exhibit
right now. Really gives a humbling sense of how insane those earthquakes in
the past were.

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sfrench
If you have a car, or don't mind jumping on Caltrain for the ride down, you
can go to Mountain View to the Computer History Museum:
[http://www.computerhistory.org/](http://www.computerhistory.org/)

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eddieroger
Book lots of time for this place if you go. I was there for two hours last
time, and that wasn't enough to really see everything I wanted.

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bemmu
I was there for a day and when the museum was about to close I realized I
hadn't properly experienced the half of it and came back the next day to spend
another day there. Hands down the best museum I've ever seen.

Among the things there are original Google servers, Apollo computers, Apple I,
Lisa and a hundred more things I can barely remember that make me want to
visit it for another two days just to refresh my memory.

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datenwolf
Head down to the Fisherman's Wharf, there's an arcade with historic/ancient
(some over 100 years old) machines. Admission is free, but you're highly
encouraged to feed the machines with quarters and play with them; that's how
that place gets its money.

I was in SF for two weeks, last month and the arcade was one of the memorable
places. Also the Cable Car Museum isn't too far away. My recommendation: Visit
the CCM first (they close at 17:00) and then walk down to Fisherman's Wharf
and play in the historic arcade.

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TylerE
Trust me, you don't want to walk FROM the wharf to the CCM. The hills in SF
are no joke, especially on foot.

I checked in google maps... it's about a mile laterally and over 200ft
vertically. Much better to be going DOWN hill.

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datenwolf
> Trust me, you don't want to walk FROM the wharf to the CCM.

Hence why I suggested going to the CCM first.

> The hills in SF are no joke, especially on foot.

Speak for yourself. Yes, they are a bit annoying. But when doing my SF tour (I
had visited the historic arcade already a few days before), I first took the
cable car from Market to Fisherman's Wharf (it passes by the CCM, but I wanted
to do the full tour), then walked back up to the CCM. After being done with
that I went up Mission Street to the Fairmont, where it crosses with Muni line
1, took that until Lands End, walked that down to the pacific beach, watched
the sunset. Finally down to the west southern end of Golden Gate Park and took
the Muni back to Powell. Between the public transport rides everything on
foot. Wasn't that bad IMHO.

Most important: Bring water; lots of water (I started the tour with about 3l
in my backpack). And drink to thirst. Dehydration is no joke, but
overhydration can be a problem, too.

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qdot76367
Cable Car Museum.

Seriously. Gigantic wheels spinning huge cables (the museum is also the cable
hub) is WAY more interesting tech than you're ever going to see at a startup.

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jonthepirate
You can see the tech office tours on techcrunch videos... the bigger ones are
giant lavish offices filled with desks and laptops. Boring. Tour the city.

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MarkPNeyer
check out noisebridge on mission, somewhere between 17th and 18th.

you'll see 3d printers, laser etchers, textile arts and maybe some cool art.
they are open all the time, with some interesting characters. just buzz the
doorbell and they'll let you up.

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george6
Two little known gems:

Hiller Aviation Museum - San Carlos

Exhibit – A collection of aviation history spanning over the past 30 years by
Stanley Hiller. Collection includes 50 aircraft exhibits and numerous displays
such as:

    
    
        1869 “Avitor” Hermes Jr. (early heavy-lift airship - unmanned)
        1883, 1905, & 1911 gliders (Montgomery)
        1903 Wright Flyer Replica (first manned powered flight)
        1911 Eugene Ely’s Curtiss Pusher (the first plane to land on a ship).
        1913 Lincoln Beachey’ “Little Looper” (early aerobatic airplane).
        1945 Hiller 360 (first inherently-stable helicopter to be licensed by the FAA).
        1955 Flying Platform (first ducted fan, man-carrying, VTOL aircraft)
        1955 Grumman Albatross (flew around the world).
        1956 XROE Rotorcycle (fully collapsible helicopter)
        1970 Boeing 747-100 cockpit (fully accessible)
        1985 Czech AERO Vodochody L-39
        1986 Boeing Condor (spy plane with 201-ft. wing span)
        And many more. Visit our exhibits page.
    

Facilities – The museum’s 53,000 square foot complex consists of a main
exhibit hall, an entrance atrium, 35-seat Theater, two 50-seat conference
center, gift store/restoration shop/and kitchen facilities for catered events.

Location – The museum is located at the Northwest corner of the San Carlos
Airport, San Mateo County, and immediately adjacent to highway 101.

Visitors – More than 85,000 annually.

Operations – 18 staff members and 100+ Volunteers

 __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __
__* '

Farnsworth Lab - Corner of Sansome and Green Streets, San Francisco. Where
Green Street deadends into Telegraph Hill from the East.

No museum, yet, only a plaque. Philo Farnsworth invented many of the basics of
television here. A block south of here is one of Henry Chung's legendary Hunan
restaurants (inexpensive for geeks).

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zmanian
There are usually hackathons and meetups going on all weekend.

The Bitcoin Sunday hackday is always fun.

[http://www.meetup.com/SF-Bitcoin-
Devs/events/220632910/](http://www.meetup.com/SF-Bitcoin-
Devs/events/220632910/)

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fb42
Free Gold Watch. Play some pinball (they also do screen printing).
[http://freegoldwatch.com](http://freegoldwatch.com)

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Animats
Autodesk has a museum at One Market. It's only open to the public two
afternoons a week, plus special events.[1] Design exhibits. A driving game.
High-end 3D printers.

Innovation Hangar, at the Palace of Fine Arts, is open on weekends.[2]

[1] [http://www.autodesk.com/gallery](http://www.autodesk.com/gallery) [2]
[http://ihangar.org/](http://ihangar.org/)

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nojvek
Thank you so much guys. I think I'd really like to come down and stay here for
a while. Love the energy compared to Seattle.

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deskinner
HSC electronics in SJ aka halted dot com has a fair bit of history.

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MilnerRoute
I've often wishes that the Bay Area had "A Museum of Computer History." Steve
Wozniak's earliest Apple devices, maybe a PDP-11...

I was a little disappointed that San Jose's Technology Museum is more of a
grab-bag of biological/environmental/astronomical everything...

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davidcgl
Have you been to the Computer History Museum in Mountain View?

[http://www.computerhistory.org/](http://www.computerhistory.org/)

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navbaker
+1 for the Computer History Museum! When I went a little over a year ago, they
had a full size working replica of Babbage's computing engine.

