Neighborhoods: Pacific Heights

This privileged, elegant neighborhood embodies Hollywood's vision of San Francisco, and its blocks of Victorian mansions and its Cinemascope views of the Bay and the Golden Gate Bridge make the area a perennial favorite with visitors to the city. San Francisco locals tend to be a bit more cynical about the exclusive air of Pacific Heights, but that doesn't mean you won't catch residents of other neighborhoods making a special trip for the eclectic, upscale shopping opportunities that Fillmore Street offers.

The neighborhood is loosely bordered by Van Ness and Presidio avenues and Pine and Vallejo streets and was first colonized by the nouveau riche of the late 1800s when the construction of a new cable-car line made the area accessible. The extravagant dwellings that characterize the district today stand as testimony to the desire of those early residents to impress their Nob Hill neighbors.

That legacy of luxury has persisted, and the neighborhood remains generally quiet and residential, with the majority of its activity clustered around Fillmore Street. For the most part, the activity of choice is shopping, with an emphasis on costly women's clothing and high-stakes luxury items. The strip is also peppered with nice gift boutiques, bath-and-body shops and consignment stores. But if you don't feel like spending money, it can be fun to settle in at a sidewalk café and watch everyone else parade by. The area draws a variety of American and international tourists and is always well populated by impossibly groomed and outfitted locals who seem capable of strolling through a windstorm without having a hair get out of place.