Stairways are Heaven
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Viz Valley Greenways up to the Park

5/13/2011

2 Comments

 
Picture
195 Steps from the end of Campbell in Visitacion Valley to Visitacion Ave. in McLaren Park
The Greenways are six miniparks in the Visitacion Valley neighborhood that stairstep up the hill.

Usually take the T-Third Metro to the Sunnydale (last) stop and walk up to Leland and Peabody to the first of them: the Hans Schiller Plaza Greenway.

Walking directly north through this first one and crossing the street takes you to Greenway 2, the Community Garden Greenway. The garden itself is usually locked, but you can still walk through the park and look through the fence bars at the garden alongside.

The third is the Herb Garden Greenway, my second favorite. There are picnic tables, a short stairway, and a tiered herb garden.

The fourth is the Children’s Play Garden with a playground at the foot.

The fifth is also rarely open to visitors, and with this one, the Agriculture Lot Greenway, corner of Rutland and Campbell, you’ll be looking into the garden from the sidewalk on the other side of the fence.

Uphill from this on Tucker is my favorite, the sixth, the Native Plant Garden Greenway, with its winding paved pathways, benches, and view of San Bruno Mountain.

From the top of this last Greenway, needed to go back downhill a little way in order to access the long stairway from the west dead-end of Campbell up into McLaren Park. Turned left at Delta at the “mural house” to descend the steep paved walkers’ pathway here (several steps at the foot).

To walk this stairway -- 195 steps from Campbell up to Visitacion Ave. in the park -- look for the opening for a person to pass through at the end of Campbell. The stairway’s foot is set back from the street a few yards.

At the top of the steps is Visitacion Ave. See above. From here it was a short but steep trek up to Mansell with the lookout area and picnic tables, and the rest of the park down the other side.

John McLaren Park, over 300 acres, is part of San Bruno Mountain with Visitacion Valley between. The south slope is already really dry and it can get superwindy in this openspace grassland, my favorite part of the park.

Mansell is a divided E-W street, the upper part east and the lower part west. This street runs all the way through the park so you have a pleasant green view from both sides.

At University and Mansell, at the top of the Portola neighborhood and at the east edge of the park, is one of the stops for the crosstown #29. The bus comes out at the west end of the park at Persia and Dublin in the upper Excelsior neighborhood and heads downhill to Mission St. 

2 Comments
sw
8/15/2016 12:17:09 pm

Wow.. I have lived in the cut my whole life and this is one of the best real tours of the magic stairs I have seen... Keep doing it its wonderful... The stairs are ine of the truely wonderful ways to get around the city... I always wantedd to to a treasure hunt on the stairs

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Tony Holiday
8/15/2016 12:54:59 pm

THANK YOU* !!

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    I like meandering around on San Francisco's park trails and public stairways, sometimes taking photos, and enjoying nature and the outdoors.

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