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In its place, Adolph Sutro built a Victorian palace, an eight-story structure crowned with fanciful turrets and towers and occupied by galleries, lunch rooms, and shops. Famous guests included Oscar Wilde, Andrew Carnegie, and two American presidents. The new Cliff House was a truly opulent sight, yet Sutro was intent on making it a destination for working-class and wealthy families. He succeeded by offering a menu with affordable prices — a dime got you a seat on the porch and a drink — and a rail line that only cost a nickel and ended at the beach. In time, the respectable nature of the Cliff House clientele began to fade, as gamblers, grifters, and their girls slowly replaced the city’s first families as regular visitors.

Cliff House - Lands End Tour
Eventually, a horse-drawn stagecoach made the trip every Sunday from downtown San Francisco out to Lands End. Because only wealthy citizens could afford to travel all the way out to the remote resort, the Cliff House was considered a very exclusive place. For many years, the guest register bore the names of three U.S. presidents as well as prominent San Fran¬cisco families such as the Hearsts, the Stanfords and the Crockers. He had plans to re-establish the restaurant as a wholesome, family-friendly venue and for next few years, he remodeled rooms, hired new management and lured families back to the restaurant.
Camera Obscura
What will SF's Cliff House look like when it reopens in 2024? - San Francisco Chronicle
What will SF's Cliff House look like when it reopens in 2024?.
Posted: Mon, 09 Oct 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]
The growth of Golden Gate Park attracted beach travelers, in search of meals and a look at the sea lions sunning themselves on Seal Rocks just off the cliffs, to visit the area. In 1877, the toll road, now Geary Street, was purchased by the city for approximately $25,000. Today's world-famous Cliff House, part of the Sutro Historic Landscape District, is the latest in three incarnations of this destination for locals and tourists. The Cliff House is positioned in a spectacular locale for visitors to enjoy hiking along the amazing Lands End trails or Ocean Beach. Explore the famous Sutro Baths ruins or visit historic Sutro Heights Park.
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If you're in a hurry, you can get a quick look by exiting Highway 1 at Highway 68 (Forest Ave). Follow the water's edge and you'll end up at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, where Del Monte Avenue will take you back to Highway 1. Hearst Castle is a good place to visit the restroom and get something to eat, even if you don't take the tour.
The blast was heard a hundred miles away[10] and demolished the entire north wing of the tavern. The building was repaired, but was later completely destroyed by fire on Christmas night 1894 due to a defective flue.[9][11] Wilkins was unable to save the guest register, which included the signatures of three U.S. This incarnation of the Cliff House, with its various extensions, had lasted for 31 years.
Robin Williams former SF's Sea Cliff home on sale for $25 million - KTVU FOX 2 San Francisco
Robin Williams former SF's Sea Cliff home on sale for $25 million.
Posted: Fri, 27 Oct 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]
With the opening of the privately built Point Lobos toll road a year later, the Cliff House became a Sunday destination among the carriage trade. Later the builders of the toll road constructed a two-mile speedway adjacent to it where well-to-do San Franciscans raced their horses along the way. On weekends, there was little room at the Cliff House hitching racks for tethering the horses for the thousands of rigs. Soon, omnibus, railways and streetcar lines made it to near Lone Mountain where passengers transferred to stagecoach lines to the beach.
A House on the Water
If you want to get from LA to San Francisco while also seeing some of the best views in California, pack up a car and take a road trip on the Pacific Coast Highway, also known as Highway 1. The National Park Service said in a letter obtained by the San Francisco Chronicle that it was re-evaluating “the feasibility of anyone operating” the scenic waterfront space as a restaurant in the near future, given the state of the hospitality industry. Our collection of Cliff House photos shows this San Francisco, California landmark both historically and today. The vast beach stretching along the entire western edge of San Francisco. I've listed a number of other places to eat in the area since the Cliff House isn't available.
Closure of iconic Cliff House ends a remarkable era of San Francisco's history
Though the resort survived the 1906 earthquake with only $300 in damage, it burned to the ground a year later. Sutro’s daughter rebuilt a neoclassical concrete Cliff House and the National Park Service acquired this building in 1977. Perched over the Pacific above rocks populated by lounging seals, this San Francisco landmark has had many lives since it first opened in 1863.
Architects added an adjacent Sutro Wing to improve access to ocean views, allowing diners and visitors alike to continue the long tradition of enjoying the magnificent Pacific from the Cliff House high above Seal Rocks. The Cliff House had two restaurants, the casual dining Bistro Restaurant and the more formal Sutro's. There was a gift shop in the building, and the historic camera obscura is on a deck overlooking the ocean. Peanut Wagon continued to manage Cliff House operations and worked with the Park Service during the extensive site restoration that was completed in 2004. In 1883, after a few years of downturn, the Cliff House was bought by Adolph Sutro, who had made a fortune in silver by solving the problems of ventilating and draining the mines of Nevada's Comstock Lode.
Highway One runs between the town of Pacifica (on the coast south of San Francisco) to the Golden Gate Bridge, where it merges with US 101 north for several miles before splitting off to continue along the ocean. Santa Cruz is one of California's iconic beach towns, home to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, a classic oceanside amusement park. It's also one of two California cities who squabble over the title of "Surf City," with legendary Steamer Lane just off the coast and plenty of nice, sandy beaches to wiggle your toes in. Besides all the oceanside ambiance, you'll find a thriving arts community and a walkable downtown.
Turn left onto Great Highway, traveling north past Ocean Beach and the Cliff House. The road curves there and becomes Geary Blvd., which will take you straight into Union Square and the middle of San Francisco. You can find public restrooms in the parking lot just behind the Little Baja pottery shop, which is just north of Moss Landing. Staying on Hwy 1 while traveling southbound from Santa Cruz can be tricky, but is easier if you focus on the fact that you're headed toward Watsonville and Monterey. Traveling in either direction, observe the daytime headlights-on section of the road, which is quite busy and requires extra-attentive driving skills.
Sutro Lands End Partners, LLC, has reached an agreement to lease the former Cliff House from the National Park Service, which administers the land where the building is located. By the time Adolph Sutro, elected mayor of San Francisco in 1895, bought it in 1890, along with the surrounding areas, the clientele was no longer so elite. Sutro built his own steam train line to the Cliff House, and then another street car line to the Sutro Baths – the elaborate, glass-domed swimming pool – when the fare doubled on the original steam train line. The Cliff House is perched on the cliffs just north of Ocean Beach in San Francisco. Although in the decades that followed, the building was regularly refurbished, refitted, and remodeled, shuttered and reopened, bought and sold, the 1909 “shoebox” is the Cliff House of today.
Erosion was detected along more than half the state’s cliffs during the time period studied — with the fastest rates observed north of Bodega Bay and in areas with weaker rocks. Barnard, who was not affiliated with the Scripps study, explained that cliffs are particularly tricky to study. Cliff height, the strength of the rock, wave action, the slope of the beach and the slope of the seafloor could all factor into a cliff’s stability. How rainfall and groundwater seep into cracks can also build up pressure and lead to collapses. A more detailed picture has finally come into focus with this latest study, which was published in the journal Geomorphology and turned into a searchable website.
After Sutro's death in 1898, his properties were managed by his daughter Emma Sutro Merritt. A year after the destruction of the second Cliff House, Mrs. Merritt obtained approval to construct a third Cliff House. Because so many of the city's wood-frame buildings burned after the 1906 earthquake, builders began to construct San Francisco's new buildings in fireproof steel-reinforced concrete.
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