Alamo Square

Alamo Square is a pleasant little neighborhood park, which has become a popular tourist attraction. This is mainly due to the postcard row of painted Ladies Victorian homes. The pictures of these colorful stretches of homes popularly known as Painted Ladies are used widely, so chances are even if you have not traveled to San Francisco, you have seen the picture. Stately Victorian and Edwardian home like this can be seen all over the city, but tourists somehow always come down to see the ones at Alamo Square. The park is a wonderful place to rest and enjoy the beautiful views that can be found here.

Things to do in Alamo Square

Tourist buses mostly stopover at Alamo Square, where they like to take a walk around the area and view the magnificent sights. There is an open grass area, where most people head over to that area, there one can see couples cuddling up and having a good time. This place also happens to provide the best view of the splendid homes. Generally, tourists spend about 15-20 minutes taking shots of the houses. While a few of them do not bother to go to the other parts, some of them explore the other parts of the park as well. There one can see the shoe garden, children’s playground and a tennis court among other things.

Alamo Square Shoe garden

The shoe garden is another attraction here; though it is not as popular as the painted ladies, many people still go to garden, while they are visiting Alamo Square. The shoe garden was made in the garden by the park’s gardener in the early 2000’s. According to the gardener, he hated the thought of throwing away the shoes he found discarded by the homeless. Initially, he placed the shoes around the flower beds to keep the dogs at bay; but later on he started planting the plants inside the shoes. Some of the shoes have been nailed down to the woods, so that they have a longer life, while in some of them the plants are planted.

There are lots of debates whether this shoe park is a folk art, public art or an environmental sculpture. While people still continue with the debates, tourists are hardly worried about this outcome, till they get to see the garden in all its beauty. Due to this shoe garden, Alamo Square is now becoming more popular and this is not just due to the painted ladies houses in San Francisco.