Bring your kid there, have them play on the state-of-the-art structures which look like they have been designed by Santa during a sabbatical at NASA**, have them network with the neighborhood kids, take a stroll in the adjoining Presidio, hit a few tennis balls on the court next door. And if you peek through the eucalyptus and cypresses which make this park a quiet grove, you'll get a glimpse of the sun shimmering on the bay. It is a place to make you love this city.

*He actually was a German immigrant (1861-1924) who became an American citizen and a Republican congressman in the Gilded Age, another period of looting of the public by robber barons.
**The park got an extensive remodel in 2003, and the neighborhood sure could afford a fund drive to make things spiffy.
Info and direction: San Francisco Recreation and Park Department at (415) 831-2782.