“San Francisco itself
is art… every block  
is a short story,  
every hill a novel.”  
William Saroyan

One of my favorite quotes, often attributed to Mark Twain, tells us, “A person who does not read has no advantage over one who cannot read.” Although there is no solid evidence to support that Twain ever said this, the message is clear. This same line of reasoning can apply to walking. A person who does not walk has no advantage over one who cannot walk.

By the grace of God, at the age of 72, I still have the ability to walk. For this reason, I choose to walk. My goal is to average 5,000 steps per day, acknowledging that not every day is a walking day. On my walking days, I try to log between 10,000 and 20,000 steps. On the last two Mondays of May this year, I walked 40,000 steps (20 miles) each day. On Friday, May 15th, I got together with a friend to walk the second segment of the Crosstown Trail in The City — a 17,500-step trek from Glen Park BART station to Forest Hill Station. This past Thursday, June 11th, my friend and I got together again to walk the third segment of the trail — from Forest Hill Station to the corner of 16th & Judah. I ended the day with a total of 19,300 steps, yet the adventure was much more strenuous than the 40,000-step walks I took in May.

I met my friend, Mary, for breakfast at Java Beach Café on Judah Street, just across from Ocean Beach. After a bite to eat, we walked along Sunset Dunes to Taraval Street, where we boarded the “L” streetcar to Forest Hill Station. This is where the real challenge of the day began. When we disembarked the light rail vehicle, we climbed the 113 stairs from the tunnel platform to the street-level station. It was the first of several staircases we would encounter on our journey.

Following the directions provided online for the Crosstown Trail, from Forest Hill Station we walked along Magellan Avenue to the Grand Pacheco Stairway. Another staircase led us up to 9th Avenue. Our walk through Golden Gate Heights involved a few more staircases, which included one which led us to the peak of Grandview Park, appropriately named for the 360º view of The City the hilltop provides. We then began our descent, which included three more staircases. The first one zig-zagged down the hill from Grandview Park to Noriega Street, near 15th Avenue. The second was the famous 16th Avenue Tiled Steps (commonly referred to as the Moraga Steps). The last staircase was the lesser-known Hidden Garden Steps, which took us to the intersection of 16th & Kirkham. Our walk ended one block north, at the corner of 16th & Judah.

Of the 19,300 steps we walked on Thursday, about 1,000 of them were stairs — some we walked up, others we walked down. It was a physically-demanding excursion, but the views of The City from various points along the way made for a memorable outing.

At this time last year, I was averaging 5,533 steps per day. In 2026, I’m averaging only 4,309 steps per day. I have a little catching-up to do.