Historical Tours
2 hours
Recommended by 99% of travellers
99% of reviewers gave this product a bubble rating of 4 or higher.
from
C$44
per adult
Cruisin' the Castro Walking Tours
Cruisin' the Castro Walking Tours
Cruisin' the Castro Walking Tours
5
City ToursCultural ToursHistorical & Heritage ToursWalking Tours
8:00 AM - 5:00 PM
Monday
8:00 AM - 5:00 PM
Tuesday
8:00 AM - 5:00 PM
Wednesday
8:00 AM - 5:00 PM
Thursday
8:00 AM - 5:00 PM
Friday
8:00 AM - 5:00 PM
Saturday
8:00 AM - 5:00 PM
Full view
About
Cruisin' the Castro Walking Tours was proudly awarded as San Francsico's 1ST LEGACY BUSINESS Tour Company, celebrating "30" years of walking with Pride! Recognized as a valuable cultural asset to the City of San Francisco by offering the most comprehensive LGBTQ tour in the world! Explore twice as many historical sites than any other tour experience with a professional tour guide, local resident and an LGBTQ civil rights activist. Discover how San Francisco's Gold Rush, WWII, civil rights activist, Harvey Milk, the AIDS Epidemic, Rainbow Honor Walk and much more have shaped the historical values of a diverse culture. Learn how the present day struggles for equality continues to plague America's laws and social justice. Cruisin' the Castro Walking Tours offers a fun and fascinating 2-hour stroll thru an amazing community where everyone is welcomed.
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Most Recent: Reviews ordered by most recent publish date in descending order.
Detailed Reviews: Reviews ordered by recency and descriptiveness of user-identified themes such as waiting time, length of visit, general tips, and location information.
Popular mentions
5.0
614 reviews
Excellent
582
Very good
28
Average
1
Poor
1
Terrible
2
Daniel H
7 contributions
Oct 2022 • Friends
Amazing, informative, funny, serious, a great time. Mind blown by how kind and open and friendly Kathy was. She stopped many times to talk to her local friends - ABC reporters, Nancy Pelosi staffers, museum volunteers. Truly out of this world.
In the words of the great Gwyneth Paltrow: "I laughed, I cried, a number of times. I sweat, I danced."
In the words of the great Gwyneth Paltrow: "I laughed, I cried, a number of times. I sweat, I danced."
Written October 30, 2022
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Reb
3 contributions
Apr 2023 • Solo
I was visiting SF from Australia and I thought I knew a decent amount about queer history but I learned so much more! Cathy is a wealth of knowledge and had so many stories to share. It was a moving, reflective, connecting tour but still with lots of humour and fun. I went on another tour in SF later that week and the tour guide spoke to me about how Cathy’s work inspired him to start doing his own tours! A must-see for queer people travelling through USA but I think anyone could benefit from learning on this tour. The Castro area is a great place to be and after the tour I stayed for a few hours exploring and eating 10/10!
Written April 18, 2023
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Katie M
1 contribution
Oct 2022 • Couples
My partner and I LOVED this tour. Kathy was friendly and knowledgeable and we learned a lot that we didn’t know about San Fransisco and it’s Queer history. I HIGHLY recommend this tour for anyone visiting San Fransisco!
Written November 8, 2022
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Claphamturk
Wymondham, UK103 contributions
Wonderful (easy) walking tour of the Castro district with local guide Kathy. Very interesting talk about the LGBTQ community and locations where Harvey Milk lived and worked. His story is both tragic and inspiring. Also loved the bronze memorial plaques set in the pavement (sidewalk) of famous LGBTQ pioneers. Sobering to hear the fight for equal rights for all still persists. Highly recommend
Written March 22, 2022
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
ReviewTourTravel
1 contribution
Jul 2019 • Friends
What do the letters making up LGBTQ stand for? What do the different flags or symbols you might see at Pride mean? Who was Harvey Milk? What was the AIDS epidemic and how did folks resist? If you don’t know the answer to these questions, then the Cruisin’ the Castro tour is for you. It is a basic intro to white Gay and Lesbian culture in San Francisco in the 1970’s, 1980’s, and 1990’s.
But if you are even passingly familiar with the Queer community and Queer history, you won’t learn anything new, and might even walk away confused and angry, as I did. Though Kathy does a good job pointing out the oft-forgotten role of Lesbians, for the most part she provides a very high-level gloss of historical information, often simply repeating information available on the plaques in the public squares. More problematically, she also often throws in factual inaccuracies and misleading statements, such as that there are no gay people in Italy because of Mussolini’s campaigns during WWII or that pansexual people “look straight.”
More disturbing than the poor quality of the tour however—you take a risk on that as a tourist--was that she went out of her way to summon the police to give a citation to a group of four homeless individuals sitting on the sidewalk along the tour route—at least one of whom presented as visibly Queer. When I asked her about this, she explained that she was afraid because she had previously been attacked by a homeless individual who was on drugs. While I certainly understand the fear of violence and her desire to protect herself and I, too, want to be able to walk down the street without fear, the individuals she reported were not attacking anyone--they were simply sitting on the sidewalk chatting. She explained that what they were doing was “illegal” and that she wanted to “help them” with their presumed drug abuse and mental health problems. This is particularly ironic, however, given that she started the tour explaining how same-sex liaisons were originally considered illegal and that LGBTQ folks were--and sometimes still are--considered to be mentally ill and in need of help. She rightly rejected those attitudes as discriminatory and against human rights but then did not further this logic to individuals whose only “crime” was not being housed.
Unfortunately, tourism does not benefit the host communities equally and tends to actually harm the poorest individuals. While I might have assumed that a GLBTQ tour would actively try to fight against such dynamics given that queer folks are highly overrepresented in the homeless population, SF tourist industry operators like Kathy have a vested interest in keeping tourists happy by keeping homeless folks out of public view--and indeed Kathy cited the tour’s presence as an additional reason she called the cops over.
I wish that someone had told me before I spent $28 on a poorly run tour that participated in the curtailment of homeless folks’ civil rights and the criminalization of poverty that I could have instead 1) looked up the terms in the first paragraph of this review to read about almost everything that Cruisin’ the Castro presented, 2) seen the exact same sights for free by simply walking around the neighborhood, 3) spent $5 to get into the GLBT Historical Society Museum & Archives for my history fix, 4) read an article by Toshio Meronek to know more about current issues faced by the San Francisco Queer (and homeless) communities, and then 5) still had $20+ left to donate to the San Francisco Coalition on Homelessness, the publisher of the StreetSheet newspaper that one of the folks Kathy reported to the police was selling as a means to support himself and to educate others about discrimination impacting unhoused folks. So now you have the choice to do something different.
But if you are even passingly familiar with the Queer community and Queer history, you won’t learn anything new, and might even walk away confused and angry, as I did. Though Kathy does a good job pointing out the oft-forgotten role of Lesbians, for the most part she provides a very high-level gloss of historical information, often simply repeating information available on the plaques in the public squares. More problematically, she also often throws in factual inaccuracies and misleading statements, such as that there are no gay people in Italy because of Mussolini’s campaigns during WWII or that pansexual people “look straight.”
More disturbing than the poor quality of the tour however—you take a risk on that as a tourist--was that she went out of her way to summon the police to give a citation to a group of four homeless individuals sitting on the sidewalk along the tour route—at least one of whom presented as visibly Queer. When I asked her about this, she explained that she was afraid because she had previously been attacked by a homeless individual who was on drugs. While I certainly understand the fear of violence and her desire to protect herself and I, too, want to be able to walk down the street without fear, the individuals she reported were not attacking anyone--they were simply sitting on the sidewalk chatting. She explained that what they were doing was “illegal” and that she wanted to “help them” with their presumed drug abuse and mental health problems. This is particularly ironic, however, given that she started the tour explaining how same-sex liaisons were originally considered illegal and that LGBTQ folks were--and sometimes still are--considered to be mentally ill and in need of help. She rightly rejected those attitudes as discriminatory and against human rights but then did not further this logic to individuals whose only “crime” was not being housed.
Unfortunately, tourism does not benefit the host communities equally and tends to actually harm the poorest individuals. While I might have assumed that a GLBTQ tour would actively try to fight against such dynamics given that queer folks are highly overrepresented in the homeless population, SF tourist industry operators like Kathy have a vested interest in keeping tourists happy by keeping homeless folks out of public view--and indeed Kathy cited the tour’s presence as an additional reason she called the cops over.
I wish that someone had told me before I spent $28 on a poorly run tour that participated in the curtailment of homeless folks’ civil rights and the criminalization of poverty that I could have instead 1) looked up the terms in the first paragraph of this review to read about almost everything that Cruisin’ the Castro presented, 2) seen the exact same sights for free by simply walking around the neighborhood, 3) spent $5 to get into the GLBT Historical Society Museum & Archives for my history fix, 4) read an article by Toshio Meronek to know more about current issues faced by the San Francisco Queer (and homeless) communities, and then 5) still had $20+ left to donate to the San Francisco Coalition on Homelessness, the publisher of the StreetSheet newspaper that one of the folks Kathy reported to the police was selling as a means to support himself and to educate others about discrimination impacting unhoused folks. So now you have the choice to do something different.
Written August 4, 2019
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Rachel, thank you so much for your comments. Its unfortunate that the tour didn't meet your expectations. Our city is plagued with illegal activities such illegal drug abuse, crime and trespassing. This is why our Mayor and Police Department are taking action to provide services for those in need as well as, safety for both citizens and tourist alike. Its too bad that you had to witness such illegal activities and the police issuing citations accordingly. Should you have finished the tour, you would have learned that the Castro does provides outreach services for homeless LGBTQ youth at LYRIC. Nonetheless, I would be more than happy to donate your $28 to the Homeless Coalition and encourage you to get involved in your city to support this cause.
Written August 14, 2019
This response is the subjective opinion of the management representative and not of Tripadvisor LLC.
NICK1971
10 contributions
An amazing tour, the best part of our trip to San Francisco. Kathy the tourguide was superb ! The tour through the history of Castro and of Gay and Lesbian America in general gave a unique insight into the magical area called Castro. I would recommend this tour to gay and lesbian travellers as well as their straight counterparts equally. My partner and I would not have missed this fantastic experience for anything. The lunch is delicious too!!!
Written November 16, 2005
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Padinbrum
Birmingham, UK128 contributions
Nov 2019
Many thanks to Kathy for this colourful tour of the Castro District in San Francisco. This was a fantastic journey through the history of Gay/Human Rights in the USA with focus on Californian. For me, it was a good reminder of some of the history that I have lived through and what came before. Kathy charismatically guided our group of 10 around the streets of the Castro for a couple of hours and skillfully included all members of the group by providing each one a voice. One member of our group was a bit of a know-it-all but this was handled well with grace and humility even with the collective rolling of the eyes of the remaining 9 on our Tour. Thanks Kathy you're doing a great service for the LGBTQ community.
Written December 1, 2019
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Dana P
Haifa, Israel23 contributions
Oct 2019
The guide Kathy was really sweet, fun to listen to and enthusiastic about Castro overall. The walk was rather informative and I loved the personal touch.
Highly recommended!
Highly recommended!
Written October 24, 2019
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Markos K
London, UK22 contributions
Sept 2019 • Solo
Interesting, informative and informed insight into the LGBTQ+ history of Castro and America. Kathy was engaging and passionate and offered space for reflection on our current struggle for our human rights. I did enjoy learning more about Harvey Milk and his fight. I met some really nice people.
Written September 28, 2019
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
C. Patrick Gendusa
New Orleans, LA15 contributions
Aug 2019 • Solo
This was the most AMAZING and INSPIRING tour I have ever experienced!!! Kathy’s passion and love will make your heart soar with pride and hope!!!!
Loved, LovED, LOVED this tour and Kathy!!! Cannot recommend this tour enough!!!!
It gave me ALL the feels!!!!!!
🤗❤️🤗🧡🤗💜🤗💚🤗💙🤗💛
🤗🌈🤗🌈🤗🌈🤗🌈🤗🌈🤗🌈
Loved, LovED, LOVED this tour and Kathy!!! Cannot recommend this tour enough!!!!
It gave me ALL the feels!!!!!!
🤗❤️🤗🧡🤗💜🤗💚🤗💙🤗💛
🤗🌈🤗🌈🤗🌈🤗🌈🤗🌈🤗🌈
Written August 3, 2019
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Hola: voy con un compañero a San Francisco que no sabe inglés. Hay posibilidad de hacer el tour en castellano o en inglés y castellano?
Written February 14, 2023
Hola: voy con un compañero a San Francisco que no sabe inglés. Hay posibilidad de hacer el tour en castellano o en inglés y castellano?
Written February 14, 2023
Is this tour trans-friendly?
Written February 15, 2020
Hi! I was wondering if this tour passes by Harveys old camera shop? I know it houses a rights group currently, but still.
Thank you!
Written April 8, 2018
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