Day Four

Golden Gate Park • Civic Center

Outside Japantown are two destinations of importance to the Japanese community: 50 the Japanese Tea Garden and 51 the Asian Art Museum. The beautiful Tea Garden (752-1171) in Golden Gate Park, with tea house, bridges and koi pond, opened in 1894. The oldest public Japanese garden in the United States, it’s a serene spot to enjoy Japanese tea and cookies.

The Asian Art Museum (200 Larkin; 581-3500) occupies the former Main Library in the Civic Center. Among the largest museums in the West devoted exclusively to Asian art, the museum’s 40,000 square feet of gallery space includes 15,000 treasures that span 6,000 years of history in all the great Asian artistic traditions. With its frequent performances and a café for rest and refreshment, you could spend all day here.

	Heart of the City Farmers Market

On Wednesday or Sunday, check out the colorful 52 Heart of the City Farmers Market at U.N. Plaza (Market and Seventh St.), the primary source of fresh fruit and vegetables for residents, especially the Vietnamese, Cambodians, Laotians and Filipinos who call the central city home.

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