A state-of-the-art visitor's center will open this weekend at Lands end in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area.

The Parks Conservancy in partnership with the National Park Service engaged 34,484 volunteers who put in 513,884 hours in 2011 alone. That kind of work would cost $10.9 million on the open market.

Most of the more than one million tourists who visit the famous former prison annually never get to experience Alcatraz Island at night or see its spooky, decrepit hospital experiences unique only to the night tour.

Andy Goldsworthy plots the curves of new Presidio creation

A newly built trail and boardwalk on the southern edge of the Presidio is as much a window into San Francisco's maritime history as it is a path through restored sand dunes and coastal habitat.