I took my kids to the Exploratorium. It was very cool, even for my wife and I. (Possibly because I'm still a man child). It was a highlight for all of us. http://www.exploratorium.edu/

Alcatraz is definitely worth the visit. We did the day tour. The whole place is interesting to visit. The view from Alcatraz to SF is great. The audio tour is really well done. I hear the night tours are really good too but I didn't want my kids (or me :-) to be too spooked out.

My son was sick this day but my daughter and I took a ferry then a cab to the USS Hornet museum. We had been to USS Intrepid in NYC as a family and everyone really enjoyed it to my surprise since I'm the only aviation and naval aviation aficionado in the family. So we were looking forward to Hornet. Hornet is definitely different than Intrepid. More museumish and less family friendly interactive. I always love seeing the aircraft and the carriers whenever possible so I still enjoyed it. It was a bit of bore for my daughter but bless her heart, she was a good sport and just humoured me for the trip.

We also toured the the Aquarium of the Bay. It's a bit small compared to other aquariums I've visited (New Orleans, Dallas) but it was interesting. We did a behind the scenes tour and got to feed the sharks and fish from above the glass tunnels.

We bought a CityPass for our trip and it was well worth it. We stayed on the edge of China town beside the Bank of America tower and took public transit everywhere. The pass was even good for street cars on the Embarcadero and the cable cars plus it had passes for most of the attractions we visited.

Wizard