We just returned from a 4 day trip to San Francisico. Loved the Marriott and location. A few blocks to Union Square and all of the shopping and attractions. The hotel was extremely clean. Rooms were beautiful. Loved the gym, plenty of equipment. TV's at each treadmill.

My only complaint is the parking at this hotel. The rate is $53 per day! We knew this prior to our trip having stayed in SF in the past year. In the future we will fly in and take the bart downtown to our hotel.

The Marriott is also a block or so next to the Westfield mall. This is a gorgeous mall with every store you can imagine. Awesome gourmet food court on the lower level. Don't miss this. Also, go to "King of Thai Noodle House" on O'Farrell next to Macy's. Excellent Thai food. Best we have ever had. Head over to North Beach/Little Italy. Great restaurant, "Ideal." Recommended by locals in that area.

Back from wonderful trip to San Francisco. I'll try to be brief and discuss hotel, a few tips and tours.

San Francisco Marriott on Fourth Street: Superb location. Just around the corner from the Westfield Mall, and loads of shopping and restaurants. Just a minute to the corner to catch the F train which runs all the way down Market Street and to Fisherman's Wharf. Just another half a block and you can catch a trolley car. The hotel's overall services were very good. Starbucks in the lobby, nice lobby bar, though about half the ground floor lobby was still under construction and walled off. Room was not ready at (early) check in so baggage check was great. Up on the 25th floor with a really nice view, the room was average, but clean and with comfy beds. I prefer room arrangements where the shower/toilet are behind the door and the sink is located outside of that area, which was not the configuration here, but the shower was still nice and the sink was wide and granite. The biggest bug that a lot of travelers complain about applies to the Marriott. Why do upscale hotels offer less in-room amenities than avg. chain hotels? $12.95 for internet access when your local Drury or Holiday In Express provides for free? And perhaps the silliest in this hotel: outrageous charges for snacks that sit on a weird magnetic tray that will charge you if you move the snack and a stocked fridge that will also charge for uses. Give me an empty fridge any day of the week. We often went around the corner and grabbed sodas and snacks from the Walgreen's and brought back to the room - kept the sodas in the ice bucket. Silly though for a hotel of this calibur to treat guests this way.

Tom's Walking Muir Woods tour: Fab-U-Lous. Can't say enough about this great guy and great tour. His wife, Lisa, joined us and there was about 7-8 total in the group (including a nice couple from Scotland). Tom was knowledgeable, friendly and funny. It was great to be picked up at the hotel and even better to get to the woods early to beat the crowd and noise. We trekked on the trails for about 3 hours and it was terrific.

Wine Country Tours: Took the F Train down to the Ferry Marketplace to catch the tour. Driver Brian and tour guide Jason were very nice. Jason was incredibly knowledgeable and made the trip very nice. While I discovered I'm still not a big fan of wine in general, the area is beautiful and the wine tasting and picnic stop was fun. It would have been nice to see a bit more of the production areas and wine caverns, but that's just me. Trust me, we had some fun people who just really enjoyed tasting the wine.

Other stuff, Westfield Mall has a great food court in the lower level - hey don't laugh, it's not your usual food court. Andale's Mexican was yummy. Mel's diner was just on the corner of Fourth and nice for breakfast and not overly expensive - under $10.

All-in-all, nice long weekend trip and it didn't hurt that the weather for northern Cal was perfect. Dress in layers and wear comfy shoes. Pack light on the way out so that you can bring home all the new stuff.

We spent four nights here for a conference—it was okay overall though we had some issues, which started right at check-in. When we got up to the room we saw we had been assigned a handicapped room though we didn’t request one. It was no big deal we assumed—just some bars around the toilet. After being in the room for a few hours we found the problem—the shower was designed for a wheelchair user ONLY. The showerhead height was designed for someone sitting and the hand held shower head could only be raised to a maximum height of about 4 feet 6 inches. When I called to complain reception offered to move us but by that time we had completely unpacked and there was stuff all around the room. In the end we opted not to move and sucked it up but every time we took a shower got angry about the situation. Have you ever tried to wash your hair with one hand? In addition, the water pressure on the 19th floor was dreadful—it was like being peed on, my husband joked.

My experience with conference hotels such as Marriott and Hyatt is that rooms are generally sizable but this wasn’t the case with our room. It was just crowded with stuff and there was not a lot of empty space in the room. The closet, for example, had the ironing board and the safe on an overly large pedestal. This stuff took up so much room that there wasn’t room to open your suitcase up inside. Also, for a property that caters to business people, we found it strange that there was absolutely no free space on the desk/dresser area. There was the TV, connectivity equipment, hotel info binders and an enormous snack display (in addition to the minibar) that made your room look like a convenience store. Of course, the candy was out in the open to tempt you (see the review below about the property not losing a single opportunity to make money off guests) but it was also ugly and in the way and because of the sensors you couldn’t move it. In the end I threw my coat over it so I didn’t have to see it—it was right in your eye line when you were sitting on the bed. For anyone traveling with kids I can see the snacks causing problems.

There were some good points to the room though. I found the bed extremely comfortable. If you like a softer, pillowy mattress you’ll be happy here. There was a featherbed on the mattress and lots of pillows and the sheets felt nice and silky. The LG flat screen got a great picture on the digital channels and the hotel offered HBO. And the windows actually opened so you could get fresh air.

We got passes to the breakfast buffet for our trouble with the shower and I have to say it was quite good. Bottomless Illy coffee and fresh squeezed orange juice, made to order omelets and waffles, all the typical breakfast dishes, some nicer stuff like smoked salmon and a huge assortment of fresh fruit. If you were paying it was pricey though, at $22 a person. A la carte dishes were also available.

The onsite Starbucks and Hertz rental desk were convenient. Also, the pool looked pretty nice; a good size for an indoor hotel pool and it had a nice area for lounging. The location is in walking distance to many SF tourist attractions, shopping and the convention center.

Finally, excepting our trouble at check-in, I was really impressed with how friendly all the staff were. Maybe it’s a west coast thing and I’m used to east coast grumpiness but everybody from the servers in the restaurant, to the Starbucks employees to housekeepers and even maintenance staff, who asked if I needed help when I seemed lost, were really nice.

With a rate of $139 a night I was okay with this place, it wasn’t great but there were some nice aspects also. Know that if you have to come here for a conference there are other choices in the immediate area. The Hotel Palomar is right across the street, for example.

Stayed here for a convention at a reduced rate. Room had a high quality 42 inch HD TV and was very comfortable. Excellent location close to Moscone convention center, restaurants, cable car, and shopping. I really enjoyed Yerba Buena Garden right next to it and the bar with a terrific view on the 39th floor. My only complaint is that there are three sets of elevators going to different floors which was confusing for the first day or two. Guests have to transfer elevators to get from certain floors to other floors.