Blogs from Alcatraz, San Francisco, California, United States, North America

Today Scott and I have signed up for a trip to the iconic Alcatraz Island out in the middle of San Francisco Bay. Issy’s not showing a lot of enthusiasm for this exercise. I assure her that I did have a shower this morning, but she’s still showing no signs of budging, so us boys set off on our own …. again. It’s only about a fifteen minute boat ride out to “The Rock”, where the tour kicks off with a volunteer giving us a potted history of the infamous site. In the mid 1850s, shortly after the Mexican American War resulted in California being ceded to the Americans, planning began to convert the island into a military base to form part of the so-called “triangle of defence” of San Francisco Bay. The first garrison arrived ... read more

Day 2: Thursday, November 18th, 2021 We woke up early in the morning to head out for breakfast before heading over to the Alcatraz ferry dock scheduled to leave at 10:00. We had breakfast at the nearby IHOP. With time to spare, we headed over to Pier 39 to see the sea lions before taking the ferry to Alcatraz. Some interesting facts about Alcatraz include it housed famous prisoners with the likes of Al Capone, Machine Gun Kelly and the Birdman. There were also various escape attempts; none are known to be successful. The prison closed on March 21st, 1963. After Alcatraz, we had a quick lunch at Pier 39 before heading on out Painted Ladies Tour of San Francisco. Some of the famous sites of San Francisco witnessed on the tour include: Lombard Street- famous ... read more

After lying awake for four hours in the wee hours battling jet lag (and booking a Santa visit at Macy’s at 3am local time), I was genuinely hoping that San Fran would live up to its reputation of not having bad coffee. Not so. I have now had what I am aiming for as the worst coffee of the trip. Let’s hope the aforementioned objective of not visiting Starbucks doesn’t destroy that very low-set bar. But there was an upside - truly the greatest almond brittle I’ve ever tasted, with chocolate and sea salt...lucky they suckered us in to buying a big container to take home. Since Sydney got another light rail line today (no transport nerdiness here), we thought we’d branch out from our success with the buses and try the street cars (not to ... read more

Dienstag, 15.08.17 Wie wahrscheinlich ist es… …. dass dasselbe Pärchen, das wir auf der Wanderung zum Rangitoto-Gipfel vor Auckland getroffen haben, einen Tag später im selben Flieger nach Fiji sitzt? … dass uns eines von vier Pärchen, die zur selben Zeit den Helikopterflug gebucht haben, einen Tag später auf der Fähre nach Alcatraz begegnet? … dass Daniela über den Tag verteilt dreimal die Uhrzeit richtig schätzt (plus/minus 2 min) und ich zweimal trotz Uhr die Umrechnung von 14 auf 4, ähm 2 nicht zustande bringe? Also heute ging es zu Mittag auf die Gefängnisinsel Alcatraz. Tatsächlich war es nur für ca. 30 Jahre ein Gefängnis. Davor war es eine Militärstation und danach wurde die Insel für einige Zeit von indianischen Aktivisten besetzt. Wir bekamen eine ziemlich coole Audiotour durch das Gefängnis und hörten von den unterschiedlichen, ... read more

It was sixty-five and sunny the day my family and I took a boat from San Francisco bay to Alcatraz. It only took about ten minutes to reach the minute island. The first thing that caught my eye when I got off the boat was a small souvenir shop. It seemed so out of place on this once highly guarded location. We listened to the tour guide give a brief history lesson on the establishment of the prison. I would be lying if I said I listened to what he was saying. I was more interested in the huge body of water that was surrounding me. There were sailboats spanning all across the bay and massive sea gulls diving into the ocean. After receiving a pamphlet containing all of the information that the guide just covered, ... read more