San francisco, Alcatraz, Pier 39

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Up at 7ish. Breakfast downstairs. Aimee was unwell overnight so just the four of us for brekkie.

The forecast for today was 11 degrees Celsius, 30% chance of rain and a bit windy. San Fran is a windy city a lot of the time, which is good, because it helps blow a lot of the wood-burn haze out of town(unlike Sacramento and Napa). Looked outside and blue sky for 95% of what we could see. Rugged up though as the wind goes right through you.

Walked down the road to the bus stop and CalTrans'ed it into Town. From there we could have got on another tram-like bus to go 3 blocks but the bus driver was horrified when I asked for directions, so we did what most locals do and walked. The blocks here are tiny compared to most other cities and usually have just onefor two buildings on them. Got on the muni, F, and tram/bused to Pier 33 by 10.40.

Joined a short queue to buy tickets to the Alcatraz ferry/tour. Got on the 11.00 ferry and off we went for a quick 12 minute ferry ride tithe island. great chance to get sme good shots of the city from the ferry.

We toured the work shops as that part ofmtheisland was having guided tours till 12. Exited there and looked at the exercise area. Then we headed to the cell block for the self-guided/earphone commentary tour. It was all amazing and very informative. We heard about how they are still determined to prove that Clint Eastwood and his 2 buddies never successfully escaped from the prison, but died attempting it. Got to see the cells the escaped from. They are still as they were,or appeared to be. We then headed back down to the dock, ate the snacks we had taken with us and broughthe boat boat, then headed into the video presentations and the 3 different shops.

We headed back on the 2.15 ferry and then walked north towards Pier 39. I can't remember if I had been here before. It is quite a busy and colorful little place, even on a cold winters day. We walked past Pandora and I couldn't get Tanya to go in and check out the special San Francisco gold ones. Lots of shops, restaurants and even a couple of pet shops.

We eventually ended up at Bubba Gump's shrimp company restaurant. A shrine to the movie. Service with jokes about the movie. Lots of props. And a menu to match. Thomas had the bus bench burger. Tanya and I had Forrest's favourites, which included some Shrimp(prawns for those of you back home). Aimee just picked bits off everyone else's plates.

We had finished there by about 4pm. Aimee was starting to really feel bad again. We retraced our route from the morning and we missed our bus by a minute so had to wait 34 minutes for the next one. On the bus by 5.40 and home after getting off one stop to late, by 6.15ish.

No dinner after such a big and late lunch(which we have now almost decided is our normal method of operation), but by 8.30 the kids decided we needed desert so I popped downstairs during an ad break for a new episode of Big Bang, and picked up 2 small tubs of icecream.

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