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Published: July 25th 2008
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Be Sure To Wear...A Jacket
Yep, compared to LA, and in fact most places during summer, San Francisco is a pretty chilly place. It's just as sunny as most other places, but it has an almost permanent fog shrouding everything (basically huge scale condensation) and has some nasty coastal winds. That being said, the weather doesn't exactly make or break a place for us.
The overnight Greyhound as mentioned in the last blog wasn't bags of fun; we didn't get much more than the dozing flat rate of forty winks and didn't get to see much scenery during the night obviously. What was a bit more frustrating was that due to getting the different bus, we actually arrived in San Francisco 4 hours earlier than we anticipated. Check-in at the hostel we booked wasn't until 11am, so getting in at 6am wasn't convenient. Still, it's Greyhound, they're not renowned for providing world class service.
Hitching our bags onto our backs, we waddled out onto the far cleaner streets of this Californian city. Using some tired mapwork, we made it to the hostel in one piece and straight away this felt like a safer city than LA. Aside from the
Alcatraz
The Rock. cleanliness, it was far less imposing, definitely more centralised and had the sublime angled hill streets that I thought only existed in Bullitt and the Grand Theft Auto games. This looked like a cool place and a different beast from most other cities we'd seen on our travels.
Nicest Hostel Yet?
Arriving at the hostel, we were ushered into the comfortable and spacious lounge area. It was classy. Free breakfast was not to be sniffed at either and when we went down, it offered multi variety bagels, english muffins, assorted breads, cereal and unlimited tea/coffee. Tasty stuff, especially toasted bagels. We tried to sleep as we waited for check-in on the couches and after what seemed like an age, we were eventually shown our room by the friendly hostel staff. Despite our bookings for different rooms (limited availabilty in this hostel) they said we didn't have to move at all during our 5 night stay.
After a snooze, we explored a bit of the town around the Union Square area, which was like a far more upmarket and developed George Square. A lot of shops too which Emma looked pleased with. We didn't really have the energy
San Francisco From Alcatraz
A reminder of what prisoners were missing. for too much else though, so when we got back to the hostel we caught up with washing and had a tasty $5 dinner which the hostel offered. This was definitely surpassing our expectations.
Alcatraz, Angel Island & The Fourth Of July
The fourth of July is a time for flag waving patriotism and one of the cheesiest national anthems ever written in many parts of America, but not so much in San Francisco. The people here certainly don't meet a lot of people's (possibly unfair) stereotyping of Americans and to most, it's just another national holiday. It's by far the most liberal city we've ever been to having been the forefront of the Hippy movement and although the 60s have long gone, some amount of the spirit is still there. We were eager to see what the day had to offer and what the celebrations would be like.
Due to a stroke of luck, we managed to get booked on an Alcatraz tour for the morning and most of the afternoon. This is basically
the most popular tourist attraction in California and during the height of summer, the tours book up a week in advance. I
was initially dismayed on seeing that all the tours were booked out on the website for our time in San Francisco, until amazingly while we were on the site, two spaces seemed to open up on the 9:30am combined Angel Island/Alcatraz tour. We weren't too fussed about Angel Island, but we didn't want to miss out on going to Alcatraz so we booked it instantly.
I stupidly wore a t-shirt and realised it was a mistake when we reached the harbour. It was pretty cold and the fog was everywhere. Alcatraz could be quite a cold place due to the coastal winds and lack of protection on the Bay. Still, it turned out that it was on Angel Island I was coldest on. We visited there first and were taken on a guided tram tour around the island. It's basically the West Coast's equivalent of Ellis Island and is where the immigrants initially arrived. On a clear day, it provides unmissable views of San Francisco, Alcatraz and the Bay Area, but of course, it was a very foggy day. We could still see bits and pieces though, which was pretty good.
Afterwards, we grabbed a bite to eat
Foggy Bay Bridge
Early in the morning, heading to Angel Island. on the island and took the boat to Alcatraz, an area colloquially known as The Rock. After watching a Discover Channel film and reading the provided pamphlets, we headed up to the main cellhouse for an audio tour of the prison. I was quite excited as we had been told by other travellers this was one of the best tours they'd done and it was definitely something that interested me.
Alcatraz is basically where the "bad prisoners" were sent to; those who provided too many problems in regular penitentiarys. It housed Al Capone, brutal sociopath Robert Stroud (The Birdman Of Alcatraz), George "Machine Gun" Kelly, and James "Whitey" Bulger. All who agreed that the place overwhelmed them. The ultimate maximum security prison, it was closed due to escalating runnings costs and most likely, while they may not admit it, the successful escape of 3 prisoners. See the Escape From Alcatraz film for further details.
The hour and a half cellhouse tour was fantastic and was narrated by former officers and prisoners. It took in pretty much everywhere in the prison and gave in depth details of an attempted escape turned bloodbath as well as the escape of the
Warning
Remnant from the older days. 3 prisoners in the 60s. Although these 3 got out of Alcatraz and sailed away on a raft, they were never seen again and either drowned or made it across a border. Definitely an interesting experience to explore the prison but it was a shame how crowded the place was.
We soon headed back and ended up at Fishermans Wharf where the boat docked. Conveniently enough, this was also the main area for the July 4th celebrations. The fireworks weren't til later so we wandered around the extremely busy "sidewalks" and took in some tacky street entertainment and the fanfare. After walking for some time and checking out some of the waterfront stores, we went to In N Out Burger for food; a famous Californian fast food restaurant with more ethics than most and also featured in The Big Lebowski. It was tasty and although Emma didn't agree, quite a bit different in terms of style and service from other fast food places. Very cheap too, as is most food in America. Thank God for the weak dollar.
We ended up in another American institution afterwards: Hooters. This place is pretty crap to be honest but $2.50 Happy
Segway
I want one. Hour pints were impossible to resist. Afterwards, we headed to Jacks Bar, a fairly historic bar located further along the pier which was far nicer and had a great atmosphere. At fireworks time, we made the short trip along to Aquatic Park which wasn't as busy as we'd expected. The display itself was underwhelming both due to the fog (the huge and powerful fireworks could barely be seen) and that it didn't live up to our expectations of Americans trying to do things "bigger and better". Judging from comments we'd heard during the day though, a lot of locals don't bother with 4th July and we heard people saying "if that's what you're into" in regards to the day.
Still, it had been a pretty fun day and we decided to walk home after having a few more drinks at Jacks. Although the distance wasn't too taxing, the famous San Francisco hills were. The streets get pretty steep pretty quickly and it took us a while to climb Nob Hill (Emma found this name rather amusing) and make it back to our hostel.
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