San Francisco Day 2

Day two started out bright and early, well early for a vacation with two girls that like to sleep in. We had to be at the pier by 9am to catch a ferry out to Alcatraz Island.

Don't lean over too far, you might fall in.

That's Shari, Riley, Sarah and Janet on the top deck.

Looking back at the pier and Nob Hill.

We passed by Pier 39.


Looking south toward the Bay Bridge. Beautiful sunrise.

Looking toward our destination.

Chilly morning.

WARNING!!!

The white building in the forground is not the prison. It's the administration building and the remnants of the old gold rush and Civil War era fort. The bottom two floors were built to hold soldiers that protected the bay during the gold rush era an the top two floors were added just before and during the Civil War era. The building in the background and on top of the island is the actual prison where they started housing prisoners in 1934.

After the federal government abandoned the island in 1963 it sat empty until Native Americans occupied it for 18 month in 1969 and 1970. The Park Service is trying to keep the graffiti as part of the history of the island.

This is the old Social Hall for the staff. It was destroyed by fire during the occupation by the Native Americans.

My beautiful ladies before we headed up the hill to the prison.

The gulls are permanant residents.

This is the intake area of the prison.

They gave us headphones and an mp3 player with directions and a tour around the prison. It was kinda eerie. I paused mine one time and there wasn't anyone talking. There were hundreds of people wandering around and no one was talking.

This is a solitary confinement cell. It was in the same area as the infirmary. It had a solid door and they could close the door and turn off the light.

This is the infirmary with the solitary cells on the bottom right. They guys in the infirmary could look out the windows to the left and see the city in the distance.

This was the visiting area. No physical contact. Just the glass window.

Mandy in one of the general cells.

In the dining hall at the end of the tour. They're still working on the prison. All the walls have the same paint that was there when it was closed. Even the linoleum under our feet was the same that was there almost 50 years ago.

Back outside and on the north end of the island were the physical facilities. This is the main storage and construction facilities. They still use it. It's falling apart because of the salt air and being abandoned for so long, but it's still in use. At the far end is where they have a 1925 fire engine that's still in use. The park ranger that's in charge of it's care actually asked us in and showed it to us. He was really chatty. Full of information and wanting to share it all. Brian and I had a hard time leaving.

Enjoying time with my daughter on the ride back to SF.

Lunch at the Rainforest Cafe. Really loud, but the food was good.

What do teenage girls do at lunch while on vacation? Text! Silly question.

After lunch we got tickets for a ride on a bus converted to look like a cable car. It was the same company as the duck ride. The guy who drove this wasn't as fun as Cap'n Jeff the duck driver, but we had fun.

Along the way we saw this little motorcycle propelled thing. The kid looked like he was having fun, no?

The cable car bus took us across the Golden Gate bridge where I took this picture looking back at SF.

What a beautiful family.

The statue in the forground is in tribute to all the sailors who shipped out of SF during WWII, a lot of whom never came home.

Back in SF we went down some very steep streets. I was glad the bus had a low gear.

How would you like to live on this street. Good thing it doesn't snow there. Could you imagine a skiff of snow on that sidewalk? You'd end up in the Market District before you could stop. Beautiful architecture all around the city. At this block it was built after the 1906 earthquake.

Down in the Market District and Sharri wanted a picture of something ahead and I put my camera out the window and just shot. Hah.

Looking up (West) Lombard Street. Remember that name? The joke for the drivers was, "What's the crookedest street in the nation?" We'd all say Lombard and he'd reply, "Wall Street."

That night we finally made it to Coit Tower. It was closed but it was impressive anyway.

And so was the view from the parking lot. I love night views of cities. Reminds me of the sight from One Tree Hill in Auckland.

That night we also took in the sights and sounds of Pier 39. This is a little old lady that does a show for the crowds.

Looking toward Ghirradeli Square along the wharf.

Silly girls. Must be getting late. Time to go back to the hotel.

So, we went to San Francisco for our Spring Break this year. Didn't want to do the same old Disneyland thing but wanted to go somewhere fun and exciting. It's been 15 years since Janet and I went, so we thought we'd take the kids and check it out. We left Tuesday the 6th after work and flew into Oakland, hopped in our rental car and drove over the Bay Bridge into downtown SF to stay at the Marriott. Wednesday morning we slept in a bit then went down to the wharf to meet our neighbors at the Aquarium of the Bay and hang out with them and take in the sites.

Street performers were everywhere. They loved having their pictures taken (for a tip).

Once in the aquarium we saw lots of the wildlife that lives in the bay. (not them...the jellyfish in the background).


Looks like either a hold up or he's sliding down the glass. All I could think of was Patrick from Sponge Bob Square Pants. That cartoon has ruined aquariums and documentaries for me forever.

Don't know if any of you have ever picked out your very own pearls, have you? These vendors guarentee that there's a pearl in every shell. They must x-ray them or something. Anyway, we did this at Disney World too. You look in the bucket and pick out the clam you want, then the helper opens it up and pulls out your pearl. Then they try to sell you the setting and all the peripherals...but that's not the story here. Sarah got a huge pearl and had it set, but Amanda had twin pearls in hers. She decided to not have hers set at that time. I took a long video of this and not too many pictures, sorry.

What trip isn't complete without your picture with the sea lions of Pier 39. They've actually sunk boats moored here. That's why they have thier own docks to lounge on.

Then it was off to ride the ducks! The old naval amphibious trucks. I caught this picture as we were walking down the Embarcadero on our way to catch one. The folks on the boat were having a blast.

Here we are about to boar our duck.

This is one of the buildings that was pointed out on our land tour. We started chuckling as the driver started to tell us the story of the building. Evidently some famous people stayed in this hotel while getting thier start in show business...Bette Middler, Barry Manilow, Robin Williams...well the driver was looking at us because of our strange reaction and we reminded him that we were from Utah. This after he'd asked our neighbor how many wives she had. Duh!

Sarah found some sunglasses that she liked. Doesn't she look cool?

We were all issued quackers when we boarded. While on the tour the driver played music to enhance the tour and we were encouraged to quack along. It was quite funny. You could tell the locals from the tourists and visitors to the city. The locals just went about their business while the visitors were looking up to see the strange site and weird noises.

Don't we have cute daughters?

Got kinda chilly when we dove into the bay and started driving around some of the piers.

But the captain (he's a captain while on the water and a driver while on land, actually has a captains license and bus driver license) let some of the folks drive the boat around the bay. We might have topped out at 3 knots.

This was the view from our duck looking back at downtown SF. Beautiful day, no? We had sunny warm weather the whole time we were there. The locals and shop owners kept telling us how lucky we were.

Back to Pier 39 for dinner after riding the duck. Just before we went into the resaurant I turned around to see this site. That's Coit Tower on the left and the Trans America Tower on the right and in the background. You can see how the flags are standing out straight. It was quite breezy, but we (or at least I) didn't even notice or care.

No tours to the top of the Trans America Tower (rats!) but we'll go to the top of Coit tower in a couple of days. Stay tuned for photos of that.

Happy kids. Waiting for dinner at Swiss Louis Italian & Seafood Restaurant. Great food.

Happy full kids. Naw. Just another photo of our beautiful daughters.

After dinner we were walking around the pier checking out the sites and shops and ran across this hall of mirrors. We had a lot of fun playing in here for more than half an hour. Notice the rubber gloves on our hands. They distributed them to us so we wouldn't smudge the mirrors as we held our hands out in front of us. Smart idea. Except it didn't work for the little girl I saw run right into a mirror, head first. Poor thing looked like one of those sparrows that runs into a plate glass window then looks around to see if anyone saw it, then runs away. I didn't get a picture of that, but I'll always remember it.

Our neighbor, Brian, trying to blow up his glove over his head. He never did quite get it all the way up. But we all had a laugh watching him try.

Just before we stepped into the hall of mirrors this container ship went by. They were going by all day, but in the fading sun and with the boats in the foreground, it just looked pretty.