Day in San Francisco

The last day I was in California, we were free to do a little sight seeing.  A friend and I decided to head out early in the morning to San Francisco and take the trip to Alcatraz, the famous prison which is an island only about a mile off the coast.

I had been there once as a kid and still remembered how cool it was.  When you arrive on the island you are welcomed by a national park representative who gives you a brief overview of what there is to see and do.  The first buildings you see are these apartments that those who worked on the island lived in (mostly prison guards and their families).

Chase and I had just finished a book series about Alcatraz that made these buildings really come to life as they had in the book.  Once up in the main prison you are given a headset that takes you on your own personal walking tour around the prison (this I still remembered from when I was a kid).  These cells really told about prison life on the "rock".

This is one of the dummy heads made by one of the only successful prison breaks on the rock in June of 1962.  The inmates made paper mache heads using real hair from the barber shop to escape being caught during nighttime rounds.  Pretty realistic looking. The hole in the wall just beyond the bed is where they used spoons to chisel their way out behind the vent, where they then climbed up the pipes to the roof of the prison .  It took them over a year to plan and execute this escape.  Their bodies were never found and some still believe they made it off the island alive.

It was a beautiful day to explore the island, although you cannot tell from all the smog looking back across the bay.  This is the closest I got to the golden gate bridge.

Probably the most exciting thing about Alcatraz was meeting this once former inmate #1259, William Baker (now 82 years old).  He was there signing a book he had written about life in prison on Alcatraz.  He was first imprisoned for check fraud, and was sent to Alcatraz because of an escape attempt from Leavenworth.  He has spent over 50 years in prison, and was just released on parole in 2011...which made me wonder if he was still conning people.

It was interesting to talk to him about some of his experiences, and about some of the more infamous inmates like Al Capone.  He said they hardly ever saw him because he was always in the infirmary due to his being "bad in the head" (syphilis).  He said the worst part of Alcatraz for him was the day he arrived on the boat, and the best part was the day he left.  I knew Chase would love that I met a prisoner, so I bought a baseball and had him autograph it with his inmate number on it for a souvenir.

We left Alcatraz and headed inland and walked around a bit and enjoyed watching the Sea lions playing on Pier 39.  We then found a little famous place to get a bite to eat.....

I am not a seafood lover, but I decided I would go all in while we were there .  And man it was good!  Mahi Mahi with shrimp over a bed of mashed potatoes and smothered in a lobster sauce....this meal alone is worth going back.

I was happy when I got to see my very last sunset in California before heading home.