[dropcap custom_class=”whb”]Today we had tickets for the ferry that takes you to Alcatraz. I had bought our tickets online before we left home. It was a good thing to, because the ferry tickets were selling out. We opted to take a taxi down to Pier 33 where the ferry left from. The taxi fare was only $8.45. It was 37 degrees when we left the hotel. I was glad I had brought my leather coat. Once we got on the ferry, I bought Jay a bottle of water, but I opted for hot chocolate and a soft pretzel. The ferry ride is about 20 minutes. Once you arrive at Alcatraz, they give you an orientation talk for a few minutes before you are allowed to walk around on your own. You have to be in pretty good shape to walk up to the cell block. It is a very steep grade, about the equivalent as walking up a thirteen story building. There is a shuttle for the visitors that are not capable of making the walk.
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When you get to the cell block, you get an audio tour that takes you through there and tells you about life on “the rock”. It also goes over the various escape attempts. I thought it was interesting that most of the inmates were not originally sentenced to Alcatraz, but were sent there because they got in trouble at the other prisons they were at. The wardens and the guards lived on the island along with their families.
[dropcap custom_class=”whb”]After we caught the ferry back, we decided to eat lunch. It was very crowded at Fisherman’s Wharf. We decided to eat at Bubba Gumps. We had to wait over 40 minutes to get seated. After lunch, we had tickets in our CityPass booklets for the Blue & Gold boat ride that take you around the bay to the Golden Gate bridge and then around Alcatraz. The boat ride is about an hour long. We had to wait in another long line and just missed getting on the 3:10 boat and had to wait for the 4:30 boat.
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When we got back from it, we decided to eat supper before we left the Wharf area. Jay of course picked an Italian restaurant where he could get his pizza. He has pizza every Saturday night and this night was no different.
[dropcap custom_class=”whb”]When we got back from it, we decided to eat supper before we left the Wharf area. Jay of course picked an Italian restaurant where he could get his pizza. He has pizza every Saturday night and this night was no different.
To get back to our hotel, I decided we would try riding the city bus. I had downloaded the city bus schedules to my cell phone, so I knew which bus we needed to get on. Our CityPasses allows us to ride on the city buses as well as the cable cars. The app shows all the stops for the route we had shown on a map and it also shows where the bus is on the route. This allowed me to follow our progress and know when to get off the bus. The bus got real crowded. The bus driver also yelled a lot. We were able to get off at the correct stop.
From there it was just a short walk back to our hotel.
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