Cali Day 1: Alcatraz

Our California trip started in San Francisco. We arrived on Wednesday morning pretty early thanks to the time change. We got our rental car and headed to the hotel. We stayed at the Warwick San Francisco Hotel, downtown near Union Square. Not only did we get a fabulous deal, our wedding reception was at the Warwick Melrose Hotel in Dallas, so I thought it would be neat to stay at the same hotel in San Fran since it was our anniversary. The hotel was small, but clean and nice. It had the same feel as the Dallas hotel. My only complaint was that the bedding and furniture looked a little used. Other than that, we had a great stay at the Warwick San Francisco.

We decided to head down to Pier 39, one of the more touristy things to do in San Francisco, to look around and find some lunch. We ended up walking about 2 miles UPHILL to get there. Let me comment here that Eric's back had gone out the weekend before and was still hurting, so this was not the best idea for us. We made it to Pier 39 and were overwhelmed by all of the tourists that were there.

This was along our walk all the way down Powell Street. I thought the city in the back ground with the school children playing on the play ground was a neat picture of the city life.

Pier 39 Sea Lions - I honestly thought there would be more! Every picture I have seen of this had tons. I was a little disappointed, but they were still neat. These guys are loud!

Pier 39 - Lots of restaurants, shops, and people.

Clam Chowder in a Sour Dough Bread Ball from Boudin Bakery - so good!! There are several Boudin Bakeries around San Francisco. I think there is a big restaurant at the Fisherman's Wharf, but we went to a small one on Pier 39. It was so good! The bread was delicious!

The Bay Bridge - between Oakland and San Francisco

After Pier 39, we ventured over to the Ferry Building.  The Ferry Building is a really cool marketplace that has lots of little shops selling fresh food (meat, cheese, wine, fruits, ice cream) as well as small gift shops.  There were lots of restaurants where you could sit outside and enjoy yourself on the patio. We stopped at MarketBar and had a glass of wine (me) and beer (Eric).  It was so nice sitting on the patio in the warm sun (it over looked this street in the picture) and people watch.

We walked back to our hotel through the Financial District.

This is Union Square, which was right by our hotel. Union Square is a one-block plaza and the nearby area is one of the largest collections of department stores, upscale boutiques, tourist trinket shops, art galleries, and salons in the United States, which continues to make Union Square a major tourist draw, a vital, cosmopolitan place in downtown San Francisco, and one of the world's premier shopping districts. (Thanks Wikipedia.) Every store you could imagine at North Park and the Galleria in Dallas combined was in this area. Nordstrom, Macy's, Louis Vuitton, Neiman Marcus are just a few.

This is the Coit Tower. I took this picture before we got on the boat for our Alcatraz cruise tour.  This is actually somewhere I wanted to go but we never made it to. The views are supposed to be beautiful from the top of the tower.

On the Alcatraz Tour - We went on the night tour, so we left before sunset.

View of Alcatraz as we approached.

San Fran from the boat

This is a view of the island you only get to see on the night tour. The night tour takes you all the way around the island, while the day tour takes you the quickest route. As we were traveling there, they told us stories of prisoners who escaped and how they tried to get off the island. Not very successfully!

We heard a lot about the Western Gull and how they are protected and the island is a sanctuary for them. They seemed to be every where in California though and reminded me a lot of the ones I grew up with in Corpus Christi, so we aren't too sure how protected they need to be...

This is where the prisoners would enter the prison and get a hose down. It reminds me a lot of the concentration camps from the Holocaust.

This is what a typical cell looks like in Alcatraz.  Very small!

He better be nice to me or I will lock him in there....

 This was the dining room.

Our tour of Alcatraz was very informative and interesting.  We walked around with a self guided audio tour to listen to.  The only thing that it was pretty crowded. Everyone was trying to look at the same thing (since we all started the audio tour around the same time). The stories that they told of the prisoners and their attempts at escape were pretty amazing. I would have hated to be on that island! It must have felt so desolate. Definitely worth the time if you make it to San Francisco!

After the boat docked back on land, it was getting pretty late, so we headed back towards the hotel.  It was around 10:00 and not a lot of places were serving dinner anymore, but we found a place called Grand Cafe down the street from the Warwick that was still serving food in the bar area.  It was pretty good! I had a margarita pizza and Eric had a hamburger. Eric's back was killing him by this point. After a long day, we turned in right after we ate.  Day one in San Fran was a success!