On Saturday, I picked up Austin and Paul and headed into San Fransisco to explore the city and visit Alcatrez. We experienced lovely city traffic, parked the car on the Fisherman's Wharf, and walked down the pier to the Alcatrez ferry.
Seeing the city of San Francisco from the ferry was beautiful. The city sky scrapers go right up to the water and go on for miles. It really is a bill city!
Once we arrived on the island we learned a lot about Alcatrez. We walked up from the dock to the industrial buildings and up through the prison yard grounds. Then we picked up the audio headsets to take the tour through the cell block. It was fascinating! The tour went through some of the famous prisoners, like Al Cappone, and infamous prison escapes.
There were 2 prisoners who escaped through the air vent in their cell. They used several spoons over a long period of time to expand the hole behind the vent big enough for them to crawl out. One night they crawled out the hole, up through the mechanics space in the wall to the roof, and then into the water. They are presumed dead...or living somewhere in Mexico??!!
We also learned about the history of the island, from military fortress, to maximum security prison, to Indian occupation, to musuem and bird reserve. Fascinating!
Alcatrez is now a national park and the tours are conducted with help from the coast guard. It is a great place to visit and we learned a lot touring it that day!!
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