Not really sure who the ‘hard case’ is in the title of this blog post, but since I tried a really poor Sean Connery impression on more than one occasion on our trip to Alcatraz, I guess it’s what’s stuck in my head.

Anyway, we were on a %#@ boat!!! (NSFW lyrics)



All pictures out on Flickr

On Friday, Randy and Rebecca finished their Southwestern US tour by stopping to visit Bri and I at our new place in Mountain View. They had quite the drive getting up here, driving north on Highway 1 all the way up from San Diego. From what I hear it was a beautiful trip (one I’ll have to take on two wheels sometime). Anyway, on Friday we headed into The City to catch a ferry out to Alcatraz Island.

You can see we were pretty excited. We had a fantastic time on the jailhouse tour. The audio recorders they give you seem a little impersonal at first, but after walking through the rather lengthy tour I realized what a great way it was to give so many people a detailed look at what it was like to be a prisoner on the The Rock. And I was pretty freaked out!

Despite me joking around up there, the place was actually pretty creepy. No stories of bitches and ocular cavities but just some down-home imposing authority and isolation. I remember asking everyone else if they thought it would be better to be imprisoned in a place surrounded by beautiful San Francisco and the Golden Gate. The audio guide answered that pretty well – much worse, because you could constantly see what you were missing.

After the tour we had a great time driving down Lombard Street and over the Golden Gate. At one point we were completely blocked by bicyclists on their monthly tour of San Francisco.

(video courtesy of @r38y’s iPhone 3GS)
Evidently this event is a Big Deal in San Francisco because it seems like most of the city comes out. The police block off the roads and if you’re stuck, you just have to sit for a half hour or 45 minutes. Of course you get to see tons of “colorful” San Franciscans – the obligatory hippies, singing people, naked people, people with homemade boomboxes on their bikes, etc. We weren’t in a rush, so it was a pretty good time.

All in all a great day!