"Anything else you get is a priviledge"

Prisoner rule #5 at Alcatraz Island read something like "You are entitled to food. clothing, shelter, and medical care. Anything else you get is a priviledge".

Yesterday began with my aforementioned summer haircut, and then a meander down to Fisherman's Wharf (including a few pretty steep inclines!) to take in some of the more touristy sites on what we hoped (hah!) would be a less touristy day. Well, it could have been worse. We went to the Aquarium of the Bay, which though it cannot hold a candle to the Monterey facility, has the very fun feature of acrylic tunnels through the bottoms of the 700,000+ gallon tanks. Not too often you see the bottom-side of a fish swimming overhead.

I think we were both a little kidded-out by the time we got out though, between other families that seemed to have 6 of them and a summer camp tour of 50 or so. In an abstract sense, I want places like that to be filled with curious children discovering the ecosystems of our planet. Personally I just wish all kids were like the smaller Hu two - quiet, polite and articulate while being immensely curious, social little people. I've seen way too many ill-behaved pre-adolescents screaming, slamming off walls, or people, and sitting or walking on the explanatory placards this week. Its a sad reality that much of the art and science of such facilities is wasted on the majority of visitors.

At the end of the aquarium walk we encountered a touch pool where I got to touch a few rays and skates and starfish (they had that at Monterey but I missed much of it). One ray was determined to escape the small rock pool and was actually "flapping" up the wall in front of me. I really couldn't figure if that was a normal behaviour that it might attempt to flop overland if "trapped", or if that was a stressed-out animal exhibiting something neurotic. Sadly, the teenagers managing the area were just trying to keep up with the hordes of kids and some simlilarly ignorant adults and couldn't really attend to the animals.

We had a leisurely and for me tipsy late lunch/early dinner at a mercifully quiet Pier 39 restaurant (had a coupon for a free bottle of wine) and then meandered our way to the boarding pass lineup for the night cruise to Alcatraz.

Alcatraz was stark, beautiful, sad, eerie, noisy, smelly, spooky and fascinating all at once. There was so much more history there in addition to what most of the public knows of a few high-profile inmates. It operated for a relatively brief time as a notorious prison, but the history of human settlement goes back to the 1850's and is still evolving in a strange and unique way today.

We got to go through the cellhouse audio tour, narrated by guards and inmates, telling stories of the 29 years of the federal prison. It was a little disappointing that much of the island is closed off this time of year, but that is due to the bird rookeries now present through much of the place. It may need to be renamed Seagull Island, as the Western Gulls obviously own it now!

I picked up a couple of souvenier "Rocks from the Rock" - excavation rubble from the restoration effort being sold to tourists. I acknowledge I've fallen for a gimmick, but the background of this one is in keeping with things I support. Selling the rubble funds the archaeology and restoration effort, prevents tourists from trying to chip off a piece for themselves, AND has the neat side effect of removing a disposal problem the parks service might have. Traditionally rubble and garbage was just tossed in the Bay, but that is obviously no longer acceptable.

We were there at twilight and had the eerie experience of being in and around the cellhouse as the fog blew in. Seeing it billowing through doors and openings, one can half imagine how hopeless a place this must have been for inmates. At the top of the island outside the cell house, we were walled in by the fog. It creates a strange vertigo, you can see no horizon, no clear line between sea and air, nothing. In contrast, historic reports say the families and children who lived here (families of guards and wardens) found it an idyllic little enclave. Gardens were abundant and today, 60+ years since being abandoned to grow wild, tons of exotic species are flourishing among ruins and birds.

Our cruise home was short and uneventful, and another hearty hike got us back to the Triton. Today we're off to bike across the Golden Gate and see what we can see of the northern towns.