"These five words seem written in fire on the walls of my cell: Nothing can be worth this!"
George ' Machine Gun" Kelly, Alcatraz inmate #117.
Alcatraz, ‘The Rock”, sits out there in the bay; so close, yet so far, and I start to feel how the inmates must of felt, but in reverse. They were trying to get out, and I’m trying to get in. Like them I can’t swim there; the currents too strong, the water too cold (I'm too unfit). It’s psychological torture. We can see it from our hotel room, and at night the beacon of light from the light house beckons us to it. But, will our dodgy tour operator come through with the tickets – can we escape to Alcatraz?
We tried again to self check in for our flight tomorrow, but it won't let us do it, so it looks like we're facing another 'random security check'. Louise is obviously considered high risk, but I'm sorry, anybody who wears a, Pandora bracelet and collects little charms to put on it is not going to hate the West and fly a plane into a building.
Sometimes it’s the little things that you notice on holiday, and causes you to think about home. The toilet bowl flush in the United States is different, and frankly, a little disconcerting. For one thing, there’s always that pause, when nothing happens and that awful feeling of anxiety whether it is all going to go down. Then, the water starts to spin, all the water disappears, in a sucking sound, like a vacuum cleaner, and the water fills up again. I can't believe, and you probably can't believe, that I'm talking about toilets, but it’s surprising he the little things you miss about home.
Fisherman’s Wharf is packed with people on Saturday, and therefore it’s probably best to avoid this area on the weekend. Looking around at the people, you realize California is far more multi-cultural than Australia. Walking around you hear Spanish being constantly spoken, being so close to the Mexican border, people of Mexican decent make up a quarter of the population.
I can’t believe it but Abdu (not his real name), our dodgy tour operator, has come through with the tickets, now we just have to see whether they work on the scanner. The ticket works! Boats to Alcatraz leave from Pier 33, and you advised to arrive about twenty five minutes early to get the best seats on the boat. You’ll want to get on the left hand side of the boat to get the best views of Alcatraz. It’s a cold, windy run in across the harbor, so rug up well. It’s a sunny day, the best day so far. The boat pulls into the dock, and we’ve made it – we’ve escaped to Alcatraz.
From the dock, we walk up the hill to the cell block at the top of the Island, where we get headsets for the audio tour of the prison (pictured below). The tour takes us through the different areas of the prison, with commentary from retired guards, and quotes from prisoners.
I'm sure the prisoners were glad to get out of their tiny cells to go to the recreation yard (pictured above), but it’s a little cruel too, providing views of the Golden Gate Bridge, and the opposite shore (pictured below – I bet they wish they could be like this bird and fly away).
Alcatraz provides some of the best views of the city and the beautiful San Francisco harbor (pictured below). I still think Sydney harbor has got it beat, but I’ll let you be the judge. At least we don’t have this biting cold wind in the middle of summer.
One of the enduring mysteries of Alcatraz is whether three men successfully escaped from the Island. On the 11th June, 1962 Frank Morris, and brothers, John and Clarence Anglin placed dummy heads under their blankets in the middle of the night, escaped out small holes they had dug in their cells (pictured below), scaled the utility corridor to the roof, slid down a stove pipe, and used a raft fashioned out of a rain coat, and were never seen again. Now, the icy current that night was heading right out to sea. Did they escape from Alcatraz?
We escaped from Alcatraz on the 6.15pm boat.
Tomorrow , we're going to Memphis, Tennessee. That's right, in the words of Paul Simon "we're going to Graceland, Graceland, Memphis Tennesse". (but not until tuesday).
