San Franciscooooo!!

It's a long drive so by the time we get to San Francisco it's late afternoon. We have the best shower ever (it always is after camping) and decide to stick around the local area rather than go to the centre. It's mainly shops and bars so we have a couple of beers, food and an early night in a big comfy bed.

Feeling nice and refreshed we get the train to San Francisco, it's a lovely warm day which is nice after the cold in Yosemite. The centre is a bit boring so we aim for the harbour. A nice policeman tells us that it is too far to walk but we go for it anyway and within half an hour we're at the harbour, that ain't a long walk mate! We can see the Golden Gate bridge in the distance and make our way to pier 39 where all the action is, seal action that is! Loads of seals are sunbathing on specially made platforms and seem to prefer climbing all over each rather than finding a nice spacious platform. They are fun to watch and very noisy! The pier is full of shops and restaurants and even has a left handed shop but the fun part is the piano stairs, plink, plink, plonk!

SF's weirdest building?

"Look at me!"

Room for one more?

Christine's new favourite shop, but no Ned Flanders to be seen!

Christine's got the X Factor

The next stop is the pier with the antique arcade which is huge and has lots of old fashioned games from naughty peep show viewers to Zoltar fortune tellers and Star Wars Atari games which gets James all excited. After having our fortunes told we find a machine that analyses kisses, we follow the instructions but must kiss for too long as we miss the result, oops. We hear some giggling and spot some young boys at the peep show viewers, teehee! After all of that fun we decide to climb a really steep hill to see the most crooked street but we're disappointed when it turns out to be just a windy road, at least we get a view of the city from above. We have a lot of planning to do tonight but the bed looks so comfortable...zzzz.

Piloting a TIE fighter at last. "Die rebel scum!"

Naughty treats

A day out with a special one

Today is the day we've both been looking forward to, a trip to Alcatraz Island! The boat is packed but it's another gorgeous day and the views are amazing. Landing on the island we walk around the old military and prison buildings, many have been destroyed by fire but it's still obvious what they were used for. We'd love to do the nature walk but a lot of the areas are blocked off to protect nesting birds. The audio tour of the cell block is really good, narrated by ex prison officers and prisoners. Its hard not to feel sorry for the prisoners at times but at the same time you can't help but think that modern prisons should be a bit more like this. If you can't do the time...
We read about the escape attempts, some of which are so clever and well planned out,you can't help but admire them for trying! After a video presentation we get back on the boat and take in the view of San Francisco before landing and spending more time along the harbour.

Aye Captain (I suppose)

A recreation of an escape attempt where the prisoner made a fake head to fool the wardens after climbing through the vent

After walking along the historic pier and seeing old boats and more seals we see a man holding a huge bunch of leaves, it's the world famous Bush Man! He hides behinds leaves and jumps out at unsuspecting passers by giving them a fright, it's so funny to watch and we could have quite happily watched him for hours, instead we find a nice park to relax in and stare at the Golden Gate bridge  before going to a stinky crab place for drinks (what can we say, It was 2 for 1). Time to go back to do the planning that we missed out on yesterday. It's been a long day!

Bush Man!