San Francisco

With the cold still in full effect, I decided an open top bus tour was the only was I going to see San Francisco in two days, plus visit Alcatraz. Luckily I got a discount on my joint ticket, so it didn’t break the bank hugely.

The Bird Man of Alcatraz had no birds on Alcatraz, there, myth gone. It’s a weird island, very eerie and evocative. The audio tour is by both ex convicts and guards, so it gives both sides of the story, it seems neither liked it there. But then again I don’t suppose prisoners are meant to like jail, sort of against the point.
Even though there is an audio tour you can spend as long as you like in the buildings, so long as you’re ready to catch the last ferry back. The tour covers everything from attempted break outs and successful ones to life on the island for the guards and their families. Plus it mentioned famous prisoners, like the birdless bird man and Al Capone, who was imprisoned for tax evasion, not any other naughty stuff. They still don’t know if a bunch of convicts ever made it to dry land, they did escape the island, by climbing through ducts and leaving fake heads to fool the guards, but no one knows if they made it to safety, some say South America as they were learning Spanish, or if they died in the freezing waters of the bay - I’m going with the waters of the bay being the winner on that one.

The hostel was located at Fort Mason, just on beyond Fisherman’s Walk, so it was a fairly flat walk back to the hostel, past all the piers and to the old army barracks. Hostel dorms being old army barracks, mean they are large, these had 24 beds in each dorm - normally there’s been a max of 12 beds. It also means a potential for more snorers, sleep talkers and late night plastic bag rustlers - we only had the snorers who seemed to surround my bed and sound like 23 people - ear plugs are an essential item at times like this.

Day two was another bus tour, this time over The Golden Gate Bridge - painted international orange - to the viewpoint in Marin County, thankfully it wasn’t too foggy, so I was able to get a picture or three of the bridge. It was the gateway to the gold rush, rather than anything exciting, like being made of gold. 

We then drove back into the old part of town, the 25% that was saved from the huge fire back in the 1800’s, via the Presidio Gardens and the hills. What seems to be the main events in the history of San Francisco are the two big earthquakes and the huge fire than followed the first earthquake as this shaped the city and the threat of more earthquakes shapes it still.

After the Golden Gate tour it was another loop of the city, covering downtown, the Ferry Building, where I stopped for lunch at Taylor’s Automatic Refresher, which sold really good hamburgers, but with a name like it had to be visited. The Farmers’ Market was taking place outside the building, but it didn’t seem to have much on offer, maybe it’s more of a weekend thing. I’d heard of the market from various food blogs so was interested to see what they had, but sadly wasn’t impressed. Then it was a case of jumping on the next bus that came along, grabbing a bunch of blankets and heading up top to see more of the town. Including Haight-Ashbury, Golden Gate Park, Union Square, Chinatown until I could bear it no more and shivering to death I got off again at Fisherman’s Wharf and trudged back to the hostel.

I’m sure if the cold wasn’t being such a pain and the city wasn’t so cold I would have enjoyed San Francisco more, but after two days of being freezing cold, with uncontrollable shakes it was time to leave and head south, where it should be a bit warmer, ha!

Next stop: The Canyons