Alcatraz Island - Visiting the Rock

 We have visited San Francisco a couple of times, but we had never been out to Alcatraz Island, so we wanted to prioritize this.  The island is part of the National Park Services, and its notorious history as a prison sitting in the middle of the San Francisco bay is legendary.  Alcatraz housed some of the nation's worst criminals, and "The Rock" has been the subject of many movies over the years.  

To visit the island, you take a ferry from Pier 33 on the San Francisco harbor.  This requires advanced reservations that you want to make sure you schedule well before our trip.  The ferry is operated by Alcatraz City Cruises.  The ticket was running $41 for adults and $25 for children when we visited.  This is an inclusive ticket price, and there are no additional park service fees collected.  The ticket will ask you to arrive at Pier 33 early for your scheduled departure.  I recommend following this suggestion as there are many people on each boat and you do not want to miss your scheduled time.  They have a scale model of the island at the terminal with interpretive information that is interesting to read in preparation for your visit.  Before you know it, your ferry will be pulling up to the dock to take you out across the bay to the island.

The ferry has both indoor and outdoor seating available. The ferry ride gets you out on the water and provides you with another view of the city.  As you pull away from the dock, you can see the Coit Tower and the Transamerica building standing out on the skyline.  As you cross the bay, the view of the city becomes more expansive, but then your focus shifts to the approach of the island and the ominous structure of the old prison.

The ferry pulls up to the dock at Alcatraz, and National Park Service staff greet each boat and provide a briefing.  A phone app is available that will offer you a narrated tour of the island as you follow the tour path.  You should download the app before going out to the island, but if you forget, the park rangers will help you at the dock, where they offer free Wi-Fi for this purpose.  The tour is excellent and enables you to understand the different parts of the island.  It is important to remember that while the prison was a big part of the island, there were many other support buildings for the families of the guards who lived on the island.  

The tour walks along the barracks from the dock and housing for the guards as you climb the hill to the top of the island. Gardens and plants are maintained along the path by gardening clubs, and you hear the squawking of the thousands of seagulls that make the island home.  As you reach the top of the hill, you see the old lighthouse on the island.  From here you also get some great views of the city and can see the Golden Gate Bridge.

At this point, you are ready to enter the actual prison.  As you walk through the front door, you pass through the office and see the area where visitors would have been able to talk to the prisoners.  Next, you get your first views of the cell block.  The size is impressive.  You are taken aback momentarily by the starkness of the facility, and the three stories of cells down multiple rows show the numbers of people that could be incarcerated here.

As you tour the cell house, the audio tour introduces you to some of the well-known criminals housed here.  They speak about their time in Alcatraz and some of their experiences.  You see the solitary confinement cells known as the hole.  You hear stories from the inmates about how they could listen to celebrations from the mainland and catch glimpses of fireworks from New Year or Fourth of July.

A few cells are still set up with a replica of what a prison cell would be like.

During the cell block portion of the tour, you also hear the escape attempts that occurred.  The cell pictured above shows how they used spoons and other makeshift tools to get behind the walls and attempt to escape, or another group who gathered parts from Navy uniforms that were being laundered on the island and tried to escape with the clean laundry.  The tour of the cell house ends with a walk through the kitchen and dining hall.

At the end of the tour, there is a gift shop that has an extensive collection of souvenirs, Alcatraz apparel, and books about the island and the prison.  A couple of other buildings are available to tour, but most are just the shells of the building that are left.  Once you have visited everything you want to see, you head back down the hill to the dock, where you will await the next available ferry.  The tour took us about 2 hours to complete.  

When you make it back to the mainland, you are ideally situated between Pier 39 or the main ferry terminal, which are both great places to grab some food and review your plan for the rest of the day.