Alcatraz

Saturday we headed out early to explore the city some more and we wound up on Powell at one of the destinations that I had planned to photograph " Lori's Diner " The Woman and I had a wonderful breakfast surrounded by 50's memorabilia including an Edsel parked by the restrooms.

It was a little cool and rainy that morning as we headed to the ferry to take our tour of Alcatraz. We boarded and took our seats on the top deck at the bow of the ferry so we would have a birds eye view of the island as we approuched. The weather was appropriate as we pulled up to this foreboding island called " The Rock".

We made our way up the steep walkways and watchtowered shore to the cell house. At the cell house we were given our audio tour headphones and started our journey through the prison narrated by ex gaurds and inmates. The background sounds at times gave you the eerie feeling that there was lots of inmates on the upper tiers. I fould myself more than once looking up to see who was making the cat calls as I walked down Broadway, the center row of the cell house.

The cells were amazingly small, 5' x 9' with a 7 ' ceiling , with a toilet, sink, two shelves, metal table and chair, and metal rack for the mattress. It must have been torture on the convicts to be so close to the city and to be confined in these tiny cubicles. There are even little windows in the cell house area so the inmates could look out at the city.

The morning at Alcatraz was very somber with the misting rain and cooler temparatures, this was a terrible place to be held captive. We were reminded as we left the island by a sign that read " When you break the law they send you to prison, when you break the prison they send you to Alcatraz"