Here’s the photos from today in a Flickr slideshow…

I gave the Nikon a good work-out today, taking around 300 photos, of which 50 are online. Some of the others are okay, but the 50 on Flickr are the keepers. For some reason they’ve gone on in reverse chronological order… not sure how to fix that! There’s a few photos that I’m very pleased with, but I need more practice with the manual camera controls. Some times I managed to get the photos I wanted, other times I either wasn’t fast enough with the controls, or didn’t have the opportunity to nut it out. Alcatraz was hard, because the lighting inside was very poor, and I didn’t want to use the flash and loose all the atmosphere. There were heaps of tourists walking around, so getting clear shots not full of tourists dictacted I leave most of the exposure setting to the camera. Anyhow, on with the details. They won’t be as full on as yesterdays, because the photos speak for themselves, and not as much crazy stuff happened.

I got up early, about 6:45 am, which was no problem because I’m not fully adjusted to the timezone here, and there was all manner of banging going on during the night. My room is one of the rooms surrounding the carpark, and I think there’s a noisy roller door which opens and shuts automatically. The hotel just gets better and better!

I went down for free breakfast, which actually wasn’t bad although there was fairly limited space available. Self-serve toast, bagels, some weird white balls that looked like boiled eggs (I didn’t bother to try one) and cake (sort of like sliced muffins). Orange/apple juice and tea/coffee also. I grab a couple of bagels and a slice of cake and washed it down with some juice. I’m going to make the most of the free breakfast while I’m here. Basil was on the front desk again when I left… he looked thoroughly cheesed off. He reminds me of the soup nazi… “No room for you!” - then he grabs the key back.

I had looked up last night my plan for today as I already had a ticket booked for Alcatraz at 10:15. It’s a way from here, so I needed to figure out how to get down there in time. I found that a couple of blocks from here is the start of the California Rd cable car. Cable cars are a bit like trams, but … er… with cables. The cables run along under the road and pull them along. At least that’s how it looks to me. They’re like the ones that Eddie Valiant grabs on to in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. They’re very old school… a dude has to operate them with a bunch of levers and pulleys. You can sit on the side of them or just hang on to a post. If you slipped you’d fall right of into the road. Anyway it cost $5 to ride from one end of California Rd to another. It was quite an exciting ride because of all the steep roads in San Francisco. It felt like the cable car might loose control and fly off down the hill at any moment, Starsky and Hutch style.

The cable car ends at the sea, at Fisherman’s Wharf. There are heaps of piers that run off the Wharf and they are numbered (fairly imaginatively) from 1 upwards. Opposite the Wharf is an area called Embarcadero. This is significant because it’s a large chunk of the San Francisco level from Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 4, a game which I’ve spent many hours playing on Playstation 2 and XBox. The other part of the level is Fisherman’s Wharf. This really weirded me out because I essentially already knew my way around. I tried to kickflip to varial heelflip over a bum and lost my balance though. Apparently computer games aren’t like the real world.

It was still very early and I wasn’t too far from where the ferry leaves for Alcatraz so I wandered around the piers. It was a beautiful morning with some really strange clouds in the sky. A little chilly but still sunny. There were a few people running or walking their dogs, and a few strange asian men doing calistenics routines involving lots of odd stretches. I got some great photos down the deserted piers that I wouldn’t have been able to get later in the day. The lighting was also very nice given it was only just after sunrise.

I kept walking round to Pier 41 where the boat for Alcatraz departs. At Pier 39 I found yet another Tony Hawk 4 phenomenon - sea lions! San Francisco is home to a whole lot of native sea lions and they hang out at Pier 39 (later I did see some down at Fort Mason, they must have been slumming it). They’re great fun to watch, the males fight for the best spots on the floating platforms and knock each other into the water. I wish I could have taped the sound of them… with 30 or more sea lions they make a hell of a ruckus. They all sound like someone either choking on a large beef steak, or having the biggest belly laugh of their lives. The noise could get on your nerves after a while, so I kept going on to Pier 41.

I picked up my ticket at the pre-paid window (good thing I booked - it was already sold out for the whole day) and waited down at the dock for the boat to leave. It all timed out perfectly. A short ferry ride over to Alcatraz, which allowed for some good pictures of the island, the city and the Golden Gate bridge, and we were ashore the Rock. The Rock is run by the parks department, so a park ranger introduced us to the facility and the attractions. Then you get sent on your way to explore. The climb to the cellhouse, the highest point on the island is the equivalent of 13 stories. More good exercise!

Again I already know the layout of Alcatraz pretty well because of Tony Hawk 4, which has an Alcatraz level too. I guess the developers must have come on a trip to San Francisco and Alcatraz too when they made the game. It’s a very interesting facility, I’ll let you check out the photos instead of me describing everything again. It’s amazing how many movies have either featured the facility itself, or have used it as inspiration for set design and art direction. I found myself thinking of Half-life 2 frequently which feels a lot like Alcatraz in terms of art direction. Not just in the jail levels, but just in general. Alcatraz is very old, and quite run down. Several buildings are burned down, others are just rusted up completely or overgrown with wildlife. Birds nest all over the island. The sea gulls here are big fellas, probably about 25-30% bigger than the ones hanging around the beaches in Melbourne.

There’s an audio tour too, in which you strap some headphones on your noggin, and walk around listening to a tour on tape. It tells you where to go and what to look at. It’s very professional and makes the cellhouse part of Alcatraz much more personal and real. I’m haning to rent The Rock and Escape From Alcatraz again now I know it a bit better. I left a couple of hours later on the ferry back to the wharf. It’s now about lunch time.

I take a walk further down the wharf, the place is now packed with people. It’s a Sunday afternoon and a lovely day, so there’s tourists, locals and all sorts walking around. Buskers are everywhere, some good some bad, some just downright weird. I get to the end of the wharf and there’s heaps of fresh fish shops selling crabs and other seafood fresh from the sea. They all sell fresh clam chowder, and a particular variety of clam chowder where it comes in a bowl made out of bread. You dip the removed part in and eat it. Then you eat the chowder. Then you eat the bowl. As Steinberner says in Seinfeld: “Nothin’ like lookin’ down after your lunch and just seeing the table.”

I grab a bowl of this local delicacy for the cheap price of $5.97. The place is so busy people are just standing around eating on the street. The place has a great vibe. I stand around and do the same. I would have taken a photo of the food first, but it was hard enough to handle without trying to document the event at the same time. I check out Pier 39 again, which is now a bustling commerical area with lots of specialty shops, tourists, buskers, tourists, kids rides and did I mention tourists? It reminds me of Main Street USA at Disney World.

I walk around again past the wharf and on the start of the bike trail towards the Golden Gate bridge. There’s no way I’d walk it, it’s probably 20kms or so but I’m just exploring. Lots of nice parks and people kicking back on a Sunday afternoon. I hang out in the park a while (my legs and feet ache by this point, having done nothing but walk for 6-7 hours) and then figure I’ll get going back to the hotel. It’s 4:30 and I can’t walk much further. Instead of going back the same way I came, I take a walk from Fort Mason to Van Ness Avenue’s start. It’s probably 20 blocks back to the hotel from here, but it means I don’t have to take the cable car back from the wharf, which would probably be just as far if not further from here.

I grabbed a couple of bottles of water, a diet coke and a coffee scroll from an Asian cafe on the way back to the hotel. I won’t eat dinner tonight as I’m still full from lunch and the San Francisco water tastes, um… “irony” I guess is the only way to describe it. Apparently it is safe to drink but has been found to be high in lead. I’d rather drink bottled water to be on the safe side. I’m still getting used to the crazy money here. It’s harder to tell which note is which since they aren’t colour coded like in Australia. I’ve tried to grab a $5 a couple of times and found a $50 instead.

I’m still shocked by the homelessness problem here. Both this morning and tonight and the way away and back from the hotel, almost every alley you look down contains a homeless person sleeping. People walk past like it’s business as usual. There’s almost as many people on the street as there are people living in apartments, and this is in a more affluent area. I hate to think what the Tenderloin (the area I unknowingly wandered into yesterday) is like at night time.

Anyhow, I’m signing out for today. So long as the weather holds up I’m going to hire a bike tomorrow and cross the Golden Gate. If I have the energy there are some park rides that you can do in Sausalito across the bridge. It’s only $28 to hire a bike, lock, helmet and map for a day, which is quite reasonable. They’re newish bikes and well maintained, and they have plenty of them so they can fit them to the rider.