Alcatraz Island

The city lights and neon signs that lined the streets hurriedly passed by as the streetcar rushed down the San Francisco street. I stood on the outside of the car holding on tightly to the hand poles to avoid falling off or being hit by a car parked to far away from the curb. The cable car's bell rang once, and the gripman pulled the red track brake towards him to stop the car. I stepped off the car along with my sister, parents, and several other tourists. It had started to smell more and more like fish and salt water as the cable car came closer to the wharf and now it was overwhelming. Behind me I heard the shifting of gears and the two bells as the car continued on its hilly track.

My family began walking towards the pier where the ferry would take us across the San Francisco Bay to Alcatraz Island. A couple of seats were left empty on the top level so my sister and I sat next to the side looking over the railing into the dark water below. The morning fog hadn't cleared away yet giving the day a dreary atmosphere and made the approaching island looked even more ominous. But I started to pick things out of the fog: looming guard towers, rocky cliffs, high fences, several crumbling buildings, and flocks of sea birds circling the sky above the island.

As my family stepped off the ferry onto the island, we were reminded it was a landmark and were then free to walk about. We decided what to visit first and then began the sloping climb to the giant cellhouse.

An audio tour was the only guide through the long rows or steel- reinforced concrete walls and its long rows tool-proof bared doors. Some light was coming in through the large skylights on the roof, but the inmate's cells and the sound effects on the audio tour gave the cellhouse a quiet but confining monotony. I passed by the cell where Al Capone was supposedly held, listened to the many stories of escape attempts, none of which seemed to be quite successful. I was glad once the audio tour had ended, and I was able to leave the depressing cellhouse behind.

We walked about the island for awhile and pointed out things on the map such as the military morgue and guardhouses. Bleak buildings sat in ruin, looking far more then a decade old. Untended plants spilled out of their original boundaries, over cement walls, and the down the slopes. Several young artists sat on the ground with their sketchbooks out and their coat collars up in attempt to save them from the chilling salt wind blowing up from the bay and from the recreation yard, the foggy outline of San Francisco could be seen. It was only a ferry's ride away for me, but for the 1,545 men who did time on Alcatraz it would have been a very long time before it came any closer.