This was my third time to Alcatraz, and although I seem to really enjoy it and try to pay attention, every time I take the tour again it seems like new information.  It’s possible that I have just naturally forgotten things in the 15 or so years since Jen and I visited during our Pacific Coast Highway tour.  I would say this is probably the case, but I do suspect that maybe they change up the stories a little.  It used to be that one guy maybe escaped but probably drowned.  Now it’s three guys who got out on to the roof and disappeared and nobody knows where they went.  Also, the Marines stormed the building to quell a riot and dropped grenades through a hole in the roof?  I think they have Marvel writers working on the audio tour narrative.  Next time it will be Iron Man locking Capone back into his cell after Scarface drinks ionically charged bathtub gin and mutates into The Big Boss who can control minions and melt steel with his brain.  (The new cell will be made out of Starktanium alloy.)

Anyway, even if they embellish the story a little now and then, it’s a great tour with gravelly-voiced guards right there in your ears and  former convicts chiming in now and then.  The place is physically remarkable in its gravity, being plunked in the middle of a scenic cornucopia.

Where they have definitely made improvements on Alcatraz is in the plants.  Apparently volunteers have been revitalizing the gardens since my last visit.  Hundreds of the specimens planted by guards’ families and inmates alike had survived neglect since the prison closed in the 60s, and these have been brought back into refinement.  Currently on the island there is an art exhibit by a former political prisoner from China and I think at least part of the idea is that beauty in a prison is supposed to be a jarring contrast.  The rejuvenated landscaping along the walkway up to the prison performed this task at least as successfully as the art exhibit did, the various flowering (even in November!) specimens stood out beautifully against the concrete and rusted metal of the prison and fort installations.

We did not take the gardens tour (I did not think the kids would be up for an hour of hearing about plants), but we saw plenty of beautiful things that seemed even too exotic for California just in the normal course of walking about.  Here are some pictures:

Mist shrouds the island as we approach.

I think the girls liked it, too, but it was hard to tell.  It is a somber place, even with all the flowers, and the girls didn’t have that much to say afterwards.  The weather added to the gravity of it all.  It was foggy enough that you couldn’t see the island from the mainland, or vice versa. It was very different from the first day here, when the visibility was excellent.  One really felt isolated on that island today, whereas yesterday you could see clearly from half the streets in downtown San Francisco.