Escapes other than the Pina Colada song...

Neglecting to think about the morning rush hour traffic to get into and through the city, we booked our ferry passage to Alcatraz at 9:30, and we were supposed to pick up our tickets by 8:30am. So we got up and were on our way to Fisherman's Wharf bright and early - by shortly after 7:00. We did hit some stop-and-go traffic, so we didn't have too awfully long to wait when we finally made it to Pier 39 and parked. While we waited, we browsed the gift shop a little, then it was time to get in line and wait some more. Having Aunt Rose along does have some advantages... instead of sending us through the long and winding line, they had us wait right up near the front and we got to board the ferry first. Once we reaced the island, there was a 1/3 mile hike up the hill to the cell block with an elevation change of just over 13o feet. Since Aunt Rose couldn't make it, she took the tram up while Kate and I hoofed it. At the top, we took a 32-minute guided audio tour which told us all about the prison and had us wandering all over around the cell block. Although it's not the imposing, dark, desolate place Hollywood has made it out to be, I certainly wouldn't want to be locked up there.


Alcatraz prison
After returning to the pier, we decided to go to the Bay Aquarium, which was at Pier 39. Not only did they have two long glass tunnels that we rode a moving walkway through to check out the fish, they also had three "touch pools", where we actually got to touch some of the marine life in person. We got to "pet" bat rays and skates, both of which were pretty slimy feeling, sharks (I can't remember what kind they were) like the one below, and starfish.


Shark!!

Once we were done feeling the fishies, we had some time to kill before dropping Kate off at the airport and driving to Bakersfield, so we took a tour of the city, including Haight-Ashbury and Lombard Street - the crookedest street in the United States. The speed limit was 5 mph and the road made about 6 twists in each direction during the span of one block.

View from the top of Lombard Street

Finally, it was time to say goodbye to Kate and head back towards Phoenix. We dropped her off rather early, which turned out to be a good thing, since Bakersfield was a long, long drive. We rolled into our hotel around 12:30 after a few times getting lost and rolled into bed, exhausted.

A day in the park (among other things...)

Let me set the scene... It's a beautiful day, slightly chilly, but nothing we intrepid Michiganders can't handle, right? It's also a Sunday morning, and Kate and I are awoken at the butt-crack of dawn by an impatient Aunt Rose. She said she was going to let us sleep in, and she did - until about 7:00... After getting ready, we headed up to the city (our hotel was about 30 miles southeast of the actual city, which wasn't too bad. We stopped for breakfast, then headed out to Cliff House, where sea lions are supposed to hang out to give the tourists a good show. They weren't interested in entertaining, so we didn't stick around there too long, but headed out for Golden Gate Park - the 1,000 acre park right in the middle of the city (Kate said it reminded her of Central Park in New York). The park was pretty nice - nicer I'm sure for those people who don't get to experience much of that type of nature. There were a lot of trees and grass, an arboretum, which we toured briefly, but looked pretty much like any botanical garden you would see anywhere else. There was also a Japanese tea garden, which we went in and toured - very pretty.


Japanese Tea Garden - Golden Gate Park

Trees in the park

After touring the park, we called my cousin Christine, who lives out in the San Francisco area to see if we could meet her for dinner. She and her boyfriend invited us to his house for burgers that night, and we headed off to explore until it was time to head over there. Our next stop was the Golden Gate itself. It was somewhat impressive - I mean, hey, it's one of the most famous bridges in the world, probably, but I didn't really think it was all that big a deal. Of course, I'm used to the Mackinaw Bridge, which is longer (I think), and in my opinion, prettier. While on the other side of the bridge, we drove through Saulsalito, which used to be an artist's colony back some time ago, then croseed back over the bridge to go to Chinatown for lunch. We had awesome food at a little restaurant, looked around some, then went down to the Cartoon Art Museum before meeting up with Christine and Gary for dinner and fresh home-made margaritas - yum! After the margaritas and the great dinner, we were exhausted, and went back to the hotel for rest and relaxation before getting up early Monday morning for our tour of the Rock...


San Francisco skyline

California dreamin'

On Thursday morning, we headed out for San Diego. We drove, and drove, and drove some more, stopping at a casino along the way, and finally reaching our hotel about 6:30. We picked Kate up at the airport at 9:00, and headed out to find some dinner. Friday morning, we got up and went to the San Diego Wild Animal Park, which is about 40 minutes northeast of the city. We saw a lot of neat animals, but most of the pictures are on my big camera because I needed the zoom. There were lots of birds around, but we also took a train ride where we saw everything from elephants and giraffes to a baby Indian rhino!


Lorikeet at the San Diego Wild Animal Park

On the way back from the park, we stopped off at a couple of beaches so we could stick our feet in the ocean and take some pictures. We walked out on the rocks at the beach, then took our shoes off so we could go in. The water was cold, but not too bad, and the view was beautiful. After our feet dried, we headed back to the city, but stopped at another beach for a few shots. When we got back to San Diego, we drove around to see the Gaslamp district and got stuck in traffic for a Padres game, which was starting at 7:05 (we got down in that area about 6:30). By the time we got back to the hotel, we were more than ready for bed.


Kate on the beach


Fisherman on the beach at Torrey Pines State Park

This morning we got up early and began the trek to San Francisco. We got stuck in several traffic jams in L.A., saw the Hollywood sign from the road, but couldn't get a picture, and drove. A lot. The drive was definitely scenic, but we didn't get to San Francisco and the hotel until about 10:00 tonight. We did stop at San Juan Capistrano for a while to tour the mission and stretch our legs for a while. I loved the bells (of course), but this picture shows the whole thing better. Tomorrow, it's down to the Golden Gate and Chinatown...


The mission at San Juan Capistrano

Catch up...

I've been out of Internet connection range/time the last few days, so here are some pictures and stories...

We got to Tucson on April 3rd to visit Aunt Rose's friends who I call Aunt Ginny & Uncle Cy. We haven't seen them in two years, and in the intervening time Aunt Ginny, who has Parkinson's disease, had had a stroke and is now confined to a wheelchair. She hasn't let that slow her down, though. She's still convinced that she can do everything she used to do. The first day in Tucson, we went over to Green Valley (a mostly retirement community about half an hour south of Tucson) to visit another friend of Aunt Rose's whose husband had recently passed away. On the way there, we stopped at an art gallery and looked around for a while.


Me with Aunt Ginny

Aunt Rose, Aunt Ginny & Uncle Cy

On Tuesday, we got up and went to the Tohono Chul park, which is like a botanical garden filled with native plants. After we went through the park, we headed out to Kitt Peak observatory to look around there. It was interesting, but I really didn't get to do anything, so that made it a little bit boring. I think I would rather have been able to go at night when the guests get to look up in the sky and see what the astonomers do all the time.


Kitt Peak Observatory (solar)

A day spent looking at rocks...

The three Gossips - Arches National Park

Those of you who have seen my other pictures from my trips out West know that the title of this post is not a bad thing for me. In fact, I can't think of many other things I'd rather see. We got up and drove the 5 miles from Moab to Arches National Park fairly early - I think we were there by a little after 9:00. The weather was beautiful again - it was a little chilly in the morning, but warmed up nicely as the day went on. The first part of the park is mostly rock formations like the one above, but as we got further back we began to see some of the arches that give the park its name. The first arches we came to were called Turret Arch and the North and South Windows. Aunt Rose waited in the car while I hiked the 1.1 mile loop to go view them.


North Window - Arches National Park

After we left the Windows area, we drove through the rest of the park. Most of the arches weren't visible unless you hiked the trails to see them, and since the trails back there were 3 - 5 miles over rocks and up and down the mountainside, I opted out of them. I did hike to the viewing area for Delicate Arch - a short but very steep climb which was well worth the effort to get there.

After leaving Arches, we began the long drive back down to Flagstaff, planning a stop in Monument Valley on the way through. It was kind of nice to get to see all the scenery that we missed by driving in the dark the night before. The drive was long but beautiful - cutting through red rock cliffs and for a long time I had a gorgeous view of the snow-covered mountains near Moab in my rear view mirror. We made it to Monument Valley around 4:00 and decided to take a Jeep tour. You can drive your own car through part of the valley, but the road was unpaved and very rough - once we got started I was really glad we hadn't brought the rental car down it. We shared a jeep with a very nice woman around my age who is a traveling nurse. Her assignment in Tucson had just ended, and she was doing the sightseeing she hadn't had a chance to do before heading to her next assignment in Vermont. Our guide, Leroy, took us through the Valley - stopping to let Lorena and me take pictures whenever we wanted to, and explaining to us what we were seeing.


Sun's Eye - Monument Valley

The tour took us about 2.5 hours and covered 28 miles and most of the formations in the valley. When we finished, it was sunset, and we had about a 3-hour drive back to Flagstaff. Once again, we were driving in the dark while watching for cows, horses, deer, elk, and falling rock. It was a long day, but well worth it in the end.


Sunset over Monument Valley

A walk in the woods?

Painted Desert - Arizona

Painted Desert - Arizona

Friday, April 1, 2005
We took off from Flagstaff early in the morning and headed for the Petrified Forest and the Painted Desert. After about a 2-hour drive, we arrived at the entrance to the Petrified Forest and stopped at the gift shop there, where I bought some geodes and had them cut. We continued on to the visitor center/museum, and, since they had a wheelchair we could borrow, I decided to push Aunt Rose around the loop through the petrified logs, which would have been fine if there hadn't been stairs involved. Every time we came to a set of stairs, she would get out of the chair and walk up or down, while I followed with the wheelchair. Very interesting... I wasn 't all that impressed with the Petrified Forest - maybe because to me, they just looked like a bunch of trees, and having lived in Michigan all my life, I've seen lots of trees. :) The Painted Desert, however, more than made up for any disappointment I may have had with the forest. The pictures above can't really do justice to how beautiful it really is. A sign there said that the Painted Desert has some of the clearest air in the nation, and I can believe it - at one point, I could see all the way to the San Francisco peaks near Flagstaff, which were 120 miles away!

After leaving the park, we began our long, long journey north. Because much of northeastern Arizona is reservation land, there's not always a town close by. We drove about 2.5 hours and had crossed into Utah before we found a restaurant to stop at. After dinner, we continued for about another 2 hours before finally hitting Moab and our beds. All in all, it was a day with lots of driving, but well worth it for what we saw. Tomorrow, Arches National Park.

Now playing: Sheryl Crow's greatest hits

In the beginning...

Well, we've arrived in Flagstaff. The trip was fairly uneventful - our plane was about 15 minutes late getting into Houston, which left us only 30 minutes to get to our connecting flight's gate. Because of Aunt Rose, they hooked us up on a cart, which was good, since the gate we were supposed to be at was probably about a mile & a half away. When we arrived at that gate, we found out that they'd moved our flight to a gate much closer to where we'd just been. The flight to Phoenix was supposed to leave at 5:30, but ended up being an hour late, so it turned out that we had plenty of time, but it was still worrisome. When we arrived in Phoenix, we made our way down to the baggage claim where the next "issue" popped up. Three of the four bags that were checked arrived safely, but my big green suitcase, which had most of my clothes and my contact solution, etc., wasn't there. I went into the baggage office, and waited while a couple from England gave the lady their information, thinking all the time "This can't be good." When I stepped up to the counter I felt like I was ready to cry. Thankfully, the lady said that she'd just gotten a message from the Northwest terminal (we flew Continental) that my bag was over there. The very nice wheelchair attendant who was helping Aunt Rose went over and got it for me, and we were on our way.

We arrived in Flagstaff at about 1:30 am (3:30 our time), and crashed. Today, we're headed to the Petrified Forest and then up to the vicinity of Arches National Park. Hopefully there will be some good picture opportunities.