Today's Blog by Natasha:

Boarded the plane this morning believing that today was our long trek across the pond.As far as I knew, confirmed by the itinerary that I had, we were flying to San Francisco with a quick stop over before heading to Los Angeles and then finally off to Melbourne.There was no reason not to believe that this was the case since Chris always does his homework and would book the best flight options.We were starting on American airlines and then switching to Qantas in San Fran, which currently has to fly through LA before going overseas.

When we disembarked in San Fran we had to collect our bags. Chris told me he needed to get something out.As I was encouraging him to hurry since we had to move to another terminal and didn't have much time, he handed me a piece of paper.It was two tickets to Alcatraz for tomorrow.What?I was very confused.How could we have tickets to Alcatraz since we were leaving today?Chris explained that we were staying in San Fran for a couple of days - his dad had adjusted the itinerary and had a whole host of other people in on the deception to be able to pull it off.How exciting and thoughtful of Chris!I have wanted to see Alcatraz since I was 12 and my dad and I visited.

The weather in SF is a lot cooler than I would have thought it to be, after all this is California in the summer. After being in Portland with temperatures of 30+, 12 degrees is a bit of a shock to the system.Apparently July and August are quite cool and usually foggy.

After dropping our stuff off at the fancy hotel, we took the tourist tram up the steep hills and down again to the waterfront.We hung off the sides while taking pictures - very fun!We had supper at the Boudin Sourdough place and wandered around the piers until after dark, listening to the sweet sounds of the seals and sea lions (you'll have to check out the video to appreciate this)