After a long day of travelling, with a stop in Seattle, we made it from Hawaii to San Francisco. It wasn't quite dark when we landed, so we got a nice view of the city and the Golden Gate Bridge as we descended down to the airport. From there we got a shuttle bus to our hotel in the downtown area near the docks - it's a really nice place, a Victorian style hotel with authentic everything, and a huge plus was that it is so quiet compared to hostels - absolute bliss! After a little lie in the next morning we got up and out to visit the Golden Gate Bridge. We thought that we would only spend half an hour or so there to take some photos, but we were actually there for around 3 hours. We started off getting loads of photos - it's so impressive to see, especially - up close. Then we walked up and started to walk across it- we got about half way before turning around, because we couldn't catch a bus from the other side. The views from the bridge were great - we could see into the city, out into the Pacific Ocean, and could also see surfers down below us as well as a couple of sea lions fishing in the water! When we got back on land we walked under the bridge to get a view of the outer bay, before going to get a snack from the little shop on site. As we were eating lunch it started to get a bit foggy, so we got some more photos of the bridge covered in mist - very atmospheric. From here we got a bus back towards the hotel, stopping off to walk up a very steep hill so that we could visit the 'crookedest street in the world' - it was very steep and windy, and quite narrow too (although Guernsey drivers would have had no problems with it - some of the Americans though found it extremely difficult to drive down!). We walked back to our hotel for a quick rest, before heading out again to go to Alamo Square to see the 'Painted Ladies' - the traditional Victorian houses painted in 3 or more colours. They were very pretty to look at, but apart from that there wasn't much to see so we headed down to the Civic Square to have a look at the City Hall - a huge building with gold decorations. It was quite nice, but again nothing special so we went back to the hotel. For tea we decided to go to the restaurant underneath the hotel, which is apparently the oldest Italian restaurant in America. We treated ourselves to a bottle of wine, as well as pasta and a dessert - it was probably the most we've spent on a meal in months, but it was really tasty! Then it was off to bed ready for our early start the next morning for our trip to Alcatraz. We had booked to go on the earlybird boat so we would get more time on the island, and it's a good job we booked it a couple of months ago because according to the office there are no more tours available until June 29th! When we arrived on the island we first got to see and hear from a former Alcatraz prisoner, one of the few surviving ones (the prison closed in 1963 so they are very elderly now). We then watched a short documentary which explained about the history of the island, before heading up the hill to the cell block. We took a couple of detours to see the other old buildings, as well as the hundreds of nesting seabirds that all have chicks now, before arriving at the cell block to take the audio tour. It was a really interesting 45 minute tour that took us all around the cell block (the cells, library, dinig hall, recreation yard, visiting area, administration area) and told us all about the history of the prison as well as about a riot in 1946 and some famous escape attempts! Once we'd finished the tour we went round to the west side of the island to see the gardens as well as the great views out across the bay towards the city and the Golden Gate Bridge - it's only 1.5 miles from the island to the city, so it must have been really depressing for the prisoners to have freedom so near yet so far. We headed back down to the docks, having a quick look at an exhibition that explained about the Indian Occupation of the island in 1969 as well as another one that explained what it was like for the children who grew up on the island, before getting the boat back to the city. We then walked along the Embarcadero to Pier 39 down at Fisherman's Wharf, which was full of souvenirs shops and restaurants. We got a cheap-ish bite to eat at a Mexican restaurant and then went to see the star attraction - thensea lions who rest out on the pontoons by the pier. They were huge and really close to the pier - it was great to see them up so close in the wild! Bynthis point we were pretty tired from all our walking around, so we went back to the hotel for a rest and to pack our bags ready for checking out tomorrow.nOn our last day in San Fran we went over to the cafe across from our hotel to get some breakfast before coming back to check out of our room. Our shuttle bus to the airport wasn't picking us up until 9.10pm, so we left out bags at the hotel while we went out to explore some more of the city. Our first port of call was the Bay Street Station to get a ride on one of the city's famous cable cars - the only ones in the world that are still manually operated by the drivers. For $6 we got a one way ticket all the way to the end of the line at the Powell Street Station, going up some really steep hills along the way - we were glad not to be walking up them! At the end we got off near Union Square and had a look around some of the shops, as well as some market stalls in the square where people were selling their artwork - very nice but too big and expensive for us to buy any! Next up we decided to walk slowly downhill towards our hotel via Chinatown - it's a really big area of the city full of chinese restaurants, shops and buildings - a little like being back in Hong Kong but with a lot fewer people! We bought a really cheap but delicious lunch from a chinese bakery, and then headed out of the area onto Columbus Street - an area full of cafes, restaurants and shops. We walked along the road a bit and decided to stop to get a coffee (and to have a sit down because we had been walking for quite a while!). Once we'd pretty much outstayed our welcome we carried on down the road until we got to a little park called Washington Square, where we sat to enjoy the sunshine for a while, as well as having a quick look inside the large church there. We still had loads of time before we needed to collect our bags, so we decided to walk up a very steep hill to get to Coit Tower, where we had some great views of the city and Alcatraz - unfortunately the Golden Gate Bridge was completely covered in mist so we couldn't see it, and we decided not to go up to the top of the tower because you had to pay to do it! We wandered back down the hill towards the park again, where we sat down again for a bit before going to have a look at some of the shops and stopping to mooch around a bookshop. By this time we were quite hungry, so we found a cafe that sold really big but cheap slices of pizza; once we'd finished up there it was back to the park again where we wasted some more time sitting in the sun. Unfortunately we were getting pretty bored and quite cold by this point, so it was back to the hotel for us to use the free wifi and wait until our shuttle could come to collect us to go to the airport - it was our fault really for booking a flight that leaves at 00:50 in the morning!