Day 3

On this day, I was not a problem to wake up, because I was up before Kari! It was mostly coincidence, but as far as I’m concerned, it still counts. It’s a very good thing that I woke up early, as they forgot our wakeup call! In addition to that, all of last night I was attempting to upload our vacation so far, and I could not get an outside line. Kari got it all sorted out, it turns out that the managers were working last night, and they don’t know how to do much without their employees. It seems that when I called to set our wakeup call, they turned off our phone, causing the effect that we experienced. Tonight, we won’t make the mistake of not setting up a backup alarm.

So, it was coffee, and back to San Francisco! We arrived at the peir, and first things first, we ordered some lobster to ship back for dinner on Friday. We drove around the warf until we found some parking on peir 39. That worked out great, as that seems to be where all the action is. The weather today was really foggy in the bay, and it was misting, not raining, so that was good. We walked around peir 39, and looked around in the shops. There is a place there where sea lions like to hang out, and whoa, what a smell! They are not as clean in the wild as they are at the zoo!

Now it was time to head over to peir 41, right next door, to catch the ferry ride to Alcatraz.

There were many other people there besides us, so it’s a good thing that Kari got tickets for the ferry before we got there. As we boarded the ferry, they took our picture in front of a large life preserver that said something on it. I didn’t pay too much attention to that. The ride only takes a few minutes, and then there we were, on Alcatraz! Kari payed a couple extra bucks when she ordered the tickets for a self guided audio tour, and it was great. They have it set up where you get this little device that you wear around your neck that has some headphones that you wear. You walk along this blue line, and when it ends, you press the start button on the device. The audio contains interviews from actual inmates and guards from when Alcatraz was still a prison. It tells you where to go, and they have signs and areas that you use as checkpoints to synchronize the tour. It even guides you through the famous attempted breakout. Then it was back on the ferry, and off to lunch. We ate at this unimpressive burger place on peir 39. Did I mention that there are ALLOT of pigeons on the peir? They were wandering around everywhere!

Now it was time to head back to Napa Valley. This time, instead of the dull Bay bridge, we went over the Golden Gate bridge!

That was really cool!

The trip to Napa up 101 to 37 was quite a bit more scenic than the trip up 80, but it is also a bit longer. Our target for the day was Domaine Chandon.

It was a good tour, with great information on how Champagne is made, and why Champagne is only called Champagne from American and French sources. Kari and I liked 3 kinds of sparkling wine, so we bought 3 bottles here.

Tomorrow, it’s back to Napa, and trips to Robert Mondavi, Berringer, and the petrified forest.

Here is today’s picture of the day! A shot of San Francisco from Alcatraz.