Trains, Boats, Planes, Trolley Cars, Automobiles

Two weeks ago Jackie and I took the train from Chi to Seattle, then rented a convertible and drove down the coast to San Francisco. Many adventures were had. Many unlikely things happened. We travelled by many modes of transport and ate many unlucky sea creatures.

The vacation was... what's a big word with the connotation of wonderfulness? Phenomenal? Extrampulicious? Flambacious? All of the above. We travel well together. Really well. Scary well. We experienced no major snags and ran into or made our own luck on a half dozen occassions. Like when we went to Alcatraz...

We did the night tour on Friday the 13th. Extra creepy. They opened the medical area between 8pm and 8:30pm. Very mucho extra double creepy. Big old metal dinosaur/bug like medical equipment in paint peeling, barred and drafty rooms where you KNOW guys died.

A park guide befriended us and took us (and only us) into A block (the oldest part of the prison), then led us to the unused sub-basement. There was no lighting there so we used the ranger's little flashlight and my supah-maglite. Lots of old brickwork and dreary concrete. Then we got to the old isolation cells that were used in the 1800's, where we shut the flashlights off for a bit. Triple extra mucho supah flambaciously creepy. You could see THE DARKNESS and hear howling wind and echo-stretched voices from the cells above. If there's a place I'd believe in spirits, ghosts, or other psychic phenomena it would be in the Alcatraz operating room or the Alcatraz sub-basement isolation cells.

But I don't. Sigh.