[Seth-Trips] Alcatraz Island, Sunday, March 20

[Nick Moffitt]

begin  The ASCII Floating Head of Seth David Schoen  quotation:
> Nick Moffitt, friend, former housemate, zork.net operator, etc., etc.,
> is now working as a tour guide at Alcatraz Island.  

	I should point out that I'm a volunteer.  Alcatraz once had 20
rangers roaming the island, but budget cuts have caused that number to
dwindle down to the point where sometimes there are only two rangers
present during the day.  So they make up the difference by encouraging
volunteers to come out, greet arriving guests, roam the island, and
occasionally give behind-the-scenes tours.

> He arranged with some friends visiting from out of town to visit
> Alcatraz this Sunday, and I'm going to join them and get a group
> tour!  (I've never been to Alcatraz before.)

	I'll be able to take you to places that are closed off to
casual visitors.  Most of Alcatraz is sort of free-roaming, and the
audio tours are popular.  But some spots are dangerous if
unsupervised, and require the company of a ranger or volunteer.  That,
and I have the keys.

	I figure I'll try to clear a quick exploration of a civil
war-era tunnel through the island, and then we'll go up to the cell
house and I'll give you all a cell door demonstration and you can
figure out why they call it the "slammer" and where you've heard that
sound before.

> Other seth-trips subscribers are welcome; I'm going to be on the 12:15
> boat.  

	The two out-of-towners will be on the 12:45 boat, so I expect
we'll gather on the dock at around 1pm and wait for them to go through
the dock announcements before proceeding on.  I'll give you guys a
tour of the sally port to wait for the crowds to disperse and then
we'll move into the behind-the-scenes tour.

	If there are folks who don't know Seth or me on sight we can
arrange some sort of sign.

FYI: http://zork.net/gallery/alcatraz/aaa

And we'll meet somewhere in this area:
    http://zork.net/gallery/13Feb2005/aak

> Nick also points out that, as a seth-trips subscriber, he's happy to
> answer any questions.

	My advice right now is to eat lunch beforehand as there's no
food or drink on the island and the ferry concessions aren't exactly
gourmet.  Also be sure to bring a little bottled water even if it
looks rainy.  The top of the island is equivalent to 13 storeys above
the dock area, so you can tire easily if you're not used to hills.

> You can buy tickets at
> 
> https://www.pier41.net/cgi-bin/PerlTix/find.pl?alc=1&special=alcatraz_day

-- 
"I think that software engineering would help to prevent      Nick Moffitt
things like imake."                                          nick at zork.net
   -- Jon Webb