We have travelled from Ellis Island to Alcatraz; from an island of hope to an island of no hope. I didn’t know what to expect of Alcatraz. I had seen the films (Birdman and Escape from Alcatraz) a long time ago and remembered that impression of hopelessness being so close to the city. (If the wind was blowing in the right direction prisoners could hear the party goers at the city’s yacht club.) In fact, a visit to the island is a truly unforgettable experience. As part of the ticket entry price visitors can follow an audio tour, narrated by some of the prison’s former guards and prisoners. It is brilliantly done, complete with sound effects, and perhaps especially the parts on the two most important escape attempts. I turned off my guide and went for a wander down through the gardens towards the waters of the Bay. The island’s flanks have become a bird reserve and the egrets and Californian gulls nest fearlessly close to the path. (I felt a bit like Tippi Hedren and then I remembered another film, about Salt Lake City and the early Mormon settlers and how the California gulls had flown to the rescue by eating a plague of grasshoppers. There are statues to the gulls in Salt Lake City now.)  Back in the bookshop the son of one of the guards was signing copies of his memoirs about life as a child on the island (they were ferried to and from school on the mainland every day). I wonder how it felt to be a warder’s wife here. It must have been almost as depressing as being on the inside of the prison…