Alcatraz Island Guide Omdömen 

I love the history of this place, I never knew it had cannons. The place itself, is trash. The outside of everything is COVERED in bird feces. And to allow that to happen is truly a misfortune. These birds don’t need another sanctuary, it’s disgusting. And all the flies that land on the feces and then on all the visitors, is plain and simply, gross. Not to mention all the dead birds just lying around. All the buildings being “restored” look more like storage areas, and probably have been for years. This place wasn’t worth the ticket price. And I couldn’t bring my water bottle because it might end up as trash, but I could purchase your water bottle… make that make sense.

The self guided tour was very well done and helpful.

We really enjoyed the ferry ride to Alcatraz and the organization and getting there. I like the fact that we could walk freely through the prison if we wanted to, and it was still enjoyable even without the audio tour that was provided. And we like the fact that you could go when you pleased on the half hour.

Great price, wonderful boat crew, amazing staff helping and answering questions. Really cool stories from staff about the inmates and some of their experiences. The night tour has some added benefits but you do see more in the daytime tour. We also got to see how the door system worked and that made the whole trip. Really cool experience.

The tour was fantastic. I learned more during the audio tour of the cell house than I’d known before. The walk around the island was amazing, and leisurely since we did have to stay with a group. Highly recommend

Over priced

There were just too many other people. The experience felt very rushed and lacking information and organisation.

Great experience, logistically well planned out and executed. Accommodated a lot of people well. We were a group of four, on the self guided walking tour two of our tour "walkman" type radios worked great - the other didn't sync with where we were, but we were able to work around that. Boat ride was great, appreciated the ride up the hill for us older folks. Great day - thank you all.

I would have liked to see more of the prison. it felt very short lived and not value for money.

Tricked into spending more than the direct purchase price

This site is a scam.

To many stairs and kind of boring

It would be nice to know in advance that the tour is no longer offering visits to certain areas such as medical, dining, and showers and that the cell house tour was cut short from the past.

Check in, boarding on/off the island and at the pier were easy, the ferry and island were super clean, and overall it was a very pleasant tour. The only thing that was disappointing was the length of the audio tour and the depth of content, both of which were lacking. I went on a tour about 10 years ago and remember it being so much more memorable.

Ferry was quick and easy to the island. Staff was very friendly and most had a smile on their face.

Easy booking,

We loved the tour. I was not expecting such a historical tour! The history over there is amazing. We loved the headset narration was excellent!

I enjoyed the experience, the history behind every location is very elaborate and educational. The audio tour that you can pause/play is very handy.

Liked the talks and demonstrations

Interesting tour, lots of great information! Sad some of the exhibits were closed but understandable in an effort to preserve and continue with operations.

The boat ride was seamless, the island and the history was really great. The pre-recorded guided tour really helped my family and I better understand Alcatraz and its history.

Our only issue was one of the volunteer guides, "Mother Constance." She is a historical reenactor of the Civil War. She mainly kept to her character and presented information as she felt it would have been seen from that time period, but she deviated from it to include a modern perspective that incorrectly stated that the cause of the Civil War as not due to slavery. Several states cited protection of slavery as their main reason for succession (i.e., Mississipi, Georgia, Texas, S. Carolina) and VP of the Confederacy Stephens stated that slavery was a main motivator for succession. She stated the Civil War was about state rights- but she left out that it was the states' right to enslavement that was the motivator. She also said that San Francisco was largely confederate at that time, it was not. In addition, she emphasized that in the 1960's when native Americans took over Alcatraz it was not "abandoned" in order to discredit the movement, why Alcatraz was taken over, and the fight for rights. She was caught up on this point, which is questionable, to invalidate the movement. It was very black-and-white in her telling and we would have preferred a non-biased source to better teach us about what happened and why.

All in all, we truly enjoyed the actual tour of the prison, but wish we had walked by "Mother Constance."