Angel Island

The fog-shrouded Golden Gate Bridge on the way to Angel Island

Having friends who were athletes in high school has its disadvantages: you are at constant risk of filling your weekends with physical activities that displace important priorities such as taking a nap or watching televised sports. The risk increases if such activity is proposed in the presence of one’s adolescent child, because guilt enters into the calculus. If the parent were to decline the invitation, there is guilt over passing up an opportunity to bond with the child and guilt over setting a poor example of physical (un)fitness. And so it was that I assented to the Angel Island bike trip last Saturday morning.

Four adults and four teenagers assembled in a Foster City parking lot at 8 o’clock. After loading up a truck and a van with bicycles and backpacks, we drove north to San Francisco’s Pier 41, where we boarded the ferry to Angel Island.

The ferry landing at Ayala Cove

Angel Island, like its Bay companions Alcatraz and Treasure Island, used to thrum with military, immigration, prisons, and other state-sponsored activity, but is now a park frequented by picnickers and bicyclists. Angel Island is accessible only by ferry (adult roundtrip-$13; under 13-$7.50), which in civilized fashion serves hot food and age-appropriate beverages. After we ventured topside to take in the view, blasts of cold air drove us below to warm ourselves with coffee, hot chocolate, and pretzels.

At the landing we trudged uphill with our bikes to the paved road that circles the island. We stopped at several of the State Park’s noteworthy historical attractions: Fort McDowell, through which thousands of draftees passed during World War II, and the immigration station, which became the point of enforcement for the Exclusion Acts that limited Chinese immigration. Newcomers from Asia may feel unwelcome in certain circles today, but their trials are nothing compared to the opprobrium visited over a century ago upon the Chinese laborers, many of whom died digging the railroad tunnels and inland California waterways. Reviewing their history in the Visitor’s Center, I felt gratitude both to them and to the GI’s who were shipped out to the killing fields of Bastogne and Gaudalcanal.

There wasn't much privacy in my father's Army.


The monument by the immigration station

Despite the steep hills, my poor stamina, and worn brakes that slipped on the gravel, we completed the trip without incident and boarded the return ferry just before 1 o'clock.

The ferry stopped at Alcatraz on the way back to San Francisco.

We were greeted by clear skies when we walked off the ferry; the wharf was teeming with tourists and the Giants were challenging the hated Dodgers in a late-season pennant race at nearby SBC Park. There were a couple of anxious moments when the truck wouldn’t start (loose battery cable) and a car door slammed the former high-school athlete’s finger (ice stabilized the swelling), and we wended our way through the traffic and arrived in Foster City by 4 p.m., all present and accounted for.

Last week I received a brochure from a real estate developer who is selling new condominiums by SBC Park. The price for a 1,200-1,400 square-foot condo, depending on the view of the Bay, costs between $1.1 million and $2.1 million. But his views aren’t as good as they are from Angel Island and are a trifle more expensive than the $13 ferry ticket, so I won’t be taking him up on his offer, even if it does include a parking space. © 2004 Stephen Yuen

Priceless view