The birds of Alcatraz: a nesting horde of Brandt's Cormorants, a Snowy Egret, and a Western Gull. In the decades after it shut down, the island prison soon became a refuge and home for these Californian waterfowl.

I now can only carry the memory of when the river flowed through this bed, providing many summers of swimming and sunlit relaxation. To stand on the now-dry rocks, smoothed by the tumbling waters that used to surround it, and look at the silent landscape, is surreal to say the least.