Home again

It seems inevitable that when we approach the end of our trip that the blog gets pushed to one side, perhaps I don't like writing about endings, or perhaps we are too busy with unnoteworthy mundane things like packing up for it to be a priority.
However, we are now home so this piece is a retrospective of the last three weeks.
We left San Juan Bautiste to drive to our friends Jan and Pete near Merced and are so grateful to them for storing our trailer on their mule field. We had a very pleasant week with them cleaning and preparing the rig for what promises to be a long hot summer.
We said our farewells to Pete and Jan and traveled to San Leandro to stay with our other friends Rich and Debra who live close to our exit airport. We had a great time with them. We visited their church, which was very interesting, we also had a Japanese Hana meal for the first time, also very interesting. Not to mention another trip to the Ice Cream Parlor. We had the time to take a couple of side trips to Oakland which were fun as well.
All to soon we were flying out to take a short break in Florida on the way home. We were again going to Connie and Jim's Bluegrass Party. This again was a marvelous event, made more amazing because of the health problems that have beset the Harper Household in the last year. Thank you to you both for your love and hospitality. From there we visited with our friends Jim and Kathy at their lovely home tucked away on a bend of the Santa Fe River. Here I fulfilled a life long ambition and got to drive a lawn tractor. Then on to Istachatta to visit with Marilee, where we took a side trip back to Homassassa Springs S.P. to see manatee again. We had a very nice day there. From Istachatta we drove to Orlando airport and flew home on a very uneventful journey (thankfully).
So ends Trip 10 to the Southern California Coast.

Closure for Vertigo

So we have now reached closure point for following the Hitchock film ‘Vertigo’, because today we drove through the little town of San Juan Bautista, just 30 miles from Monterey.
It is a charming town which was left behind in 1869 when the railway went to Hollister rather than to San Juan Bautiste.
What it does have is a beautiful Mission, which forms one side of the town square, with the best hotel (Plaza Hotel) on another side and the Non- City hall/Courtroom facing the Mission. The square is now grassed over.
This area and the buildings (except the Mission) are now part of the San Juan Bautista
Historic State Park. It made a very interesting stop, where we stepped back into the Nineteenth Century for a few hours.
In truth the main event for this the square is its place in the film Vertigo.
Firstly the Mission is the building where Kim Novak threw herself from the bell tower, even though the bell tower was not there when the film was shot, as a couple of years before it had collapsed due to termites. So Hitchcock rebuilt the non-existent bell tower in the studio. However he shot them going in and out of the Mission on location.
Secondly Hitchcock filmed on location the courthouse across the square for the inquest scene. Unfortunately it was the only time the building was used as a courthouse.
The City Hall/Courthouse had been built by an ambitious entrepreneur in 1868 in anticipation of San Juan Bautiste becoming the County Town, what he didn’t take into account was that the City Fathers would turn down the offer of the North Pacific Railroad to come to San Juan Bautista for a fee of $50,000, so the railroad went to Hollister instead, it grew, it became the county town, the courthouse was never used, so the guy turned it into a house, until Hitchcock came along and turned it back into a courthouse for that one scene of Vertigo.
That film is so full of interesting stories, but I guess that now we have unraveled most of them. It was a fun day.

Monterey Aquarium

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From San Simeon we drove up the coast on Highway 1, passing along the stunning coast with its views, through Big Sur and we have now returned to Monterey, in order to fulfill our promise to ourselves to revisit the Aquarium. We first visited in 1997 with the kids, we attempted to revisit in November last year, but Sally was too ill, so we just camped in the Monterey Fairground for a week, hoping she would recover enough for us to make the visit.
However this time we arrived in good time and were set up ready to visit the Aquarium.
We set out as early as we could and managed to arrive at the Aquarium just after opening time, we decided that we would like to take the ‘Behind The Scenes’ Tour as well.
This time we were armed with a timetable of events and moved smartly to the Penguins, to see them being fed at 10.30. Cute little Blackfooted Penguins whose home, surprisingly, is Namibia in Southern Africa.
We now had to traverse the length of the Aquarium to see the fish being fed in the gigantic Open Sea Tank. This was a most amazing experience as the main act for this was the feeding of the sardine! Well in this case 20,000 of them. Most of the time they cruise unseen around the bottom of the tank, leaving the top to the tuna, sharks, sunfish, dolphin tuna (mahi Mahi). However come feeding time a handful of Krill dropped in the water brings them swarming to the surface where they swim almost as a single organism, round and round, sweeping up the food being offered. Miraculously parting into two swarms as the bigger fish swim through trying to grab one of them. The group display was amazing. So amazing that when the food was gone and they sank back out of site as quickly as they had arrived there was a spontaneous round of applause – for sardines I ask you!
From there we had a chance to visit one of our favourite areas – the Moon Jellies. They are jellyfish found in Monterey bay and with subtle background lighting they produce yet another amazing display as they appear to bioflouresc (although it is only an effect of the light) in their tanks and drift aimlessly around. It was here taht I really appreciated the amazing optical quality of the tank material, they are designed to be optically neutral, being laminated acrylic. The view was excellent, with very little distortion, great for taking pictures.
From there we went on our guided tour behind the scenes (we really pushed the boat out on this visit), this was great fun and we got a chance to see lots of fish food and water pipes, as well as looked down on the open tank tops and checked out the SCUBA divers area. Then we had time to sit on the patio and have lunch watching the wild life on Monterey Bay. There were a couple of Sae Otters swimming round and a seal also came swimming close into the shore.
We now just caught the end of the a short viewing of the Albatross, which was fascinating
From here we had a look round the shore life exhibits where we could see a lot of hsore birds, who had been rescued and could not be returned to the wild, then we explored the touchy feely exhibit, where we could pick up and touch crabs, starfish, sea urchins, sea cucumbers and abalone. That was relly fun.
This display led us to the Octopus area, where there are two giant Octopus in separate tanks. Lo and behold just as we arrive they start to feed these giants and we see them swimming around and being very lively, it was an excellent display.
Now we got into conversation with a volunteer who kindly took us to see the Sea Horses being fed. The Sea Horses were lovely to watch, especially the Leafy Dragon Fish. While we were there the lady told us that there would be an extra Sea Otter Feeding Session, where one of the sea otters was being employed as a surrogate mother to teach an orphaned baby how to become a proper Sea Otter. That was great fun seeing them being fed and playing around in the water.
All too soon our day was complete, we had really enjoyed ourselves, but were both tired out, so we stopped at the local Chinese Restaurant for a meal. A lovely day.

Sunday is Seal day

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Just down the road from the campground is a beach which is famous as the gathering place for Elephant Seals, so we took a picnic and drove down to have a look.
At this point the road runs along by the sea and there is a car park and a wooden boardwalk to give access seals to the beach. When we got there the cr park was not quite full, but pretty busy. We joined others and walked along the boardwalk above the beach, where we could see the seals, but not interfere with them.
There were probably a hundred or so seals on the sandy beach, they were all laid out in the sun. As we stood and watched we could pick out three types, the huge bull seals, the smaller females and the much smaller baby seals. The beach is a complete community as the seals come ashore in January and stay until march. They use the beach to live on, to mate then following year to have their babies then suckle them and mate again.
We watched the elephant seals for about an hour and a half, slowly we worked out how their social system worked. The males tried to create their own harem, so the strongest males had about half a dozen females for themselves, while other younger or weaker males hung around trying to pick off one of the females and mate with her. This brought about conflict as when the owner male saw this he would heave himself across the sand to protect his females, the result being a stand off between the two males. During whic the two males would rise up on thier flippers and roar through their big noses, which would inflate horrendously. If this was ot enough to rresolve the showdown then the males could end up fighting, many mlaes had large lacerations on their bodies. If he was successful in heading off the interloper he then reinforced his dominence by mating again with the female. The more aggressive the male, the more females he has, the more he has to to do to protect his harem. The females mostly lay out in the sun feeding their pup (most had one), or being chased and taken by a male, or just sleeping. The pups either slept or bounced around looking for the mothers teat, though they didn’t seem to mind which mum, or even male they approached, though the adult did and would bark at them or push them away. It was a fascinating visit, full of drama, a bit like watching Big Brother.

Hearst Castle Calls

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Visiting Hearst Castle is akin to a military operation. We had a tour time of 11.00, we had to be there 20 minutes before and at the shuttle gate 5 minutes before boarding. The Shuttle took us up the long winding road from the visitors centre to the castle which is built onto the top of a mountain in the middle of nowhere. On arrival we could see that the castle was a very large building surrounded by an Italian looking landscaped garden/grounds. Since we were on the ADA tour we were placed a board an ADA golf cart and taken unceremoniously round to the back of the building, where we had our first architectural shock. The back of the building was just bare walls. I mean bare walls. The building structure was of concrete walls, which looked like they had put up a pre-stressed framework, then shuttering and filled it in with cement, when it was cured they remove the shuttering. After that they 'adorn' the building with window frames, stucco, wooden beams, door frames, architraves, guttering and whatever to make it look as it should be on the plan. Very similar process to building a bridge, however round the back it had never been finished, so you looked at a towering concrete wall, still with the marks of the shuttering, or reinforcement wires sticking out. There were however some window in place – Gothic stone arch windows for the first three floors, with Georgian windows on the top floor. Although a fancy Italian patio door and window set had been added to one portion of the wall. It was about this time that the word 'Bizarre' popped into the mind.

Hearst Castle History and Architecture
After our visit we realized that Hearst Castle architecture was its history. It was in the process of being built and rebuilt from 1920 through until 1947 when William Randolph Hearst left the place for the last time. It was a building dreamt by Hearst as a castle that could be used for him and his friends, who were the movie and incrowd, could play. Also somewhere he could show off his enormous collection of Art work.
Now for architectural style you have to think 'concept' rather than specifics. Internally Hearst had in mind grand Gothic and Renaissance Europe, so the entrance hall was French Renaissance, although it mixed 'chateaux' with 'cathedral' style, even though the grand entrance was Greek style. The room was stuffed with treasures of French art and The Grand Dining Room was Mid European Gothic castle with Monks Stalls round the walls, the  drawing room was Moorish Gothic.
However the outside is made to look like an Italian hillside, with a Moorish cathedral at its centre. It has a focal point, which is a piazza just outside the front door (you can’t get a car to it, as the piatza is up some steps). The front facade of the castle is dominated by the entrance, which is adorned by a mixture of 600 year old figures, a 400 year old Madonna and child and 300 year old stone plaques, set in cement stonework. Above is a chinese style teak roof, with the two Moorish towers on the corners. The word Bizarre came readily to mind.
It is however a total experience. Some people would say the style is eclectic, personally I think I wold call the style Macdonalds, it is the fast food of architecture – anything you want you can have, we just stick it on to the concrete walls. The gardens however were lovely, with their beautiful views down to the sea, or across to the mountains.

Birds on Pismo Beach

We have been at Pismo Beach for 2 or three days, it is a very pleasant town. The campground is pretty good by Ca SP standards, having hook ups and being by a small lake. The weather has been dominated by cold nights and windy days, the wind being cold. However when you get in the sun it is warm enough. We have tried to do as little as possible, but that gets boring. We visited the State Beach and found that you could take your car onto the beach and drive along the sand for miles, so we did. We enjoyed watching the Kite Surfers, the Dune Buggies and ATV's and the little waderbirds, which we have found out are called Sanderlings. Sanderlings are very funny to watch. They are very small, blackbird sized and run up and down the beach following waves in and out, presumably looking for food brought in on the waves. However they also stand just above the water line. As we  watched we noticed various behaviours. They stand absolutely still in tight little groups of up to 50 birds. Then we noticed that they all face exactly the same direction, into the wind (It was quite windy). Then that some of them stood on one leg, actually a lot of them stood on one leg. Then as they followed the waves, they ran on one leg (hopped)! The we saw that some groups stood in a dead straight line, which looked strange, but reduced the effect of the wind. The whole thing looked like a pelaton from the Tour De France, as every now and then the one at the front of the line ran round to the back. We then saw large groups hiding in the lee of clumps of seaweed, every now and then one or two would run from one group to another and the whole group would shuffle round to accommodate the new, or close up the space where one had left, then stillness again. It was fascinating watching the birds moving. It appeared to be a dynamic combination of a  social dance and making sure that they lost as little body heat as possible. Even the standing on one leg is a mechanism to reduce body heat loss.
On lour last day we stopped for a meal at the local diner - a real converted train. it was great fun and the food was good as well.

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Los Alamos - Lost Hotel

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Sunday

After two nights at El Capitan we have now moved another 60 miles up the coast, taking a shortcut on State Route 101. On the way we passed Los Alamos, which is a very small town south of Santa Maria. Because we had been to Los Alamos in New Mexico we detoured into the town in search of a coffee/tea. Well what a lovely little town, mostly Main Street with lots of wooden fronted shops. Right in the middle is the prize gem – The Union Hotel. Built in 1870 it was a staging post for Wells Fargo (no references to Dale Robertson could be found), it was still in almost its original condition, with a faded timber front. We went in and there was a large room with great big padded armchairs arranged round a big fire, with lots of original knick knacks. We were made most welcome as we sat by the fire with our coffee and tea. To one side was a Saloon, with proper swing doors, that had been imported from New Orleans, out back of the Saloon was a pianola, a paper roll piano. It was wonderful place, even the toilets seemed to be original, they had the same front emptying porcelain W.C that we have at home. It was a really excellent experience just sitting there reading the Sunday papers (headline being that Whitney Houston had died).

We reluctantly moved on and found our camp site at Oceano Campground State Park, one of the few on this coast with partial hook-ups, we are booked to stay here until Friday, so we are hoping to get more time to relax in the sun.

Also hope to get Internet back on tomorrow.

Ventura Surf Beach

Tuesday

Today we moved on along the coast, we drove past all those fabulous Malibu Beach houses, on past a place called Paradise Cove, made famous by one James Rockford, as it was here that he had his beach side trailer in the Rockford Files. We were bound for Ventura, only 50 miles up the coast, to the Fairground there. The fairground is actually on the beach and with full hook up is a cheap deal at $35 per night.

Wednesday

Today I thought I had got up really early to get some sunrise pics of the sea, only to find that even though it was almost dark there were some surfers already out on the water. After yesterdays wind it seems that todys surf would be very good.

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Sally gave in on her back and we went in search of a Chiropractor, we found one only a couple of minutes away and Sally spent some time having her back crunched, her neck clicked and her legs manipulated and amazingly she seems a lot better and in less pain, She goes back on Friday for the man to finish the job.

In the afternoon we sat on the beach watching the surfers. The weather had deteriorated yesterday and today’s surf was quite spectacular, even though by now the sun was out and it was pleasantly warm.

Thursday

Relax and chill out again. We wandered the beach again amongst the surfers, this time we walked to the pier, which is described as the longest pier in California (as opposed to the last pier we visited, which was Oceanside Pier, which describes itself as the longest pier on the Pacific Coast (go figure). This pier at least was built as a working dock which was used as a place to import and export stuff, which enabled Ventura to become a successful community.

Friday

We packed up and would have left, but for Sally’s, early morning, second visit to the Chiro man. That over with we hitched up the wagon and moved 50 miles up the coast through Santa Barbara to El Capitan State Beach, where we found a lovely site on a cliff top where we could see the sea and watch dolphins and sunsets. It was lovely, though quite (as in rocking the trailer) windy at times.

Malibu Creek and the Film Industry

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Saturday

We relaxed today

Sunday

We took a walk up to the Visitor Centre. It was here that we learned more of the peculiar nature of the State Park. It was originally owned by Twentieth Century Fox and was the place where they would shoot all their outdoor scenes, they sold/gave it to the State in 1976. It’s greatest claims to fame were that the original set of MASH was there (though we didn’t get up to it), the place where Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid jumped into the Colorado River, the House that Mr Blandings (Cary Grant) built and the Welsh valley from How Green Is My Valley. The countryside also featured in The Planet Of The Apes. In fact some 150 films are documented to have been filmed in part here. We chose to visit a place called The Rock Pool, which is a beautiful and secluded pool in a little canyon, well it would have been secluded but for the 30 or so other people who were there enjoying their Sunday afternoon. Although this rock pool has appeared in many films the only one that we knew of was Dr Dolittle, but it was very pretty.

Monday

Today we are taking the movie theme further, because just up the road is the Paramount Ranch, which was where Paramount shot a lot of outdoor scenes, particularly Westerns, in fact there is a complete cowboy town which has been abandoned. We had a good old stroll round this abandoned set, with its huge list of films shot there, most of them were made before the war, notably ‘On the Trail of the Lonesome Pine’ a Laurel and Hardy movie of note. More recently the Herbie films were shot here. Although we didn’t remember seeing these sets in the films we had a great time and enjoyed exploring these bits of movie history.

On Towns with a Theme

On Saturday we drove inland to a town called Solvang, which has made the decision to appear to be a Danish town!!! So all the shops and houses are sort of painted with beams, with lots of Bavarian woodwork, spires and towers as well as windmills, the overall effect is slightly right of Disney’s version of Pinocchio. It was absolutely awfgul, still, I suppose someone has to do a quaint version of Denmark, complete with Brother Grimm and Hans Christian Anderson.

I sometimes wonder if there was at one time a giant convention of town officials in U.S.A. and they drew up a huge list of food items, animals, countries, artefacts, materials and stuff and then bid for what their town could exploit So Plant City (FL) got Strawberries, London (KY) got chicken, it is the Chicken Capital of the World, Petaluma (CA) got chicken too! (ah, but it’s West coast Chicken), Helen (GA) got Switzerland. Now Santa Rosa managed to Charlie Brown Capital Status, which is pretty good. Some are not so obvious, I am racking my brains for the town in West Virginia which is so memorable as the Grits Capital of the World, hardly surprising I can’t remember it.

But there are a lot of unfortunates who had to end up with the wrong end of the manure rake, here though we have two towns next to each other, both of whom are in competition for the most unimaginative Capital of the World – Solvang has Denmark (which I suppose at least in not Belgium) and right next to is Buellton which has as it’s claim to fame: Buellton - The Home Of Split Pea Soup!! I don’t think you could actually invent that one.

I am now determined to create a list of towns which are famous for ……., are the World Capital for ……, or are The Home Of …….. Watch this space.

The most inspiring place in Solvang is the Mission, Santa Inez, which is number 18 of the 21 missions that were founded in California. We have visited several already, this one is not particularly remarkable, but is a very lovely place which is very peaceful. Sally and I enjoyed our wander around it.

The Cruise Highlights

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Tuesday So today we take to the little launches that will take us to Catalina Island. The Sun is out and it is nice and warm. We are landed on the pier of Avalon and left to stroll round the little town at our leisure. There are some nice shops, but the best entertainment was the pelicans, the fish we could see going in and out of the kelp forests and the dolphins that were swimming in the stretch of water between the ship and the harbour. We did have a nice cup of tea/coffee and spent a few minutes watching the bluegrass Jam in Anthony’s Pizzeria. By lunchtime we had exhausted the tourist bits and returned to the ship for our buffet lunch, before finding a bluegrass jam, which was a bit slow.

Dinner however was excellent, poor Sally could only find Lobster Tail and Shrimp to eat on the menu, so she ordered two of them. I on the other hand could order the lobster and shrimp as well as a slice of Prime Rib, which complemented each other quite nicely.

Wednesday

Today we arrived in Mexico at a town called Ensenada. It is barely in Mexico and is not much of a town. Still we took the shuttle bus into the mains street and walked from there back to the boat. The overridding impression is that of dirt, poverty, poorly maintained roads, buildings and pavements. Almost everyone we saw wanted to sell us something or to beg for money. It was not a very pleasant experience and we were glad to be back on the ship for lunch. Now I am sure that this is not typical of Mexico, but it’s the only bit I have seen (apart for a view from El Paso last April), so that is my experience.

Thursday

A day at sea, when we would try and do some bluegrass jamming. The morning was a total write off as Jerry had tried to organise a slow jam, which just did not work for us. The afternoon was much better and we had a real swinging time on the Promenade Deck.

Friday

We were disembarked pretty early on Friday, but it was well organised and gave us plenty of time for a last breakfast on board. We returned to our rig in the Queen Mary Car park and set off for our next campground – Malibu Creek State Park. It was our intention to use this park as a base to visit Los Angeles, but when we got there it was such a pretty park with so much to do that we never did go back to see Los Angeles.

Internet Problems

Well. At the  moment we are unable to get ourselves on line. We seem to have a problem with Windows 7. But I am working on it.
Be back soon.

Queen Mary

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So we have made it aboard the Queen Mary and it is indeed like stepping back into the 1930's, not that I remember those days, the ship is definitely a star. Once we got ourselves sorted we had a wander round, up to the sun deck and the bridge, then down to the promenade deck and a walk round the deck, it was a beautiful day, warm and sunshining. Looking up the three huge orange and black smoke stacks. Lots of Art Deco ornamentation, although you could see the move  to functionality in the fittings, a 1936 response to the Depression. We found our room, it is one of the rooms that still has the Art Deco decor of the 30's, with wood paneling and lots of geometric angles and curves built into the dressing table, wardrobes and ceiling. It was a very luxurious and interesting eexperience, preparing us for our cruise tomorrow.

Cruising

Today we are traveling up the coast to Long Beach and tonight we will stay aboard the Queen Mary. Tomorrow we transfer to the Carnival Inspiration for a five day cruise to Catalina Island and Mexico. I have no idea what Internet coverage there will be, I suspect little as we are in steel rooms on the ship. WiFi is available, at a cost of about $1 per minute -sack that. So our next blog may not be until next weekend.

Mount Palomar

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There are some places and things which define a generation, time, or a culture.
Mount Palomar is one of those places, and one of the icons of the the 50's and 60's which impacted on a whole generation. As the Iron Horse the technology which enabled the development of the West in the 19th C, so Astronomy was the technology which fed the romantic fires of the frontiers of Space and our drive towards digital technologies. In the early part of the century new telescopes enabled scientists to look further and further into the universe, boldly laying down theories on top of new observations, which promoted more new theories which need to be verified by observation. The race was to build the biggest and best telescopes to attract the brightest intellects. At the top of this tree was Edwin Hubble, it was he that unified the observations of galaxies to bring order to the stars.
This early space race fed the imagination and gave the need to go into space some credibility, which crystallised in the development of NASA and the race for the Moon.
At the heart of this technology was the 200 inch Hale Telescope at Mount Palomar. If an astronomy story was published, if space pictures were needed they the iconic building which housed the Hale Telescope was rolled out. It was the 1950's quintessential image of all things spacewards. Though it was planned and paid for from 1928 it was not completed and operational until 1949. It was such a leap in technology that nothing better could be made until the Hubble Telescope was put into orbit in 1990, even now with advances in technology the Hale telescope is still at the forefront of Astronomy.
So Mount Palomar to me has been synonymous with pure science, which I first came into contact with probably as a 7 or 8 year old, and new I would never get to see.
Well today we did see it. We drove the 45 miles up into the mountains and took a good look at it and around it. We were not there very long, but what we did see fulfilled my expectations. Although there is no tour on weekdays we were allowed access to the building and because sally is disabled we had to enter using the service elevator, which enabled us to not only see the huge telescope but to get up close to it and marvel at its size and engineering. We had to wait outside for the man to escort us, he was supposed to arrive at 1.00, but was a few minutes late. When he arrived he apologized and asked if we had been waiting long. I said "About 55 years, since I was about seven".
The rest is boring statistics.
The telescope is like a giant shaving mirror. It is a piece of pyrex 200 inches across, that's nearly 17 feet and 20 tons, perfectly ground (it took eleven years to complete). Mounted on a huge structure which is so perfectly balanced and well lubricated that it can be moved by a single person. Unlike a shaving mirror the top surface is silvered, rather than the back surface, so it must be resurfaced every few years, so the whole mirror can be removed and placed in a giant vacuum tank which is used to diffuse Aluminium on to its surface.
Although the telescope was put in place 60 years ago new technology means that results are constantly improving. The biggest advance has been Adaptive Optics. A wobbly mirror, whose shape is controlled by computer, is placed in the light path. A laser reference system determines the distortion due to the atmosphere and the computer then flexes the wobbly mirror to neutralise the atmospheric distortion, amazing. It is no longer the largest telescope, as new technology will dwarf this mirror, ESO, European Southern Observatory is now building the E-ELT, a 39 metre diameter mirror with 948 sq m of collecting surface, compared to the Hale's 20 Sq m. Nice web page here, do miss the nice video
So having now achieved a boyhood dream Sally and I returned to our campground, a momentous day for me at least.

San Luis Del Ray Mission

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Just down the road from the campground is the San Luis Del Ray Mission, the Eighteenth Mission of the 21 founded in California.
We visited there on Thursday, it was a glorious afternoon and we had a very pleasant time looking at the old mission. I had noticed that above the entrance to the Mission's cemetery was a skull and crossbones. On enquiring I was told that this was a relatively recent addition. In the  50's Walt Disney made a series called Zorro, with Guy Williams as Zorro. They used the Mission to do some of the location filming and the skull and crossbones was part of their set, which they left for posterity, fascinating.
After the Mission visit we re-visited and old haunt, we had noticed a local branch of The Home Town Buffet and thought we should give it a try, for old times sake. We were quite impressed both at the variety and quality of the food available, I am sure that the kids would enjoy it now just as much as they did when we ate there in 1997.

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Oceanside

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We decided to drive to the beach and have a look around Oceanside. We found parking and a pier. Our simple activity was to stroll along the pier. Now Saltburn has a pier and you can have an exciting 20 minutes walking past the amusements to the end of the pier, see the seagulls and the Lone Surfer.
So why is it that when we walk along Oceanside Pier it takes 2 hours? We are greeted by almost everyone, fishermen, joggers, families.
Half way down we stand and watch a friendly pelican on the railing. We turn and watch the 50 or so surfers ride the pacific rollers.
The sky is blue, the temperature a pleasant 75 (22C).
As we walk to the end of the pier we watch a silly seal floating on its back with its flippers out of the water, sunning itself.
In the distance we see a large pod of dolphin swim by.
Pelicans are 'dive bombing' into the sea to catch fish, this is visually quite exciting as they fly up to about 40ft above the water, spy a fish and plummet downwards, with their wings swept back behind them and hit the water like a spear, coming back up with the fish (hopefully).
We talk to some people from Canada, arguing whether the floating seal is a seal or a piece of driftwood (of course it is a seal, but they are Canadians and don't have a lot of imagination).
We turn to stroll back to the beach and the sun is getting low over the ocean.
We pass the (now 3) pelicans posing on the hand rail and stop for a few pics.
I notice a kind of swirling in the water, like a whirlpool about 15ft across.Talking to a man fishing starts a discussion as some fishermen say it is a bait ball of small fish, others, a surfer, says that it is just the water moving across a sand bar. We all stand and watch it for about 10 minutes, without a significant conlcusion. I think it was a bait ball.
Meanwhile Sally is talking to a Graphic Design student at UCSD who is taking pictures. By now the sun is sinking to the horizon and I try and get some nice sunset pics, but they are not very good. The girl points out the house used by Tom Cruise in the film Top Gun. As we cross the beach we watch a guy with a stick, he is producing weird pictures in the sand.
We eventually get back to the Chevy and drive back to the trailer.
A very pleasant stroll.

Pelicans fishing - click here for full screen slide show

San Diego - The Review

So we have spent almost exactly two weeks in San Diego. In that time we have been to the beach at Coronado,  seen the Hotel Del Coronado and eaten in one of its luxury restaurants. We toured the huge U.S.S. Midway aircraft carrier. We visited Loma Point, where Cabrillo first landed and where the lighthouse is, we also stood and watched whales swim past. We visited the Presidio Park and gigantic Balboa Park. We saw the Historic State Park and the Gaslight area. The highlight has undoubtedly been our sail out to sea on board America to go and watch whales.
We have really enjoyed our time here in San Diego, it has been quite warm for January, though the nights were still cool and it did rain on two days. It seems quite a cheerful place I think though that we found it to be one of the noisiest cities we have been in. The busy airport is right in the centre of the city, there are several military bases and helicopters are constantly buzzing around. There is a comprehensive Freeway network, which means that you are never more than a couple of miles from a motorway, good, but also noisy.
We are now ready to move up the coast a little way, we are stopping over at Oceanside before embarking on our cruise from Long Beach.

Balboa Park

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On Sunday afternoon we took a stroll in Balboa Park, right in the middle of San Diego, it is about 1200 acres of gardens and museums. This has been on our To Visit List since before we actually got to San Diego, but fairly low. Public parks are always good on a Sunday as people come out to just be there, Even good old Albert Park comes alive on a Sunday. Balboa Park is no exception, except on a gigantic scale.
First off we had to find somewhere to park, in the park, the only way was to actually follow a family through the car park as they returned to their car. Once parked we strolled briefly down the centre promenade along with hundreds of other people. We ate our picnic as we watched others out enjoying the sunshine, many were appreciating the sideshows, magicians, jugglers,  religious zealots, buskers (we saw spanish guitar, guitar and banjo, cello, steel drums, saxophone, another cello and violin) an outdoor art class and a display by the local rescue parrot club. Most were moving between museums, there are 14 museums in Balboa Park, like the Aerospace Museum, The Model Railway Museum, The Natural History museum, The Museum of Mankind, I have run out, but they are there. Or perhaps they were on their way to the San Diego Zoo, or maybe the huge fairground. Unless they were between gardens, the Botanical gardens, the Japanese garden, the cactus garden, the Alcazar garden, the Palm garden, the arboretum, the California Garden (sorry I can't remember all the 19 gardens there).
So where were we going, just strolling? Well actually no, we had planned to attend an afternoon performance by Carol Williams on the Spreckel's Outdoor Pipe Organ, with, as we were told by the curator, no less than 4500 pipes, from a 32ft bass to a  pipe the size of a pencil. The organ is a permanent feature of the Spreckels Organ Pavillion, a massive outdoor amphitheater which can seat 2400 people. We took our seats and at 2.00 the concert began, with The Trumpet Voluntary, followed by a variety of pieces which were great fun.
Following the concert we strolled up the main thoroughfare in earnest, stopping off to see a room full of beautiful orchids, as there was an orchid display, competition and sale. We walked among the blossom covered trees and Sally stopped to talk to the rescued parrots, well their keepers anyway. I spent a lot of time taking snapshots, it is a very photogenic place. We finished off by dropping in on one of the smaller Art Galleries, taking in the Reubens on display there as well as the priceless 14th C Russian Icon screens.
Eventually we returned to the car having had a really enjoyable afternoon, and we still didn't even see the miniature train or the carousel, or the replica of the The Globe Theatre. Maybe another time.

Closure for The Padre

Fra Junipero Serra in Dolores Mission Cemetry

The Indian

When we were in San Francisco we visited the Dolores Mission, while in the cemetary we saw a statue with a plaque naming it as Father Junipero Serra, by Arthur Putnam, however this was only a copy in cement. On researching it we found that it was one of a series of statues called The Padre which were in San Diego, so now that we are here I was determined to find that original statue. It was supposed to be in the Presidio Park. Now, as a part of San Diego, the Presidio Park has a long history. In 1543 when Cabrillo first landed at Ballast Point, just below Point Loma it more or less defined where a future settlement would be, however it is not until 1769 that the first permanent settlement is established by Junipero Serra, who went on to found other missions which formed part of the famous 21 Missions of California. The usual practice at the time was to combine a mission with a military presence, the presidio. This one was established on the hill overlooking San Diego, with a stockade and a small mission. The stockade was later abandoned and the mission moved to its current location some 6 miles away, the Mission San Diego de Alcala, however the land was acquired and became a public park. A newspaper millionaire called E.W. Scripps had commissioned Arthur Putnam to produce five statues depicting California, of which Putnam made three, for the grounds of his ranch. He later donated them to San Diego and two of them now stand in the Presidio Park, The Indian being the first and most famous.

The Padre in Presdio Park

The Padre being the next and the third was the Plowman, which is in the grounds of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography.


 As I said earlier, I was determined to find the bronze version of The Padre. Originally Sally and I set out on the Friday, however the museum was closed and I had very little idea of the layout of the Park, The park is also very overgrown,so although I later found out that we passed within about 20 yards of it, we were looking the wrong way and completely missed it. So today (Sunday) I was able to find out exactly where the statue was and we went directly to it. It now stands on the site of the original mission in a quiet grove of Live Oak.

The Inscription in Dolores Cemetry

The Inscription in Presidio Park

This statue is called The Padre and is meant to show a concept, not a person, however it seems that at Dolores Mission they have mistakenly taken their copy as being a statue of  Fra Junipero Serra, which is quite strange.
The trail of this statue has led me to finding out some of the interesting history of California, two of its great cities, San Diego and San Francisco, its early history and the rise of the 21 Missions as well as its artists and patrons of the 19th and early 20th century. Great fun.

Whale watching on The America

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The weather today was perfect for our adventure, we took a trip aboard the schooner America, which is a replica of the the boat that was built to take part in the Round The Island Race from Cowes in 1851, as part of the Great Exhibition of 1851. This one was built in 1995 and is a beautiful two masted ship 128ft long. We joined the ship, which sailed through the bay, out past the headland and onto the open sea. Almost immediately whales were sighted and we sailed to follow them. The whales are still migrating south, so we have to sail southwards if we want to get alongside them. It is also apparently good to keep on the seaward side of the whales, as otherwise we may drive them out to sea and into unfamiliar waters. During our day we tracked at least half a dozen whales on their migratory journey. The boat was amazing, the weather was fantastic, the whales were exciting and the day was unforgettable.The story of the day is best told in pictures, so select the slide show view, press F11 on your keyboard for a full screen viewing (you may have to click on the little play triangle at the bottom and also slow down the slide show to read the captions)

Dining Out at The hotel Del

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Wednesday.
After visiting the Hotel Del Coronado last week we have been planning a way to be able to dine there, as ordinarily it is far too expensive for us.
However, we have found out that there is a festival of food in San Diego called  Restaurant Week, whereby a lot of good restaurants offer an affordable fixed price menu.
By checking out the Internet we find that the Sheerwater Restaurant in the Hotel Del Coronada puts on a two course lunch menu for Restaurant Week for a mere $20.
So we  phoned up and booked a table for 1.30 today, we then got ourselves poshed up and drove back over to the island.
On the way, since we had time, we stopped at the Maritime Museum and had a coffee, while we watched the old boats, then we drove across to the island and had a drive round the Bay shore, where we found a nice little park and watched the waders on the shore and a seal, who was relaxing in the shallow beach waters.
We turned up at the appointed hour and were seated and a window table. Sally had the soup and I had a plate of mussels and clams with lemon grass.
We followed this with a main course, Sally had a salmon burger, without the bun, but with the salad and avocado pear, while I had the BBQ Brisket sandwich, both of which were excellent and so completely filled us that we did not have room for desert. So our great adventure of eating in a posh restaurant in a posh hotel was a great success, which we enjoyed immensely.

Midway

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Today was overcast and cool so we decided to visit the U.S.S. Midway aircraft carrier, which is now a museum. This ship is large, very large, it's flight deck is 2.4 acres.

We discovered that the ship has four main areas. Right at the top is the flight control and bridge, which is sort of stuck on the side of the flight deck. Then there is the flight deck , which is the top of the ship, below that is an enormous space called the Hanger deck and below that are about four floors of ship, which house the crew, parts, engines and things. We started at the hanger deck.

Fortunately their is an elevator to take us up to the hanger deck. Once there we could roam around looking at all the bits to do with storing and maintaining the aircraft, as well as see a number of aircraft on display, including the famous Bird Dog plane that was used by a South Vietnamese major to escape from Vietnam in 1975. He and his family just flew out to sea, hoping to find somewhere to land(?) fortunately they found the Midway. in order to land on it the captain ordered that about $10 million of helicopters be pushed over the side to make room for it! It succeeded in landing safely amid huge shouts of support.

We then went up to the flight deck, where all the planes take off and land. There are two runways, one for take off and one for landing. We listened to Bob, an ex pilot talk, about the take off system, which uses a steam catapult to accelerate the planes up to 160 mph in 150 yards!

Following this we went right back down to explore the rest of the ship, looking at the crews quarters, the dining halls, the post office, the engineering shops and the officers quarters.

All in all we had a great day, which was helped by the ship being quite accessible for handicapped visitors.

Finally we visited the Fish Market area, where there is a giant statue of the now famous couple kissing, which is taken from a photograph of Times Square on VJ Day.

Whale Watching on Loma Point

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Today we wanted a gentle drive out, so decided to go to Loma Point, a headland on the far side of San Diego. They built a lighthouse there, which is now a National Monument. From San Diego the headland can be seen a mile or two to the north, however from the Headland you get an amazing view of the entire region, all the way into Mexico.
We went to the visitor centre and had a look around, noticing that you could borrow binoculars, so we were able to get brilliant views of the whole area. The weather was calm with medium high cloud cover, so it was not too bright, just right for looking around.
San Diego was laid out beneath us, we could see all the downtown skyscrapers, the big navy ships, the miitary aircraft going in and out of their airbase as well as all the ships going in and out of the bay, just beneath us. It was very interesting.
However the real fun began when we turned our attention to the seaward side of the headland, as there is a special lookout for whale watching. We stopped there for our picnic lunch listening to people looking enthusiastically for whales. After lunch we had a look for ourselves, without much luck. All we saw were a couple of pod of dolphins, still that was fun. The sea was absolutely flat calm, except where the rollers hit the beach, where we could see people surfing beneath us.
After a while we noticed that among the many small fishing and leisure boats (it was Saturday) were a couple of boats with lots of people on, these were Whale Watching Cruise ships, also a very large yacht. All attention was paid to these ships as the cruised beneath us, about half a mile off shore, because if we couldn't see whales, perhaps they could, as they are the experts.
Sure enough after a while the yacht started to circle and we could see something in the water! We couldn't see a whale, but something was making a gentle wake on the water. As the yacht circled one of the Whale Watchers approached and stopped, so we the view was that there was definitely a whale there. Then it broke surface, not spectacularly, but it was definitely a whale, we had seen our first whale! The a whole scene played out before us as the Yacht followed the whale and the other cruise ship had a quick look then  disappeared to the North. Shortly after the whale started to spout and break the water, not the spectacular 'breach' but enough for us to easily watch its progress South past us about half a mile off shore, the binoculars were very helpful as we watched it for about half an hour braking surface and spouting. After it had passed by we packed up, returned the bins. and drove back to the trailer having immensely enjoyed watching the whale today.

Some Like It Hot

Today was a perfect day for weather. The sun shone, it was warm, it was lovely.
We chose, for this our first day trip in San Diego, to visit Coronado.
We did so for several reasons. It is an exclusive little almost island across the bay from San Diego. It has the most amazing beach. It has a main street that looks like Rodeo Drive in Beverley Hills.
And it has the Hotel Del Coronada. Possibly one of the most amazing hotels in the world, along with Raffles in Singapore, the Dorchester in Hyde Park and the Fairmont in San Francisco. It is a hotel of a certain age, built in the 1880's and comes with a history that reflects, and has even shaped, the history of California and the USA. It sits right on the edge of the Pacific Ocean and spreads untidily along the shore, with it's red roofs and white balconied facade rising above the many pools, bars, restaurants gardens and sun decks. The restaurants are of course expensive (although we may have a story on that one next week!!).
Ultimately though for us it's claim on our vacation time is because it is the hotel that Billy Wilder chose to shoot many scenes from his film 'Some Like It Hot'.
To get to Coronado we drove across the Coronado Bay Bridge. Built in 1969 it was until 2008 the longest box girder bridge in the world, built high enough for the tallest of tall navy ships to pass underneath. We drove up and over it and as we dropped down the far side we could see Coronado laid out before us, big houses, wide avenues and palm trees. We cruised down the Main Street past all those expensive shops and turned along the beach front road, stopped a couple of times to take in the sunshine and the views, wandered down to a lifeguard tower and watched some surfers take on the long Pacific rollers that were coming in. We then worked our way back to towards the Hotel Del, as it is known locally. We found a nice parking pace down by the beach and wandered along the beach sidewalk which passed between the beach and the hotel. We then explored the hotel itself, stopping for a coffee in one of their beachfront bars, very nice. Continuing through the hotel we wandered round the shopping area and the lobby, all was dark stained wood paneling, which made it dark, but kept a cool feel. We went into the ball room, which is circular and opens out onto the beach front. Everywhere outside there are manicured gardens with views of the sea.
We could see how the hotel had changed in the 50 odd years since Some Like It Hot was filmed, the front entrance had been lawned, but now is a car park and gardens, but the beach where Marlyn Monroe played beach ball was still the same and I took a picture of the hotel from the same spot. It was very interesting, but you have to remember that we are easily pleased.
After visiting the hotel we finished our day by driving South along the long sand spit that links Coronado to the mainland, returning to our trailer having enjoyed our day immensely.

San Diego Here We Are

We have now made the short hop to San Diego and we are now safely pitched in the local Sweetwater County Park, we have a  nice shady site with plenty of space. Time now to catch up on those things that have been left to one side for the moment.

Peggy Sue's Diner

 

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We left Las Vegas and headed south on Monday morning. It was so good to be in sunshine again after all the darkness and cold back home. Just north of Barstow we stopped at a 1950's Diner, Peggy Sue's, which had been advertised several times as we headed south. It didn't look too impressive from the outside, but inside it was very interesting. It had the original diner consisting of three booths and nine bar seats which then opened out to three more rooms which had been added over the years.  Peggy Sue was obviously a film fanatic as the place was filled with film memorabilia - signed photos of stars, life size models of Elvis and other stars etc. etc. There was a five and dime shop and an ice cream parlour to one side as well. The shop was full of film knick knacks on sale from The Beatles, Betty Boop, to Disney and Elvis. We spent a very enjoyable time having a drink and their famous curly fries and wandering round the shop. The waitresses were dressed in authentic style 1950 uniforms.  Only in America!! We continued our journey and got to San Bernadino to find our rig in excellent condition - all safe and sound. We spent a couple of nights there - sleeping a lot to make up for the jet lag.

A promptly dealt with problem.

All went well until they brought my manual wheelchair to the door of the plane. Terry tried to open it and it was obvious that it was quite badly damaged. The seat would not lie flat, the metal had been twisted, and something was wrong with one of the wheels. The Virgin Atlantic Service Delivery Manager was called and arrived within a few minutes. She took one look at the chair and said it would have to be  replaced. She took us to her office where she arranged for a local shop to open for us ( at 5pm on a Sunday) and show us a wheelchair that sounded to be a  good match for my chair. She also said it would be too late for us to travel to San Bernadino, as in our original plan, after we had sorted the wheelchair and arranged a night with dinner and breakfast in the newly refurbished Tropicana Hotel on the Strip in Las Vegas.
So, after collecting our hire care, we went to the shop and tried out the wheelchair. It had all the same features as on my old one, quick release wheels, drop down handles etc and was quite comfortable. The man adjusted the foot plates and even gave me a cushion as the seat was not padded as my previous one had been. We signed the papers, which said the bill was to be sent to Virgin Atlantic, then went to the Tropicana.
We have stayed twice before at the Tropicana, but the last time it was quite run down. Now it has had a full refurbishment or remodeling , as they say in the USA, and is plush. They have kept the beautiful old stained glass roof over the casino but everything else is brand new. Our room was very comfortable and the food was delicious. In fact Terry was feeling quite guilty as we ate our dinner - only one course followed by coffee- which came to about $100 dollars!!! But, as I said, we didn't ask to stay in Vegas, Sharon, the service manager for Virgin Atlantic suggested and arranged it for us. Breakfast was a very good buffet and then we had a wander round the pool area and the rest of the hotel, all beautifully redecorated. So we set off to San Bernadino on Monday morning with a brand new wheelchair and my old wheelchair in the boot after having a wonderful night and a refreshing sleep.
I cannot fault the promptness with which our problem was dealt with and the bonus of a night in a good hotel on the strip - all courtesy of Virgin Atlantic. Wonderful.

The Journey

We had a very good journey, starting with a train from Middlesbrough to Manchester airport. We then caught the shuttle to the Crown Plaza Hotel which, on first sight, seemed very nice. The room was very well appointed but cold, so we turned up the heating thermostat and waited for the room to warm up. It didn't. So after a couple of hours we called the main desk to tell them. They sent a man along with a portable radiator and eventually the room began to warm up. I decided to take a shower to warm up and nearly jumped out of my skin, after I turned the shower off and was getting dried, when the shower head just fell off with a clatter into the bath. It turns out that it was broken. The meals were expensive so we just ate the food we had with us and had an early night. Terry managed to have a shower the next morning by fiddling with the shower head. I don't think this is a hotel where we would stay again.
We had breakfast at the airport after check in and the flight was on time. The plane was practically empty so we had room to spread out which enabled us to stretch out on empty rows and sleep. Terry got some good photos of the frozen sea over Northern Canada and snow covered mountains over Northern USA. We landed in Las Vegas early and thought we were doing so well until we ran into a problem.

The Night before we leave

Last night before we set off, we said our farewells to Helen and Stu.
Almost all ready to leave.
Off to bed now