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