2020 Hindsight

Hour of the Pearl, redux

I just got an email from someone who liked my Hour of the Pearl pictures, from rollerblading along the Santa Barbara waterfront. (thanks, CW!) I clicked the link in the email to see what he was referring to... aaah, those pictures. Yes, as a matter of fact, those are kinda nice. Nice to be reminded of forgotten twilight. So I remind you.

Pictures of Joshua Tree at Dawn

Over the weekend, I spent moonlit night and dawn's early light inside Joshua Tree National Park. (I was at Joshua Tree two weeks ago, too. More wildflowers this time around.)

See the pictures! Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3 | Page 4

Virtual tours of southern deserts

Palm Canyon panoramas. Follow the related links under an individual panorama, and see how far away it leads you. Don't stop, travel further and further. What a treasure! Requires QuickTime.

Heya! Where you been?

Okay, gotta admit that I'm being inconsistent with plane stopovers. If I hung out at the airport at all, then the state is in. I know, I know. Low standards. create your own visited states map

Planes, trains (and automobiles)

I was in the air when the quake happened. For all I know, I was flying over the site where it happened, flying from Southern to Northern California. Didn't learn of it until late last night. Good to see Doc blogging it.

Yesterday I visited the California State Railroad Museum in Old Sacramento. Beautiful old trains. Facts that present themselves anew: A trip from the east coast to the west coast used to take months, but once the transcontinental line was complete, took 7 days and 7 nights and brought on a revolution. The "revolution: but of course!" reaction I have now wasn't so self-evident to me as a kid in school. I wonder at all the other facts and revelations they tried to jam into my too-young-to-comprehend head. I revisit them (or they revisit me) from time to time. What else will I re-learn, this time with the jaw-dropping awe that didn't get me when I was a third or sixth grader?

Big articulated engines, up close and personal. The exhibit for the train station, with the office of the railroad dispatcher, gave me pause: the telegraph equipment transported me back to the telegraph set given to me by my grandpa (Dad's dad, not the grandpa I've described elsewhere on this site) when I came across it in his little cellar at the time I was learning about Morse Code in Girl Scouts. The display had the exact same equipment, with the exact same tobacco can modifications. I probably played around with it a little and then lost interest. I want to track it down.

Other highlights: a pullman sleeper car with the motion feel of night travel, a dining car with examples from numerous railroad china patterns, a peek into the private car owned by Lucius Beebe and Charles Clegg, Gold Coast. And toy trains.

Just saw this SacBee story on a new train museum-- the Train Technology museum. The museum'll get one or two new buildings in which they'll house their railroad technolgy museum. Sacramento is train history: The opening ceremonies of transcontinental railway happened *right there* where the railyard and museum stands. (speaking of SacBee, when I saw a newsstand box on teh street, I thought, Oh, right! Sac Bee! That's Dan Weintraub's paper--a perfect example of how blogging skews a person's perceptions)

Travelogues on the Coast Starlight

The Coast Starlight is the Amtrak train that goes from Los Angeles to Seattle. Trainweb has lots of stories of trips taken on that route.

Costa Mesa Highland Games

Saturday I went to the Highland Games in Costa Mesa. Weather: overcast, bits of drizzles (perfect Scottish weather). Some highlights:

There are tents for each of the Scots clans. But this was, by far, the best clan tent.

Tartan midgets.

My niece in the highland dance competition. Check out the foot placement! Check out the elevation!

A boy watches the highland dance competition and takes photos.

(L to R) Alasdair Fraser, Eric Rigler (piper in Road to Perdition, Braveheart, Titanic, Patriot Games), Natalie Haas.

Highland dancers in front of the concert stage play pied piper to a lot of wee folk.

A Mother and Daughter in matching kilts near the concert stage.

This pipe band 'cast' member says the show must go on.

A boy cradles his first bagpipe while watching the massed pipe bands (170+ pipers!)

Monday Along The Five

Here are some images of California's Central Valley, taken along Interstate 5 (or "the five" as we Southern Californians call it) from the drive south.

At a stop at Harris Ranch:

These are the hills near the Grapevine:

The wildflowers in the Tejon Ranch area (Grapevine, Gorman) are in amazing splendor. I hope to bring a more detailed report after next weekend.

En route, I listened to the Valley Public Radio station. Heard a talk show, a Jeffersonian perspective. One of the speakers on the show wrote a Bush victory speech as tho Bush were a Jeffersonian (to get the whole thing you gotta pay bucks to support the show, but this page has a taste of it.)

A great escape

Yesterday, after intermittent desert rain (oh! the smell of newly moistened creosote!), I went to Joshua Tree National Park with some friends. Desert wildflowers haven't yet arrived, tho we did see some joshua trees in bloom.