Day 27 – February 6 – Carlsbad, CA to Indio, CA

Today was mostly a destination day but we made a couple of unplanned stops.

We checked out of the Four Seasons Resort in Carlsbad at 10 AM and hit the road eastward, passing just south of Escondido, and turned onto Highway 78 to make our way to Indio for the night.

We were tempted to stop at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park for a second visit – we went there when we stayed in Escondido in 2013 – but resisted the urge.  We chanced upon the San Diego Archaeological Society not long after the Safari Park turn-off and decided to go have a look-see.

The property used to be an elementary school and along the outside corridor they have about six hummingbird feeders.  There were at least a dozen of the little things enjoying the nectar.

We spent almost an hour talking to the volunteer and looking at the displays then backtracked just slightly to go see the San Pasqual Battlefield Site and Museum.  A very short, but very bloody battle was fought here between Americans and Californios in Dec. 1846. They do a battle re-enactment each year and tomorrow there is a short 20 minute program where they fire the cannon, have a presentation and fire the cannon again.

After we left San Pasqual we drove through a very winding canyon/valley (a great motorcycle road) that got less and less green, with shorter and shorter trees and more and more rock and cacti.  We passed a lot of orange groves before we drove through Santa Ysabel and Julian – sites of a short-lived gold rush.  Julian has maintained much of the gold town facade and is obviously a popular wandering around place judging by the number of people walking on the sidewalks and the solid lines of parked cars from one end of the town to the other.

Awhile later the road entered the Anza Borrego Desert.  A very, very inhospitable land.  Nothing but rock and cacti.  I would not want to walk through that area; the many different varieties of cacti would pierce you with every step.  I sure hope the early scouts that came through wrapped their horses legs to protect them. Nasty, nasty area.  I have no idea why people would fight to have it.

These may look like thin grassy bushes but they are all spine-covered cactus.At the end of the Anza Borrego Desert State Park we drove for miles and miles and miles through the Ocotillo Wells State Vehicle Recreation Area – which is open for four-wheeling, quads and dirt bikes.

Highway 78 turns south to eventually end up in Arizona.  We turned left onto intersecting Highway 86 that runs northward along the west side of the Salton Sea.  We weren’t sure whether the Sea was fresh water or salt water so I had John Google it while I sorted my photos.

The Salton Sea was actually created between 1905-1907 when the Colorado River burst through poorly built irrigation controls south of Yuma and the river flowed into the Salton Basin for over a year.  Homes, ranches and sections of the South Pacfic Railway line were buried under water.  The water was finally stopped in 1907 when the South Pacific Railway created levees with boxcars full of rocks.

The Sea is a “shallow saline endorheic rift-lake” that sits directly on the San Andreas Fault.  It averages 29.5′ deep and the deepest point is 51′.  The current size of the lake is 35 miles long and 15 miles wide, covering almost 400 square miles.  The lake size can increase to 40 miles X 20 miles in a wet year.

At the community of Desert Shores we turned off the highway and drove to the edge of the lake.  It stinks.  I am not sure of what exactly but I would not want to live on that lakefront.  There are fish in the lake but biologists feel that most of them, except the talapia which can stand a higher concentration of saline, will cease to re-produce.

As we drove north through the small communities of Salton City and Desert Shores, sitting amidst the barren, dry countryside, we wondered what people would do here for a living.  As we neared Indio we found out.  This valley is a major producer of citrus fruits, date palms and many types of vegetables. We drove past acres and acres of cultivated, irrigated farms.

We arrived at Indio at 4:30, checked in to our hotel, went out to find some dinner and returned to our room to do our usual email, photos, blog, and Facebook before going to bed.  Tomorrow we go to Joshua Tree National Park.

Day 26 – February 5 – Carlsbad, CA – Day 21

Yesterday was a down day, although I worked for several hours on my very long blog with all the photos of the critters at the San Diego Zoo.  I did however spend a few of the morning hours sitting in the sun reading Bambi before and I sat down at the computer.  I took this photo of the view from our condo because it was the first time since we arrived that we could see the far-off mountains.  They were usually obscured by the winter mist that comes off the ocean.

Today is our last day in Carlsbad.  We have had a good time.  We saw some of the sites, found some geo-caches, had some lazy days and enjoyed the warmer temperatures and lack of snow.

There was only one thing left on my To-Do-In-Carlsbad list and that was the Historical Park and Magee House.

The house was built in 1887 by an early Carlsbad pioneer Samuel Church Smith who located an artesian well that provided abundant fresh water.  Others had tried to find water in the area with no success.  Mr. Smith would meet the train when it came into town and hand out glasses of water to the passengers to promote Carlsbad as a nice place to move to and live.  Apparently the water gained a reputation of having healing properties.

When Mr. Smith’s water business failed he sold the house to Alexander Shipley in 1896.  The Shipley’s lived in the house until they died .  After the passing of Mr. Shipley their widowed daughter Florence Shipley Magee moved back into the house to care for her mother and until her mother died.  Florence lived there until her death in 1974, at which time she bequeathed the house and property to the City of Carlsbad.

The Historical Society owned a nice-sized piece of property in a highly developing area of Carlsbad – at the time still a vacant lot – and rather than have two locations, sold the lot and set up the Society at Magee Park.  They probably generated several million dollars from the sale because they are still operating the house and park and other buildings that have since been moved to the park with the interest earned.

The house was a kit house from Nebraska. At the time Mr. Church bought this prime property on the highest hill in Carlsbad there were almost no wooden houses in the area.  Everything was made of adobe brick so his wood house was quite an extravagance.  We had a good visit with the staff and a good look around at all the period pieces before going outside to read the placards on the other buildings.

The complete works of Charles Dickens.  This object was tucked in a corner in a small room of the house dedicated to the story of the railway in Carlsbad.  Neither of the docents knew what it was or even if it had anything to do with the railroad.  One fellow thought it may have been a stirrer/agitator for a laundry tub.  Anyone know what it is?? The original Smith barn – that was only used as carriage shed – was still there and is the oldest surviving barn in California (I think that is right).  Moved onto the property were a former Catholic Church now used as a meeting room and the Granary from the Twin Inn (local landmark hotel that is the ‘home’ of fried chicken in California). After we finished checking out Magee House and Park we drove back to Hosp Grove Park; the first place we visited when we arrived in Carlsbad.  At the time our phones would not load the information about the five caches hidden in that section of the park so we made sure they were loaded before we left the condo today and went off to find them.  Success on all five.  Plus I had noticed a couple of caches hidden at a big shopping mall across the road and we were able to find them as well.  That made 7 new Smileys on our geo-cache maps!The big wind storm we had last week uprooted this tall eucalyptus tree.  It was just short enough to miss landing on the roadway.Obviously a storm a previous year caused this really big one to fall and it would have definitely blocked off at least one of the road lanes; if not both.

It was almost four thirty so we turned tires toward home.  We made a short stop at Von’s for some groceries for the road – PB and J and bread and apples and oranges – and were hit up by some cute little Girl Scouts to buy a couple of boxes of their cookies.  They sell 8 varieties of cookies.  We only bought a box each of two kinds.

Tonight we pack up all our belongings and tomorrow we check out and head 3 1/2 hours inland to Indio where we will spend the night before heading into Joshua Tree National Park on Sunday.  Over the next two or three weeks we will travel through Joshua Tree, Death Valley, Mojave Desert, Petrified Forest and Mesa Verde National Parks.  Good times ahead!

Days 24 & 25 – February 3 & 4 – Carlsbad, CA – Days 19 & 20

The only thing I like to photograph more than flowers are critters and I had ample time to do that yesterday at the San Diego Zoo.  The zoo is celebrating its 100th anniversary in 2016 and is world famous for it’s breeding and conservation programs; especially China’s severely endangered Giant Panda.

Since I love animals of all kinds we have gone to many zoos and, when on the World Cruise, 7 safari tours in South Africa.  San Diego Zoo is a zoo I have heard about since my childhood and have always wanted to visit.

We were about 15 minutes later than planned leaving the condo and we took a wrong turn on our off-freeways route and therefore drove a few miles in the opposite direction from the zoo.  Stella, our GPS, got us turned around and we arrived a little after noon.  We spent until 5 o’clock closing time wandering the zoo and didn’t see it all.

We drove down the Coast Highway through all the ocean-side communities: Encinitas, Solana Beach, and Del Mar before entering Torrey Pines State Forest (Torrey Pines has a famous golf course for those who care about such things).  South of Torrey Pines we headed inland and followed Gennesse Lane right down to within a few miles of the zoo where we did some zigzags through residential areas.

 Since we walked non-stop for two afternoons in a row, today is a down day when I have time to go through all my 500+ photos, sort, delete, edit and choose which will go in this blog.  We have no plans to do anything else today but read. (Side Note: While we were waiting at the reception area for a staff person to scan a couple of document pages we needed to send home I was perusing the display shelves and saw a 1944 copy of Bambi written in 1929 by Felix Salten.  I have never seen this book and so I asked if I could take it to read.  Certainly was the reply.  The staff here are very courteous, friendly and accomodating.)

Just like at the Botanic Garden you got a blog full of photos of flowers, cacti, etc. today you are getting a blog full of birds and animals.

 Australian Kookaburras The Tasmanian Devil is under threat in the wild.  There is a contagious cancer that is spreading through them.  When we were in  Tasmania in 2011 we went to a Devil sanctuary where they are breeding them in the hopes to have a sufficient gene pool to re-introduce disease free Devils back to the wild if the wild stock dies off; which is a very real possibility during the next few years.

The two Grizzlies in the enclosure had each been given a large marrow bone.  This fellow was very happily sitting in the water pool working away at it. We watched him for quite awhile.  It was amazing how dexterous he was with his long-clawed paws.

.  I loved this Red Panda. Could it possibly look more comfortable?   

I have never heard of a Takin.  It is quite a strange looking creature. This next critter is especially for my great nephew Cole who loves snakes and will be working this summer as a research assistant to a biologist studying rattlesnakes.

And here are two of the Zoo’s three Giant Pandas.  There are only about 1800 Giant Pandas left in the wild and they are all protected as National Treasures in China.  The first Pandas came to San Diego in 1987 for 100 days only.  After years of paperwork and lobbying China agreed to send a pair of adult Pandas to San Diego as part of a 12-year research project.  At the end of that time the zoo was given a five year extension and in 2003 it was renewed again.  Bai Yun – meaning White Cloud – is the female.  Pandas are slow reproducers. They only come into season once per year and have a two or three day window for conception.  The cub stays with the mom for 18 – 24 months so most female Pandas will only have a cub every two years and thus produce 5 – 8 cubs in her lifetime.

Bai Yun’s first cub was conceived by artificial insemination but she and the male Gao Gao have since had five babies.  All the Pandas belong to China and after the cubs are reared each is returned to China where they continue as part of the breeding and research program.  Bai Yun turned 24 last September and they think she has reached the end of her reproduction years.  Gao Gao is also over 20 years old and has a few health issues so the breeding program at San Diego Zoo may be near an end.  My first look at a Giant Panda – broad white butt.  Xiao Liwu is the sixth cub born at the zoo.  He will be two in July and will soon be sent to China.  We did not see Gao Gao. Panda’s only eat bamboo.  The San Diego Zoo grows 70 kinds of bamboo and they harvest 700 pounds of bamboo a week for the Panda’s.  The San Diego Botanic Garden also provides the Zoo with bamboo for feeding.

This male Gazelle kept twisting its head so the horns were not near the youngster and then it would push it’s nose forward to brush the little one’s nose.  Seemed as if it was saying hello and not wanting to frighten the baby.  Believe it or not this is a polar bear?  Grubby, grubby guy!  

He came out of his house a while later with a carrot.And the reason it is such a black polar bear is because there was  a pile of nice loose sun-warmed dirt that it liked to lay in.The gal that cares for the leopards was leaving for the day.  This leopard, every day, will run across the compound, up onto this branch and lean over while she says good-bye.                                                               Baird’s Tapir

The Elephant enclosure was being cleaned and food put out.  These two were anxious to get back in and have dinner.Secretary Bird

Another animal I had never heard of. The tigers, too, were anxious to get back into the other half of their enclosure for dinner.The hippo was sitting on the bottom of the pool resting his heavy head on a rock and having a good snooze.The pretty pink flamingos bade us farewell and we headed back to Carlsbad.

This sign with a quote from Lewis Carroll’s “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” was hanging on the wall of a library.  Quite apt for many of us these days.

We left the zoo about two minutes before five o’clock and missed the rush hour out of town.  I was very surprised at the traffic heading INTO San Diego at the end of the day. The south-bound lanes on Gennessee Lane were solid with cars and we were just cruising along.

We caught up with a traffic snarl for a short while north of Del Mar.

A bit of a glare from the car behind us but this is the line up behind ours.

Day 23 – February 2 – Carlsbad, CA – Day 18

This morning was down time.  John is reading a good book so I worked on puzzles and played games most of the morning. After lunch we decided to walk down to Ambrosia Lane where we could see a series of geo-caches were hidden on nearby trails.

It was a very nice day for a walk.  We took about 20 minutes to get to the first cache which we could not find.  We walked up the long hill of Ambrosia Lane and found the entrance to the Golf View Trail where there were two caches hidden.  Yea for us we found them both.  There was some pretty nice views of the golf course as well.

 At the end of Golf View Drive we crossed Ambrosia Lane to the other side and followed a hydro-line ‘trail’ to find two more caches.

 This was a clever cache container. In May of 2014 a brush fire started at the edge of the La Costa Golf Course and the Santa Ana wind quickly spread it to 100 acres.  Five homes, 18 apartments and a commercial building were destroyed.  North County, where Carlsbad is located, had four other brush fires start in the next few couple of days. The fire was called the Poinsettia Fire due to its proximity to Poinsettia Lane.  Along the trail we had walked our first week here to find geo-caches I said it looked like a fire had gone through recently; that was it. Property owners filed suit against the golf course for the damages claiming one of the staff or a golf club piece of equipment had started the fire.  No idea how that turned out.

 After we found the two caches along this section we backtracked a quarter mile or so and started down another power line trail to find three more.

 Even the hydro poles were charred bottom to top.

A varigated thistle. We started our walk beyond the far hillside.   You can see the path under the hydro pole in the distance.

  The next cache was hidden at the bottom of the hill -very cleverly inserted in a burned stump.  The last cache was also well hidden in the base of a bush enclosed in a silk spider plant.  When we got to the end of the power line we found the area fenced and gated.  John noticed that a section of fencing had been torn down so we climbed over and walked down the drive to Aviara Parkway and two miles back to the condo.

This bush seems to also have become a ground cover. When in full bloom it must look very pretty.Our walk took us outside the boundary of the Aviara section of Carlsbad.  They have lovely landscaping all over this city.

 The sun was setting as we made our way back to the condo. At the resort the Summits section where we live is lower on the hill than the Osprey Terrace.  The day after we checked in the stairway between the two was closed off for rebuilding.  They have torn out the worn and rotting wooden stairs and replaced them with cement ones.  Today they were just finishing up welding the hand rails.  We noticed this clever sign at the top of the closed stairway.

I’d say the owner takes pride in his work. And it is cleverly humorous as well.

Tomorrow we are planning to get up a bit earlier than normal and head into San Diego to go to the zoo.  I have always wanted to go to the San Diego Zoo.  It is world famous and it has pandas!  If you drive down on the number 15 freeway it takes 40 minutes.  I have examined the maps and found a route that misses all the major highways so we will take about an hour and a half to get there.  But we drive through the swanky Del Mar area and the Torrey Pines State Park so it should be a nice drive.  We are not in a hurry anyway.

Days 20, 21 & 22 – January 30, 31 and February 1 – Carlsbad, CA – Days 15, 16 & 17

Saturday, Jan 30, we spent the day visiting with our friends Bill & Lynn who we met on the World Cruise in 2009.  They live in Yorba Linda, a southeastern area of LA.  They kindly drove the one hour down to Carlsbad to have lunch with us.  I whipped up a wonderfully complicated and exotic chicken ceasar salad (well, actually John grilled the chicken, but who’s keeping tabs?) with garlic bread and chocolate ice cream and peanuts for dessert.  We were having such a good time no one noticed it was already five o’clock and they had to head home.  Right after they drove away I remembered I had wanted to take a photo and had forgotten.  Lynn, too, had specifically brought along her camera to get a pic of us and forgotten.  We have each promised to a get snap done in the next week or so and send it to each other.  So, if you want to see Bill and Lynn you will need to wait awhile.  It was wonderful to see them again.  Maybe they will come north some summer and we can show them some of our hometown sites.

Sunday we intended to go back to Christ Presbyterian Church for the 11 am service, but I hadn’t been sleeping well all week and Saturday night I slept through until 10:30 am Sunday.  It felt great to have a good sleep but with the church 20 minutes drive away and us not even up it wasn’t going to happen.  I was sorry to miss the minister’s sermon on his ‘word’ for 2016 and it would have been nice to chat again with some of the people we met last week.

Sunday was also a lousy weather day.  There were 60 mph winds predicted with rain – lots of rain, and snow in the high mountains. The wind blew steadily all day with a constant howl outside.  There was heavy rainfall all afternoon so the plants and ground will be happy.  Everything is very dry here, they really need rain.  It did not appear to be a deluge, at least not at our place, so hopefully the water will sink in and not just run off into floods such as they had earlier.

Monday was supposed to be a cloudy day but it was really quite a nice one.  Since the sun was shining when we finished breakfast, dishes, email, etc. we decided to drive south to Encinitas and see the San Diego Botanic Garden.  

Last night’s wind blew leaves and twigs all over. The maintenance staff at the resort will be very busy cleaning it all up over the next few days.

We spent most of the afternoon wandering the pathways of the botanical garden.  So what follows from here is pretty much a hundred or so photos of cacti, trees, flowers, and landscapes.  Skip to the end if you want.

 A ‘living’ roof and plants on the walls of the entrance ticket booth.    The garden covers 37 acres and has sections for international plants that are suitable for this climactic zone.  We had a really nice wander.

 Dragon Tree.  The sap is red and is used to dye violins.

Giant Timber Bamboo.  Bamboo comes in clumping-root or runner-root types.  Most of the varieties in the garden are clumping root. Runner roots can grow 30′ in a season so it is very hard to contain or get rid of if unwanted.  There are several thousand species of bamboo and some of them are hard to classify because they only bloom once every 10, 15, or 20 years – or as some do, 150 years.  Many species will die off after blooming.
 Honey Mandarin. Produces very flavorful and sweet fruit but also produces many seeds so is not popular commercially. There was also a Mamey Sapote tree. The sign under it said the taste was similar to pumpkin, sweet potato and marachino cherries with the texture of an avocado.  Why on earth would anyone want to eat something that tasted like that???

This Mariachi band was in the Mexican Garden

 This guy might look nice and fuzzy but notice the spines.  Ouch!

There was an avenue of these cork trees in this area and more throughout the garden.

You could buy this sculpture for $11,000+ if you wanted to put it in your garden.  Sculptures by different artists were placed in the various gardens with the title, artist, and price to purchase on a placard. The most expensive was $50,000 and was just a shaped block of metal.  I much preferred this Matador.                                                                                This is an Orange Clock Vine 

Rosalind Hibiscus – it was a huge flower We saw hanging air plants like these in Ecuador. As we were walking past a huge Agave plant a couple pointed out this tiny hummingbird that was flitting around.  I couldn’t get a really good picture of it; it wouldn’t stay still long enough that  my camera could lock on a focus.  As we were leaving the garden the couple called us over to their vehicle. They had a bird book and had looked it up.  It was a Rufus Hummingbird, which is the smallest of the hummingbird species. This is called a strawberry tree, obviously for the blossoms. Hummingbirds really like the nectar in them.

The Hamilton’s Children’s Garden contained a “Spell and Smell” Garden where they had a plant for every letter of the alphabet.

They also had an amazing tree house!  

This is the blossom of an Island Mallow. 

 Well, if you made it to the end:  Good for you.  I believe I mentioned in a prior blog that I like to photograph flowers. This is the proof.  We had a good afternoon anyway.

Day 19 – January 29 – Carlsbad, CA – Day 14

Because we had gone out THREE DAYS IN A ROW! we didn’t do much today.   It was our son’s birthday so we were up early – for us – and had a one hour face-to-face talk via Skype with him in Muscat, Oman.  At his house it was 8 pm so his birthday was almost over and yet it was just beginning for us.  Time zones are interesting.

We have friends coming for lunch and a visit tomorrow so I needed to get a few groceries.  Mid-afternoon we decided to go down to the beach and take a stroll, see if we could find a couple of caches, and get our groceries on the way home.

We had no luck finding the caches.  One was supposed to be hidden in a brush/tree ‘bower’ but we couldn’t find it.  We still had over 200 meters to walk along the shore to get to the second one and the tide was coming in quite quickly so we decided to turn back while there was still beach to walk on.

I like the fine foam left on the sand when the wave receded. This clump of black rocks had steaks of black on the sand deposited by the incoming waves.  

Right after I snapped the above photo a wave came in and buried my feet in water.

Motto: Don’t turn your back on the ocean. 

A perfect footprint in the sand.We had a nice walk up and down the beach, got our groceries, BBQ’d some steaks for dinner and are now settled in for a quiet evening.

Day 18 – January 28 – Carlsbad, CA – Day 13

WARNING: LONG BLOG, LOTS OF PHOTOS.

When I checked out things to see and do in the Carlsbad area one of the places was the historic Mission San Luis Rey de Francia about a half hour north in Oceanside.  I had heard of the Mission but I couldn’t remember when or where or whether it was from history class, cowboy books, or movies or what.

The Missson probably featured prominently in American history class and I am sure it was also mentioned in many books and movies but in the last room of the museum there were two painted wooden doors attached to the wall and above them was a poster promoting the 1957 Disney-produced television series “Zorro.”  Disney used the Mission for a regular set in the series; the helpful Friar Felipe was a member of the Franciscan Monks who lived and worked at Mission San Luis Rey.  The Disney studio used the doors for the TV series and they also put a skull and crossbones above the entrance to the cemetery, which is still there today.  I loved Zorro – well I really loved his black horse, but he was good too. Childhood memories Chapter 2!

Although the series was the most popular show on its Thursday night time slot it was pulled after only two years (1957-1959) due to legal wranglings between Disney Studios and the ABC Network.

Mission San Luis Rey de Francia (named after French King Louis IX) was nicknamed the King of Missions and was the 18th of 21 missions constructed along the Alta California coast to claim land for Spain and establish a presence in the New World to thwart the threat of Russian encroachment.  Of the original 21 missions 18 are still standing.  The missions stretched along the coast from the Mexican border to north of San Francisco; each one built the distance a horse could travel in a day from the next.  The first was built in 1769 and the last in 1823.  San Luis Rey was dedicated June 13, 1798.

When Spain decided to protect it’s interest in Alto California by building the missions it was a three-pronged venture.  The missions were homes to soldiers who could provide security, the various orders of monks could spread Catholicism to the native Indians of the area (there were not many Spaniards in the New World so Spain decided to colonize with the indigenous people), and the Indians could be taught new skills so they could become productive citizens for Spain.

During the 34 years, from the day of dedication until he left in January 1832, Father Antonio Peyri was in charge of the Mission.  In that time it became home to 3,000 Indians and the Mission cared for more than 50,000 head of livestock.  Vast areas of land surrounding the Mission were brought under cultivation; producing grapes, oranges, olives, wheat and corn.  The Indians and monks made all kinds of goods and products that were needed for the work at the Mission and could be traded for things they needed.

Small basket made of pine needles.  

I love the way the posts in the room were chiseled a bit to make a decorative feature.

When we were in Spain in 2012 on the Grand Mediterranean Cruise we took a tour up the mountain to Caravacas, a medieval monastery where we heard the  story of the miracles attributed over the centuries to the original Caravaca cross.  It was interesting to see a small version that had been brought by the Franciscan monks.

During the heyday of the Mission there were shops for blacksmiths, locksmiths, ironworkers, tailors, leather workers, shoemakers, saddlers and harness makers, carpenters and joiners, coopers (barrel makers), and rooms for carding, looms and weaving.  There was a pharmacy, infirmaries for men, ladies and children, a school, a school of music, and a wine cellar,

After California was ceded to Mexico the Mission was abandoned in 1846, it’s lands given to settlers, it’s buildings looted of any goods and useable building materials.  Over the years there were several restorations and subsequent abandonment.  When California became part of the United States in 1850 the Catholic Bishop of California petitioned to have all the Missions returned to the Church.  March 18, 1865 after twelve years of lobbying President Abraham Lincoln signed the proclamation – only a month before his assasination.  The original document is in the Mission museum.

There has been ongoing restoration and archaeological work at the site ever since.  There are still Franciscan Monks living and working at the Mission and the property is used as a retreat center.  The local Luiseno Indians hold their annual pow wow on the grounds.

A sign on the wall in the museum mentioned that there is still an active cemetery here.  I chuckled a bit at that; most cemeteries are not all that active.  But people are still being buried at San Luis Rey.  There is a large cemetery with family crypts, walls for cremated remains and grave plots.  We explored the church as soon as we arrived and then went to the museum.  When we came out of the museum we saw a hearse parked in front of the church and mourners in black wheeling a flag-draped coffin inside for a funeral service.  When we went to look at the cemetery there were more than a dozen US Marines preparing to provide military honours.

The church was the first building to be completed and the first one worked on during any resorations.  It took four years to build and all the designs on the walls, door frames, etc. are hand painted.

We wandered all over the grounds checking out the old foundations of the soldier’s barracks and the Lavanderia – the bathing and laundry area.  It was a gorgeous sunny day so I was a happy photographer.

The oldest pepper tree in California viewed through the original carriage gate.

Ruins of the soldiers barracks.

It was 1:30 when we left Mission San Luis Rey.  We had lunch and then drove back toward Carlsbad along the El Camino Real road.  One of the intersecting roads is Marron on which is the entrance to the eastern half of Hosp Grove Park.  Since it was still early we pulled in and went geo-cache hunting.  There were four caches hidden here and we found them all.  This part of the park is much larger than the side we explored before so it was after 4 pm when we got back to the truck.  We called it a day and headed back to the condo.

This large very smoothly round rock looked like an egg. We also found a small one that I picked up to bring home for our great niece who loves rocks.

Day 17 – January 27 – Carlsbad, CA – Day 12

At the end of Monday’s blog I said tomorrow would be an awesome day and that we had PLANS.   Those plans were not the visit we made to the Leo Carrillo Ranch.  Tuesdays PLAN was changed due to 30 mph off-shore winds that cancelled our hot air balloon ride.  Thankfully the weather co-operated today and we soared into the sky!

Awesome, awesome day!  I have always wanted to take a balloon ride so I guess if I actually had a bucket list I would be able to cross that item off.

There were ten guests on the flight plus one crew and the pilot.  The basket will actually hold 14 guests but that would be a bit crowded.  With only ten we were two people to a section so we all had room to turn around and gawk in all directions.

A big fan blows air into the balloon once it is stretched out on the tarps.
 

If you need to straighten cables and such just walk right in. When it is all ready the gas from the tanks in the basket are turned on and the hot air fills the balloon which causes it to rise.

And then the crew works like the dickens to make sure it doesn’t rise into the air until all the passengers get in the basket.

As our balloon was being filled another basket and guests arrived and began to prepare for their flight.  They followed several hundred yards behind and cruised to a landing just past our basket.

There is no door to enter the basket.  There are some holes in the sides where you place your feet to climb over the side and in.

We reached a maximum height of 3600′ on our ride and had great views.  The route took us over the swanky Del Mar area of the San Diego coast.  The largest house in the area is 56,000 sq. feet.  Many of those we flew over had to be 40,000 or so.  There were swimming pools and tennis courts galore, riding stables and jumping courses, putting greens and massive landscaped yards.  What a person needs all that square footage for I can’t fathom.  Unless they are entertaining they probably live in about 4 of the rooms.

The first building we flew over was this school.  All the kids yelled hello and waved.

We startled a small herd of deer.

This race track, stables and all the cleared land belongs to Bill Gates.

We are coming in for a landing and here comes our chase vehicle and crew. While the crew member that rode with us and the two from the chase vehicle gathered up the balloon and the tarps and put it all into big bags Jeff, our pilot, told us a brief history of ballooning.

Two brothers in France in the early 1780’s noticed how smoke rose into the air and drifted away.  They decided to build a balloon that utilized this hot air and become the first people to fly.  After much experimenting with small ones they made a balloon large enough to hold people.  Not sure what would happen to the human body once it became airborne they sent a rooster, a duck and a sheep aloft.

As the smoke-belching big balloon carrying unseen bleating, crowing and quacking critters flew across the countryside and descended to the ground the local peasants, thinking it was some type of new warfare or a satanic apparition, attacked it.

News of this successful venture soon made its way to the court of  King Louis XVI  and a demonstration flight was arranged.  It was witnessed by the King, Marie Antoinette and 130,000 spectators. The balloon with the animals inside flew two miles and landed safely.

It was suggested that prisoners from the Bastille would be good human guinea pigs since if they came to harm or were killed it was no loss. The king would not let Joseph-Michel and Jacques-Etienne Montgolfier (the inventors) ride so their knowledge would not be lost in the event of an accident.  On November 21, 1783 a chemisty/physics teacher and a military court officer petitioned the king to be allowed to go.  The teacher made the first flight alone and stayed aloft 4 minutes.  When the two men went they travelelled 5 1/2 miles and flew for 25 minutes.

The legend is that the king, when he heard about all the ruckus created by local people attacking the balloons that held the animals gave the Montgolfier brothers bottles of champagne to be carried by balloonists.  When they landed they would be able to prove they were French and friendly by offering some good French champagne to any of the people that came to see the balloon land. The tradition is carried on to this day and we were given champagne at the end of our flight as the fellows packed up.  The champagne is accompanied by the following toast:

“The winds have welcomed you with softness, the sun has blessed you with its warm hands.  You have flown so high and so well that God has joined you in your laughter and set you gently back into the loving arms of mother earth.”

The sun set as we drank our champagne.  How perfect a day was that!?

Day 16 – January 26 – Carlsbad, CA – Day 11

Every once in awhile you have a day that brings back fond childhood memories.  Today was a such a day.

This afternoon we drove to the Flying LC Ranch, once owned by Broadway/Movie actor Leo Carrillo.  The Flying LC is registered as a Designated California Historic Landmark and is on the National Register of Historic Places.

In 1937 Leo Carrillo purchased 1,700 acres of an old homestead property and began restoration work to create a place of retreat from the Hollywood hustle and bustle that also connected with the proud memories of his past and honoured the history of the land and previous owner’s lifestyle.  Two years later he bought a further 838 acres.

Over the years, after Leo and his wife passed away, their daughter sold parcels of the land for local development.  The final ten and half acres containing the hacienda and ranch buildings was gifted to the City of Carlsbad for a park.  The city subsequently purchased a further 17 acres, did extensive renovations to structurally and historically protect the buildings and opened the Leo Carillo Ranch Historic Park in 2003.

So….you ask, what does all this have to do with my childhood?

After a lengthy and successful career on Broadway and making 90 films Leo Carrillo, at the age of 70 was cast as Pancho, the sidekick to the Cisco Kid in the first children’s colour TV series.  I loved to watch the Cisco Kid.  Anything about cowboys and horses was right up my alley.  We watched a short ‘background’ film when we arrived at the ranch and on it was a clip from one of the episodes that I clearly remembered seeing on the TV.  During each episode there was always a moment when Pancho would say “Oh-h-h Cee-sco-o-o” and Cisco would respond, “Oh-h-h Pan-n-cho.”  To see the actors performing such an iconic scene was very nostalgic and heartwarming.

The ranch was called Rancho de los Quiotes (Ranch of the Spanish Daggers – a common name for the agave plant that grows extensively in the area) and the Flying C brand became known all over the state of Californina.  It became a full working ranch with over 600 head of cattle, dozens of horses, chickens, pigs, etc. and crops of corn, beans, avocado, citrus and wheat, oats and barley.  Peafowl also wandered the property and there were peacocks and peahens freely walking around even today.

We spent the afternoon wandering around checking out all the buildings and outdoor spaces.  Unfortunately the inside of the hacienda is only open on weekends but we peeked in a few windows as we were able.  The L-shaped house wasn’t all that large but Leo and Deedie held many gatherings at the ranch.  The large outdoor patios and BBQ spaces, along with the swimming pool, would have adequately met their entertainment needs.

Leo wife’s Edith (Deedie) was not as social as Leo and sometimes needed some ‘away’ time.  Leo had a small house built up on a hillside so she could retreat and work on her art projects in peace and quiet.

We had finished walking around and were heading in the general direction of the parking lot when I decided to check my phone and see if there were any geo-caches hidden at the park.  Lo and behold, yes there were.  There were four of them.  Unfortunately our phones wouldn’t download the details of the caches but our compasses worked and we were able to locate three of the four. We think we know now where the fourth one was hidden so we may just go back over that way one day and see if we can find it.

It was really fun to spend time at the favoured home of one of the remembered TV characters from my childhood.  The sun shone all day, the temperature was nicely comfortable and we walked along nice pathways with interesting visual and historic buildings.  To find some caches just iced the cake.

Day 15 – January 25 – Carlsbad, CA – Day 10

One of the things I find enjoyable about geo-caching is the unknown.  We look on the geo-cache map and if there is a series of caches in a row we go see if we can find them.  You never know what kind of terrain you will be in or what you may see along the way.

Today we decided to see how many we could find along a path that appeared to go from Poinsettia Lane down the hillside to Batiquitos Drive.  Poinsettia Lane is about two kilometers from the condo and the trail, which we found out was called Eucalyptus Grove Trail, was another two kilometers down to Batiquitos.  The entrance road to the resort complex is off Batiquitos Drive and then we had to climb a last kilometer back to our condo.  So, we got some exercise today.

We finished the puzzle last night.

I love how this ivy is growing like a flag banner on the wall.

We walked from the condo through the resort to the Aviara Parkway and folllowed it to Poinsettia Lane.  The first geo-cache was, according to the co-ordinates, straight down a steep embankment just off the roadway.  We walked up and down in each direction trying to find a trailhead without success.  While I was searching along the side of the road John clambered down the bank and looked for the cache.  A few minutes later he called up that he had found it.

Since I had not found an access to the trail I, too clambered down the embankment.  Once we had signed the log and logged the find we also found a trail.

 The Aviara Parkway is just beyond the trees at the top of the bank.

The caches were hidden along the trail about 150-200 meters apart.  It took us  two hours to walk all the way to Batiquitos Drive at the bottom.  We found all of them but one and we could have found it but our presence was annoying a couple of dogs in a yard below the trail so we decided to leave it.

We go down and then back up again.

We saw this interesting formation along the way.When we arrived at the bottom of the trail and Batiquitos Drive we were right across the road from the trail beside the lagoon that we had walked last week.  We decided to walk that way back as far as the Aviara Golf Club which is only a corner away from the entrance drive of the resort complex.

The sun was setting as we turned the last corner to the driveway and home again.

                                                                                                        This is a small portion of the geo-cache map for the Carlsbad area.You can see our successful finds by following the smiley faces.It was a good day.  And tomorrow will be an awesome one.  We have PLANS.