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Archive for November, 2005

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Nov 25 – CA

Sunday, November 27th, 2005

Day 116 – LA – we hit the streets of Los Angeles in full swing early in the morning. First stop – Walt Disney Hall and the Music Center. Only pictures can describe Frank Gehry’s work, it was inspiring to see.

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Then, we viewed the plaza area of the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels – very nice also.


A sculpture garden at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels

After that we visited El Pueblo de Los Angeles, which was okay. The market was a bunch of tourist shops with Mexican type items. Little Tokyo was next, though it took us a while to find it, and we roamed through a few not-so-tourist type streets.


Thom Mayne’s Caltrans Building in Los Angeles

Just a street scene in the Toy District.

We ate a great lunch of yakisoba in Little Tokyo. We have been excited and planning this since Wednesday. It was a fun area to walk around and I got to see parts I didn’t go to last time I was in LA.

While driving in LA, I received my official “welcome to the city” as we drove down highway 101 towards downtown. A not so happy man yelled at me quite loudly (my window was up and I still heard him) from his little sporty convertible, going about 75 mph, as I ever so speedily (as fast as a 1981 air cooled vw van can go) merged onto the highway. Hey mister, so sorry to slow your day down – it’s not like there aren’t four other lanes on the highway you could use also. Did I say four lanes, I mean five or six. I can’t believe how wide these highways are in this city. I have to say at one point the highway had more lanes than I could count safely (I would have gotten into an accident trying to figure it all out). Jason counted 8 lanes at one point and it never got smaller than 5 lanes – about 6 to 7 lanes was average for Los Angeles. This research was mostly done cruising down highway 405 south from Manhattan Beach and southbound on highway 101 into LA.


another sunset ends the day

Nov 24 – CA

Sunday, November 27th, 2005

Day 115 – Our Thanksgiving was spent as we never would have predicted ~ sitting in the van with the doors wide open, staring at the beautiful beach and Pacific Ocean. We started the morning by going to Santa Barbara and walking down the pier. It was a pleasant holiday morning with a few fisherman on the pier and a couple of cute little kids learning how to skate at the skate park.


fog rolling in off the ocean

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fisherman on the peir_____________Santa Barbara from the peir

Then we continued south on highway 101 (which highway 1 merges with in that area) and tried to hunt for a single parking space in any campground. After seeing the sign “Full”, over and over again, we gave up and found a great day parking spot right on the shoulder of the highway. We were allowed to park there until 7.00pm – yay! We parked, popped the top up on the van and ate and relaxed, as most Americans do on this day. We were quite humored by the amount of RV’ers this weekend; just south of where we were parked was about two or three miles of spots that were on the shoulder of the highway. You could pay $20 a night to park and ‘camp’ there and it was booked solid! It was impressive to see. I think this weekend is the most RV’s I have seen within 48 hours, I wish I would have kept a count.


all of those white dots are rv’s lining the coastal highway

Thanksgiving eating 🙂

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I want a thankgiving dinner toooooo

So, after sunset we figured we better find a place to sleep – and there were no more rest stops until after Los Angeles. Full, full, full or “no parking at night” was all we ran into until we hit Malibu. We finally found a resting spot at Malibu Creek State Park. It is in the middle of a valley and at the end of about 10 miles of curvy road on N1 north of Malibu and past Pepperdine University. It was a great state park and it was almost full, and would be by tomorrow night, we were told. It was expensive though, $25 for a spot – but it won us over because there were showers… and let’s just say we were a bit stinky ~ not all parks have showers 😉

Nov 23 – CA

Sunday, November 27th, 2005
Day 114 - Butterflies, butterflies everywhere… or at least in Pacific Grove. There are a few places in California where millions of butterflies spend their winter months and this is one of them. They all rest on ... [Continue reading this entry]

Nov 22 – CA

Sunday, November 27th, 2005
Day 113 – We took off from Oakland via highway 92 which led us west back to highway 1. We stopped at Santa Cruz and walked around their downtown and did some people watching. There are a lot ... [Continue reading this entry]

Nov.20/21 – CA

Monday, November 21st, 2005
Day 111/112 - Jason and Ryan went driving in Ryan’s sporty car and visited Ryan's grandma again. [Continue reading this entry]

Nov. 18/19 – CA

Monday, November 21st, 2005
Day 109/110 - We spent the 18th walking around San Francisco and then meeting up with some Burners for dinner. Martin & De, it was really great see you two again! ______[Continue reading this entry]

Nov. 17 – CA

Monday, November 21st, 2005
Day 108 - We transferred to highway 1 and continued south along the California coast. This is one of the most winding roads we have been on, and be forewarned, it is not just a nice, curvy road, ... [Continue reading this entry]

Nov. 16 – OR/CA

Monday, November 21st, 2005
Day 107 - We cruised down the rest of the Oregon Coast and headed into northern California, where the redwood forest lives. Oregon Coast The redwoods are the most ... [Continue reading this entry]

Nov. 15 – OR

Monday, November 21st, 2005
Day 106 - Tillamook Cheese Factory! Man, was I ever excited to finally see where the cheese I grew up on in Washington was created; and get this ~ it is considered imported cheese in New York City. ... [Continue reading this entry]

Nov. 15 – WA, Vancouver

Tuesday, November 15th, 2005
Day 106 - Farewell Washington, the evergreen state; such a beautiful culture and such a magnificent environment of ocean, mountains, forests, and meadows. For now, good bye to all the Haase’s, Bottman’s, Manzer's, Sheldon's, Youngblood’s, Bauersfeld’s, Briskin’s, ... [Continue reading this entry]