Cactus - Fill My Heart

Stanford University- Arizona Garden

Cactus - Fill My Heart

Drink Deeply and Hold my Soul

In your Fine Needles

Time Travel Portal - 1915 - CA Tower - (San Diego Field Trip)

Looking for a way back to 1915? Travel up the stairs of the California Tower in San Diego's Balboa Park. Back to the time of the Panama Pacific Exposition, when folks saw the world through a pair of rose colored  - Beaux Arte flavored - glasses, International was another word for exotic, and California drifted like an almost unexplored cultural island.

Edgewood - Western Style Autumn Colors (Hiking Edgewood)

Our version of fall

Toyon berries in orange and red

California!

California Asters In Bloom - Hiking Windy Hill

California Asters - Aster chilensis

Hey, Purple Asters!

Autumn pollen can be found

Though Windy Hill dry.

Palo Alto Baylands

Relaxing walking

At Palo Alto Baylands

Wildlife Sanctuary

Hiking Windy Hill - California Buckye In Bloom

California Buckeye is in business on Windy Hill * serving up fragrant blooms to hikers, native bees and butterflies, like the Pale Swallowtail butterfly. This shrubby tree, found over much of the Western United States, is a great wilderness plant counted on by many natives. Before European contact, it was also a food source for native peoples, following an extensive toxic leaching process.

It's not a good neighbor in the  suburbs, however,  since there it may come into contact with non-native bees. That's because it's pollen, though extremely appealing to the European immigrant bees, is toxic to them.

So . . . we love it, but we don't plant it.
*Windy Hill is close to - Silicon Valley, Within the San Francisco Bay Area , is  nearby the 280 freeway

On my Flower-Lovin' Hiker's Bookshelf

              

Hiking Windy Hill:Glorious Royal Purple Lupine

Windy Hill Arroyo Lupine

I identify with the Lupine Lady, Miss Rumphius, when it comes to lupines. I'd like to carpet the world with their glorious purples and blues. In addition to the Arroyo Lupine I saw hiking Windy Hill yesterday, I'm partial to the big silver-foliaged bush lupines, and miniature bi-color lupines with their little white throats.

If you not acquainted with  Miss Rumphius, I recommend her highly. Like many nature lovers, she wanted to preserve the wildflowers that once thrived before people crowded in. She did it by distributing seed. I haven't had a ton of luck when it comes to getting lupines established in my yard, even though it's supposed to be conducive to my heavy clay soil. I've also read that it's a natural when it comes to discouraging foraging deer. My neighborhood is too surburban for that to be a problem, but I live pretty close to people who do have issues with losing their yard crops to our local mule deer.

Before the Spaniards arrived in California, local folks ate lupine seed, though you needed to know what you were doing to remove the toxins. It makes sense that they are edible, once properly processed, since they are legumes - just like peanuts and other beans.

I'm not interested in snacking on them, just enjoying their brilliant royal purple robes every spring. The draw of Lupines in flower, is one of the things that keep me hiking California.


                                                             

Also On my Flower-Lovin' Hiker's Bookshelf

              

Valley of the Moon

Sonoma Day Trip!

Cows and Vines - Jack London's home.

Valley of the Moon.

~ ~ ~

Web Resources

History and What's there http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonoma,_California

Wine Tasting http://www.sonoma.com/drink/

Hike in Nearby Jack London State Park http://www.jacklondonpark.com

Not All . . .

Not all who wander,
Are lost

Cliff House - Primed for Time Travel Perfection (San Francisco Field Trip)

The Neo-Classical, Greek Revival Art in
the Cliff House is a strong clue to any regular historic traveller, that
there's at least one time travel portal nearby!

I'm pretty sure there's a time portal in or around The San Francisco Cliff House. Perhaps my difficulty in finding the entrance to a trip back in time, is the number of eras this quintessential bay area locale evokes.

The Sutro Baths finally closed down in the 1960's.
The ghosts remain.

There are a limited number of public buildings in the area that survived the 1906 earthquake. This restaurant, with it's beach front location and view of the one time Sutro Baths public bathhouse, is one that did. And it's also one of my favorite places to return again and again. Locals, in and near San Francisco, have been traveling to the Cliff House for a special supper in a prime ocean location since 1863. The baths and associated marine recreation activities opened to the public in 1894. 

Upstairs at the Cliff is a little more casual, but the views are still there.

This week we went up for a birthday supper, we'd put off a month back. I'm glad we waited until it was just the right night. We chose to eat upstairs. It's less expensive than the reservation-only downstairs, though definitely not a budget meal! The scenery and setting made our tasty, simple prix fixe suppers stellar. We thoroughly enjoyed our supper at the Cliff House, followed by a walk along the promenade, with a view of the historic Sutro Baths, and ended with by walking back along Ocean Beach. 

I didn't manage to find my way back in time to take in the sights of 1920's swimmers cavorting in the classic Grecian inspired entryway of Adolph Sutro's baths, or catch a glimpse of late nineteenth century railroad baron  university founder Leland Stanford or famed newspaper owner William Randolph Hearst chatting over a racing form and cocktails.

But, then again, maybe my own time's the best for travelin' to...

                   

~ ~ ~

 


Download a free copy of the music for the golden age tune, "Moonlight at the Cliff"  

Postcard from Casa De Fruta (Field Trip San Francisco Bay Area)

The United States Interstate Highway System was the pride of the country in the late 1950's.   The U.S. put a ton of money into paving highways after the war. Kids that remembered the Great Depression came of age during the great international conflict. After folks came back home they began shuttling around the country on the new highway system burning cheap gas, and enjoying modern access to intercontinental travel.

Casa De Fruta evokes a past era of post-WWII agricultural-centered roadside breaks. Most of these low-key recreational stopovers have gone the way of twenty five cent a gallon gas, Burma Shave signs, and the lack of perceived need for seat belts, but Casa de Fruta remains a roadside rest success. It's got lovely spacious grounds, clean bathrooms, plenty of parking, a place to park your trailer, a playground, a lovely pond complete with ducks, a wonderful little puffer billy train and plenty of fruit, wine, sandwiches and souvenirs. We always stop there on the way to and from trips, like Disneyland, on Interstate Highway 5.

 ~ ~ ~ 

Web Resources

Postcard from Highway 152 - Field Trip San Francisco Bay Area
http://postcardfromcalifornia.blogspot.com/2014/06/postcard-from-hi-152-field-trip-san.html

A Hundred Years of History at Casa de Fruta http://www.casadefruta.com/about-history.php

The U.S. Interstate Highway System
http://www.history.com/topics/interstate-highway-system

CA Highway 152 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_State_Route_152

Gilroy CA http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilroy,_California