The Journey to Casa Madera - Los Angeles

November 15, 2010 - Tonight I gave Alfonso a ride home as he lent his bicycle to Marco whose bike had broken and lived farther away.  We were told last week by our insurance agent that Mexicans are not allowed to be on foot in our neighbourhood after 6:00 pm unless they live in the neighbourhood.   Otherwise they run the risk of being picked up by one of the many police patrols that run through the area.  I am pretty sure that is not a ride any of them wanted to take so I loaded him into the jeep and ran him over to Jarretaderas which by car is only 5 minutes away.

The man loves to talk and he loves to talk about music (no wonder I like him).  And he really likes to talk about english music.  It was very strange his first day here when he turned his ghetto blaster up to about 9 (so he could hear it over the smashing concrete) and into our home flowed Can't buy me love by the Beatles.  This was followed up with many other Beatles classics.  Throughout the day we were treated to Creedence Clearwater Revival, the Eagles, The Bee Gees and finally the one english music radio station in town.  CKUA stayed silent in the house that day.  Mainly because there was not a snowball's chance in Puerto Vallarta that we could hear it!

But I digress, all the way to his casa he talked.  Trying to find the right english word for this and that.  Asking me for the proper word in english for this spanish word.  Now this would be just fine and dandy if my spanish vocabulary was more than about 200 words!  I fear that he is going pick up the wrong english from someone who had no idea what he was asking me in the first place.  It was quite the enjoyable ride.  Reminded me of many of the rides we were on in Disneyland....

November 10, 2008 - when we checked out of the hotel in Santa Barbara (who knew it was an elitist playground? apparently everybody but Heather and I) after we coughed up the ridiculous amount of money they wanted for a very average hotel room we asked the desk clerk about the Monarch Butterflies.  We had been reading that there is a park where the butterflies rested in Santa Barbara on their migration to Michoacan, Mexico for the winter.  The desk clerk told we where the park was and said it was very close.  He gave us directions and we set out to find it.  After driving in circles for what seemed like hours but probably was only 45 minutes, we said the heck with it and headed for the freeway to LA.

[caption id="attachment_117" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="The Freeway to LA"][/caption]

Our plans were to hit a few high spots in Los Angeles on the way through and spend the night in Anaheim so we could hit Disneyland the next day.  We figured that we were there so we should make a stop at the Happiest Place on Earth.

[caption id="attachment_118" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="One just never tires of seeing that"][/caption]

First stop, Beverly Hills. What can you say about Beverly Hills that has not already been said.  Rodeo Drive

[caption id="attachment_120" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="I would like to actually see this at night!"][/caption]

is kind of cool and they have chandeliers for street lamps.  Had no plans to actually shop on Rodeo Drive or shop period as we could barely fit a bag of chips in the car as it was so we just drove the street.

On to Hollywood and Hollywood Boulevard.  Checked out Grauman's Chinese Theatre, the walk of fame and moved on to the La Brea Tar Pits.  Those were interesting and worth checking out if you are stuck for something to do in LA.

[caption id="attachment_121" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="The largest lagoon at the Tar Pits"][/caption]

Over the years we have heard so much about Venice Beach so we decided it was a nice day we should check it out.  We were 2 of maybe 6 people on the beach.

[caption id="attachment_122" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="This would be something to see in the summer"][/caption]

Not much going on but what a beach, goes forever.  The water however is not the warmest in November.

[caption id="attachment_123" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="The Venice Canals"][/caption]

The day had been full so we thought we should mosey on to Anaheim before the traffic really built up on the freeways.  I have driven the freeways before with a map and made out ok but man the GPS makes things so much easier.  The little voice tells you a couple of kilometers ahead that you will be exiting right instead of the passenger (does not matter whether it is Heather or me who is the passenger) saying I think that was our exit we just blew by.

[caption id="attachment_124" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Thank god for Garmin!"][/caption]

It was a nice comfortable drive to Anaheim, found a reasonable hotel (100 bucks cheaper than the night before in SB) and relaxed for a bit before heading out and finding some dinner.

The next day we awoke to an absolutely perfect Southern California day.  Sun was shining, temperatures were warm but not too hot, all in all a great day to visit Disneyland.  We did every possible thing we could do there.  Watched the parades, listened to the Barbershop Quartet, watched some of the shows.  It was great.  We especially enjoyed the evening show, Fantasmic.  You had to be in place early but it was worth it!

It had been a long day and we had a lot of miles to cover in the morning so we said our goodbyes to Mickey and started the walk to the hotel.  It was a beautiful night and enjoyable to be walking without a coat in November.  We were hoping we would never need a coat in November again....boy were we wrong!