28/12/12 – A Tribute To My Uncle Ken…..

Woke, packed and said farewell to Becky and Barrow. It was a joy to spend time with them and we look forward to keeping up the correspondence. Becky is a ‘docent’ – a guide to a gallery or museum - and with her excellent contacts in the travel business she had managed to swing us a good deal at the Terranea Resort and Country Club back in LA at Rancho Palas Verdos. So that’s where we headed.

This resort is located just south of LA and next to the Trump Golf Course. Needless to say it was expansive and well-appointed although we were slightly bothered by the constant flow of helicopters and golf buggies ferrying guests to and from venues. Still the complimentary glass of champagne upon arrival put us in the right frame of mind for our afternoon walk along the cliff face. The Pacific Ocean is just as pretty on it eastern shore as it is in Australia and the occasional break along the way for a drink was relaxing.

Our favourite spot was ‘Nelson’s’ a café atop a hill overlooking the crashing waves. It is dedicated to Lloyd Bridge’s and his character ‘Mike Nelson’ from the TV series ‘Sea Hunt’. The series was filmed here from 1958 to 1961 and the photos displayed on the walls of the restaurant reminded us of our childhood spent watching Mike Nelson the ex-navy freelance scuba diver and his adventures travelling on the Argonaut, outmanoeuvring villains to save threatened people and salvage various items.

Although Sea Hunt only ran for four seasons (with 155 episodes) it was repeated on Australian TV so often that it felt to us as if it had run for our entire childhoods, and beyond. Lloyd Bridge’s died many years ago now but for us, the voiceovers he did during the underwater sequences in the show and his heartfelt advice, at the end of each program, on how important it was for all of us to do whatever we could to care for the marine environment are features that will be locked forever in our memories.        

Seafood buffet was amazing and we finished the night with a port by the fire listening to some wonderful music. Late checkout organised! 

27/12/12 – An American Football Feast

Woke to the delicious smell of fresh coffee (thanks Becky!) and soon found ourselves out of the house and off on a trolley bus tour of San Diego. Unfortunately today was game day (Holiday Bowl between UCLA Bruins and Baylor University Waco Texas) and that meant a huge parade through the main streets of downtown San Diego. As a result the trolley buses were all running late and they had to detour around the harbour area of downtown (so we did not get to see the USS Midway Naval Museum) but still it meant that the whole place was really buzzing and we were soon caught up in the frenzy of colour and noise.

Our excitement rose even further when we got home at the end of the tour and Barrow surprised us by announcing that he had somehow managed to get hold of five tickets to the big game!    

And so our preparation began in earnest. First the ‘kit’ – scarves and beanies in the ‘right colours’ since Barrow is a graduate of UCLA. Then the rituals – ‘tail gate party’ – where people hang out in the car park before the game and drink beer. (This is similar to the ‘boot parties’ held at Twickenham before the Varsity Match except that ‘boot parties’ have food.)  Then there is the ‘meet up’ – find people you know and have more drinks. These drinks by the way, may be purchased but only after one has shown ID which is hugely amusing to those over 50.

One’s choice of beverage was limited to light of full strength Budweisser beer or a massive plastic cup containing so much Margarita or Bloody Mary that two hands are required for the transfer of the contents of the cup to one’s mouth. This made it very difficult to hold on to the slices of pizza, the packets of corn jacks (caramel corn) and peanuts (in the shell) one was also supposed to be consuming along with ones drink, particularly when the guys in front of us kept jumping up and shouting their support every time UCLA got the ball. 

Still by the start of the game we had mastered the process and were well into the swing of things. Which was just as well as the national anthem was something to behold. While a girl in a naval uniform (with a really big voice) sang the ‘Star Spangled Banner’, what must have been nearly two hundred marines unfurled a flag that covered the entire field which is 110yrds x 55yrds – we knew that Americans love their flags but this was amazing. Then the football began and two hours later we paused for half time…..

Now if the anthem was impressive the half time entertainment was something else again. Each College is given time on the field to ‘play’ their tunes - which for the team from Texas meant the ‘1812 Overture’ complete with fireworks for the cannons! This was then followed by 'A Tribute to First Responders – the Military, Law Enforcement Officers and Emergency Response Teams' (sponsored by the Dr Peppers soft drink company). We were awestruck to witness what must have been nearly one thousand dancers, baton twirlers and acrobats gaily dressed in black, red and silver sparkles going through their routines but the crowd took it in their stride and applauded politely at the end of the show. 

 

 With the marching bands now back into their respective places in opposing corners of the field ready to respond to the action, the game began once again. Unfortunately ‘our team’ didn’t play so well and the nineteen year old freshman quarterback seemed to be under pressure all night. The final score at 11pm was 49 – 26 in favour of Baylor. We were exhausted by the barrage on our senses but the players, many of whom, with squads of eighty plus, seem to spend most or all of their time just warming up on the sideline, appeared ready to play on for another 3-4 hours.  But not us … we had had enough. We caught the light rail train back from the stadium to where we had parked our car in Little Italy and then drove home to Coronado Island. What a great day!!

26/12/12 – Farewell to the Del Coronado

We woke this morning to the sound of calling Pacific gulls. How nice they sounded compared to the ones back home – more like the one you hear in the movies. We spent the morning at leisure before moving camp to the Day Spa where we attempted to scrub off the remnants of our treks through volcanoes and snow so that we could present ourselves all shiny and new to Becky and Barrow at their home later that day. It seems to be quite the Californian thing to do for one to lie on the infinity pool deck in front of a gas fire overlooking the ocean and watch the people walking by – so this is exactly what we did. And damn nice it was too!

Becky and Barrow were gracious hosts and we soon found ourselves whisked off to a St Stephen’s Day party at friends of theirs where we were surrounded by US naval aviators who had done a tour or two of duty in Perth and enjoyed recounting their experiences. We soon were tapping away to the sounds of Irish tunes provided by a banjo player, fiddler, hand drummer and guitarist as any other guest who desired to pick up an instrument. The night was topped off with some Power’s whisky and some fine cheeses – which was great since we hadn’t had any dinner!! Needless to say we slept soundly.  

25/12/12 - Merry Christmas One and All

Needless to say we slept in this morning and exchanged gifts at our leisure. We kind of missed getting woken up early and the squeals of little people as they opened the gifts that Santa had miraculously delivered. But we were still happy enough pottering around the room for the morning without eating as we saved ourselves and our appetites for our HUGE buffet lunch in the world famous Crown Room complete with its 30 foot high pine ceilings and four magnificent crown shaped chandeliers at noon. A great feast was anticipated … 

But nothing could have prepared us for the diversity and divinity of the spread that was presented in one of the most magnificent dining rooms I have ever eaten in. The room is massive and today was catering for rolling shifts of guests who dined on a sea of silver platters and domed trays that overflowed with seafood, meats, vegetables, salads, cheeses and desserts while the harpist played.

Not only was the selection magnificent but the detail and combinations of tastes was innovative and imaginative. I tasted things I would never have put together and yet they were sublime.

For example who would have put together three silver plates with delicate portions of gruyere and hot blueberries, rocquefort and hot spiced pears and brie at a perfect temperature beside warmed strawberries? And don’t start me on the desserts….
We grazed and chatted with our three guests (Barrow, Becky and Michael Emerson) for three hours and by the end the decor, the food, the champagne and the festive atmosphere had seduced us and we were ready for an afternoon nap.

But it wasn’t over yet. After our nap we woke to find the most glorious of scarlet sunsets casting its glow over the beach and the hotel, which was itself a sight to behold, decorated in over 50,000 lights and backlit by a full moon!!

We went for a walk on the beach and soaked up the ambience of nature at its best and finished the day with drinks on the Sundeck watching hundreds of people ‘Skating by the Beach’ on the hotel’s ice rink that has been set up for the holidays on the Windsor lawn (the very place where the future Edward VIII met the infamous Mrs Simpson).

24/12/12 – Yuma to San Diego

For a long part of history Yuma provided one of the few safe places to cross the mighty Colorado River. In the old days at Yuma, where the southern Colorado was at its narrowest, it was still a raging torrent 1,000 feet wide. But nowadays, as a result of the construction of the many dams that now provide the many farms of the central Californian Valleys with water for irrigation, the strength of the river has been almost completely drained and it is now a shadow of its former self. In fact for many months of the year no water any longer actually flows from the river into the Gulf of Cortez.

Yuma is also the first place were the pioneer aviator Robert Fowler landed on his epic first ever flight from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean. In fact there was even a statue of Fowler on the road next to the hotel where we stayed in Avenue 4E!

The trip to San Diego the next morning was eventful. We left Yuma with fine weather and a temperature of 72 degrees but this rapidly changed as we headed to the mountains. On the way we passed green fields, travelled through sand dunes and mojave desert, drove alongside a massive irrigation canal and through massive wind farms before climbing a mountain range (the Santa Rosa Mountains) that was made of neatly arranged piles of rocks. In the course of this journey we encountered high winds, clouds, rain, rainbows and fog so thick we were down to 20 mph!

But it was worth it because San Diego and Coronado Island in particular are beautiful.

 Peter and I both agreed that we could easily live here. This pleasurable feeling was significantly magnified by the fact that where we are staying, the Hotel del Coronado, is indeed one of the great hotels of the world. Its old world charm combined with excellent cuisine and unobtrusive service is impressive. This is the place where ‘Some Like It Hot’ with Marilyn Munroe was filmed. It has been the playground for Presidents and Kings since 1888. It is rumoured that Edward Prince of Wales met a ‘local girl’ Wallace Simpson here, but that’s a story for another time.

It was a joy to meet up with the Emerson’s again and go over fond memories of Perth and Alistair’s there month long stay with them here in Coranado during his gap year. We had drinks in our hotel then went to the Emerson’s favourite Mexican restaurant (where Barrow is the resident guitarist) for dinner. It was a bonus that Michael Emerson was able to join us and bring us up to speed on his political studies at University in Atlanta. The swordfish tortilla was sensational but it was early to bed for all of us as tomorrow is Christmas!

 

23/12/12 – The Town Too Tough To Die

Well many thought it would never happen, but Peter eventually convinced me to call in to see Tombstone – ‘The Town That Was Too Tough To Die’. And just so you know, the deal was not sealed with the purchase of a Navaho silver and purple spiny oyster shell (from the Gulf of Cortez) bracelet and matching earrings by Victor Trajillo. I thoroughly enjoyed the visit and took a genuine interest in the significant history to be learned there.

We stepped out of our ‘Doc Holiday’ room at the Larian Hotel to greet a 75 degree day and a perfect start to the tour with breakfast at the ‘Chuck Wagon’ Restaurant. Today’s special was bacon and eggs with blueberry pancakes and maple syrup, so no need to read the menu. We got to sit at the counter and the waitress served me coffee with complimentary refills – something I have always wanted to do in the USA!! 

We took a stage coach tour around the town to discover that most of the buildings are original since the town, with the water table flooding of the silver mines ($5 million in the 1870s from the ‘Good Enough’ mine alone) had become almost a ghost town overnight when everyone packed up and left for the unflooded mines in the nearby town of Bisbee.

But as the figures quoted in the preceding paragraph indicate the ‘silver rush’ in Tombstone was something to behold, while it lasted, and as is so often the case when there is a fortune at stake, greed soon turned to violence and the shootout at the OK Corral between ‘Doc’ Holliday and Wyatt, Morgan and Virgil Earp on the one hand and the Clanton’s on the other was a classic example of such lawlessness. It has been the focus of many westerns over time. Interestingly the same events probably unfolded in Kalgoorlie at about the same time in history but seemed to have been sorted without the need to use a six shooter to fill the grave yard!

Next stop Yuma on the banks of the Colorado River on the border between Arizona and California.   

22/12/12 – Art Meets Science

Great days sometimes happen without a great deal of planning and today was just such a day. It turned out to be day filled with a wonderful mix of art and science. We had originally planned to travel directly to Tombstone but instead we meandered through the suburbs of Phoenix and into posh, upmarket Scottsdale, where we found Taliesin West, Frank Lloyd Wright’s famous winter residence. With my Dad’s background in architecture we really could not drive past this place. We weren’t sure what to expect but it was a glorious journey through one man’s egocentric determination to change the way people lived and ultimately viewed the world – a bit like Steve Jobs in this century.

Hard times after the depression had forced Mr Wright (as they referred to him on the tour) to take in pupils to his Wisconsin home (Taliesin East). Not long after this he contracted a bad case of pneumonia and was advised to take a trip to a warmer climate and so he visited a friend in Arizona, was shown a large plot of land on a hill overlooking Scottsdale  and quickly came to be inspired by the ‘Nature of the site’ and the ‘Site’s nature’. These two were the foundation of his beliefs about organic architecture and led to him designing (and getting his young student ‘apprentices’ to build) structures that combined art, music and theatre into the highest form of art as he saw it – architecture. 

Taliesin West is built on the brow of the mountain (so as not to upset the flow of the landscape) and a tour around it takes you on a journey filled with mystery. It is hard to find the front door and when you do you getting through it and into the house involves the almost hobbit like experience of ‘compression and release’ as you enter through a small space and then are released into wonderful and truly unique series of large and airy rooms. Everything (as was the case in the old days) was designed by Mr Wright and if you even moved a piece of furniture from where he had decreed it was to go you would not be granted the red square at the front of your home that was his signature and sign of approval and ‘authenticity’.

And the furniture is something else again. Most of it is deliberately low so that you are encouraged to look up at the mountain (or perhaps to pay homage to your host as he was not a tall man). We sat in the chairs in his piano room (modern day reproductions cost $4000 each) and they were small and tight and designed to make you sit upright and have your knees and hips at 90 degrees. This way you were forced to ‘look good’ in his chairs! The larger entertaining room (set up like a cabaret theatre as the third Mrs Wright was a dancer from Montenegro) was a mathematical masterpiece that used the science of non-parallel walls to perfect the acoustics by eliminating echo. The chairs were an example of reflective seating (angled to the left because Mr Wright liked to have Mrs Wright seated on his right) so you needed to extend your right arm and cross you left leg over your right in order to face the front to see the show. (Are you getting the feeling that this guy was a control freak?)

Frank Lloyd Wright was the man, who after designing ‘Fallingwater’ for the CEO of Kaufmann’s Department Store in Pittsburgh (claimed to be the most influential building design of 20^th century in the USA) got himself on the cover of ‘Time’ magazine and was hailed as the master American architecture. Interestingly he did most of his greatest works from the age of 71- 92 years when he died in 1959. Some would claim him the master of 20^th century architecture. Being the devoted daughter of a big fan of Rennie McIntosh, I will fail to support that claim!

And all that was before lunch….

As we travelled south on the Interstate 10 to Tucson we saw the signs to ‘Biosphere 2’ and thought why not balance the day with a little science. We had heard of this experiment to sustain life in a closed environment and we were keen to learn more.

In the 1990s Ed Bass (a Texas millionaire) gave a huge endowment (of which 150 million dollars bought the land here in Arizona) to look into ways to sustain life on another planet. The experiment was set up to last 100 years with the initial ‘biospherians’ set to complete two years in the dome and those thereafter to complete one year each for the next 98 years.






However the second rotation came out after only 7 months as they were unable to sustain the caloric intake necessary to complete the work to sustain life unassisted due to dome maintenance taking each person 66 hours a week. The ‘biospherians’ had been responsible for all aspects of their life – cultivating, harvesting and preparing food. They had a largely a vegan diet supplemented with meat from animals they had slaughtered on Sunday nights and some products from the goats they raised. Rice and fish came twice a month with the harvest. This left little time for keeping the dome in working order (huge engineering feat) and conducting research on the world’s biomes – rainforest, wetlands, savannah, desert and ocean. So in the end it became clear that the experiment could not succeed and the facility was handed over instead to the University of Arizona which now uses it for various biological and earth science large scale research projects. 

The current Biosphere 2 program (Biosphere 1 is our world today) has simplified its original brief and now looks at how water affects the landscape and therefore life on earth because water is the essential link between our chemical and biological worlds. Central to this is the newly constructed LEO 10 (Landscape Evolution Observatory). The research currently being undertaken here looks at what may happen to our world in a time of climate change. What will happen to the rainforests that supply our oxygen if the world has less rainfall? How is soil made from rocks? How do desert plants like those in Australia, Nambia and Baja California get water from fog? What may be the long term effect of plastic in the ‘northern pacific garbage patch’ on the cycle of life? What kinds of bacteria eat plastic and how do we design a better plastic for the future?

This is big science, big questions with people from different disciplines working collaboratively so it struck me that this project and the essential questions it seeks to answer could be a wonderful real world introduction to the fishtank/garden hydroponics sustainability experiment that Oliver Gee and others do at Wesley. Imagine how exciting it would be to look at Biosphere 2 and then get the boys to design similar action research for themselves – Think Global, Act Local.

After this fascinating afternoon we drove to Tombstone and took up residence in the Doc Holliday room at the Larian Hotel. It was supposed to be haunted……..