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Friday 30 January 2015 – sightseeing around LA

I woke up early in the familiar surroundings of a Motel 6 as my body clock was still set somewhere between London and LA, bladder and stomach provided the relevant trigger.
I dropped ET a line to advice her that I was up, so we could start our plans for the day early and then got stuck into checking emails.
Soon after, ET arrived and took me to ‘Polly’s’, a currently preferred alternative to Denny’s, for breakfast. Apart from the MASSIVE Cinnamon roll, it was a remarkably healthy breakfast of 2 fried eggs on toast with lean bacon and a fruit salad! And of course, the bottomless coffee cup.
Then off to Nikon on Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills where the friendly receptionist in the customer service department welcomed Eunice like an old friend. We had come to check in my D600 that suffered from a common problem of ‘oil spots’ on the sensor and had led to a global recall to have the problem removed free of charge.
We then moved on to a rare sight these days (at least in rural Britain), a well stocked camera shop, Sammy’s, spread over four floors, a bit like being let loose in a sweety shop. Just browsing!
Where to next? Well, how about the Hollywood sign that overlooks LA and districts. So we drove up to the Griffith Observatory from where you had an excellent view of the sign and, by turning 180 degrees round, over Los Angeles. As it had not been raining (apart from a light drizzle over breakfast) the familiar LA haze that is a mixture of naturally moist air from the Pacific Ocean and air pollution from industry and transport was blurring the view. It was great to walk around in the sun in Spring-like temperatures of 18 C, at least until we could see rain clouds gathering. All images filed here as S3219 – no cacti or other succulents recorded.
On the way to Bellflower, the Art Deco Union Station is still in use and well worth a stroll around and taking more pictures (S3220 – again no cacti).
By now a light rain had started but as we headed back to Bellflower we left the dark clouds behind us.
This was also about the time that jet lag kicked in – a bit like hitting a brick wall. Since then we have been for dinner at El Torito, watched TV and typed up these notes but to be fair, I have been asleep all the time 🙂
I have had more exercise since I have stepped off the plane than I have had during the rest of 2015! Must do MUCH better when I get back.
How is this report related to cacti? I hear you ask. Today was not, but it is part of a trip that will have cactus and other succulent plants content before I fly home and I find it useful to have all my notes in one place. Plus I know of many cactophiles whose partners or spouses do not share our fanatic interest in plants but who might well be persuaded to allow them to come on such a trip or even to come along on a trip to California when they learn that there is more to see than ‘just cacti’.

Category:

USA, USA - California

Thursday 29 January 2015 – Amesbury to Bellflower, CA

Yes, I’m off again!

This is not planned to be an intensive cactus & succulent plant trip, such as last year’s trips to Mexico, but a mixture of talks at nine Cactus & Succulent Societies, an excellent opportunity to experience how people in California and Nevada experience the hobby in February, a time when in the UK my plants are in deep rest, locked into the conservatory; hopefully a look at some member collections and formal parks and gardens and an opportunity for some sightseeing. Driving from one Society to the next provides opportunities for some nature stops on the way where I’ll be keen to point my camera at plants of interest and the environments where they grow.

Today was a travelling day – 3 hours waiting at Heathrow’s Terminal 2 then 10:30 hours in flight, this time trying out Air New Zealand on a direct flight to LAX. It all went without incident and Eunice Thompson was at the exit to meet me.  I had taken off at 16:00 hrs and landed at 19:oo hrs – the different time zones accounted for the the remaining time in the air.

As we were over Reykavik, Iceland there was a beautiful sunset in progress. As we were flying south west, we seemed to travel at roughly the same speed as the sunset – if anything catching up with it. I remember attending a promenade concert at London’s Royal Albert Hall of a work which had this ‘never ending sunset’ as its theme (and title?) The name of the composer escapes me for now.

I had the window seat and an elderly lady blocked my way to the isle that would enable me to get to the rucksack with my camera. Sleep set in before I managed it. Better luck next time.

Category:

USA, USA - California

Tuesday, 31 March 2009 – Flights home

Alain was dully dispatched at LAX at around 8:45 a.m. while Cliff and I had another 12 hours around LA, so Eunice took us shopping for a book (Flora of the Mojave Desert) of which Alain had bought the last copy at a shop a couple of days earlier. Then on to Vern’s place, where again we were impressed and surprised of how many of the plants that we struggle to keep alive in heated greenhouses in Europe were doing very well, either planted out in the garden or in pots on the large patio.

Just one small incident on our departure from LAX – my bag weighed in at 61 lbs, with an allowance of 50 lbs, so a potential extra cost of US$ 150!! Must be all those maps and a few books that I had acquired over the last 5 months. Nobody in Chile or Peru seemed to have worried, but here the check-in clerks were on the ball. It turned out that as a long haul passenger, I was allowed two free bits of hand luggage and it just so happened that right at the bottom of my hold-luggage bag, I had a spare rucksack, having left my worn out purple monster behind at Eunice’s. So right in the middle of the departure lounge, a quick repack ensued, with dirty clothes strewn around to trip up bemused onlookers. Next hurdle, I was convinced that the guy at the check in had kept my passport as well as the tags for my bag. He claimed that he had not. So once again bags were opened and searched top to bottom when as usual, it proved that I had one more pocket than I had allowed for and this was where the missing travel document turned up.

The plane was 30 minutes late leaving and I slept most of the way to New York’s JFK where we arrived at 7:30 a.m.

Category:

USA - California

Monday, 30 March 2009 – A day at the Huntington Botanical Gardens

Today’s visit (S1399) had been on both Cliff’s and Alain’s wish list and although we had returned our rental car, Eunice kindly offered to pick us up and drive us there.

For me this was my fourth visit, so while the novelty factor was missing, knowing my way around by now, I was able to enjoy four hours of photography on my favourite subjects. I probably spent longest at the corner where the Creeping Devils (Stenocereus eruca) were densely planted. This had been my favourite spot last year, after seeing the plants in habitat in Baja. It seemed that this little corner had grown since then. Are they really creeping to extend their territory?

After a nice meal out and our last Margarita’s (probably the best of the whole trip), it was time for an early-ish night as Alain had to be at LAX at 9 a.m. for his 11 o’clock flight back to Brussels.

View 2009-03-30

Category:

USA - California

Sunday, 29 March 2009 – Rest day at Los Alamitos

We really did very little today, other than starting the massive exercise of copying each other’s digital images to our respective plug-in hard drives, thus significantly increasing the already huge numbers of images that we had taken ourselves. Why? The exercise provides us with back ups of our images just in case some small disaster should befall our computers. Plus, it is the first opportunity of looking at each other’s images, as by the time that we have down loaded our own images each day there is no time to share what we saw with our fellow travellers.  While we tend to take pictures of each other as well as of the plants, we never get round to taking pictures of ourselves, so it is a good opportunity to collect evidence, if it were needed, that we ‘were there’.  And last but not least, as a group we see much more than as single individuals, so it is always worthwhile, if time permits, to check through each others pictures for something rare and unusual that one person saw and photographed but that had escaped the rest of us.

Eunice got the car washed and valletted and we returned our home for the last four weeks to Dollar Rent A Car in good time, where its return to the fleet went without any hitches.

Category:

USA - California

Saturday, 28 March 2009 – El Cahon to Los Alamitos

We had a nice and relaxed day along the sea front, looking at Feros. Eunice had selected two spots where she and I had found them last year, the first (S1397) at Point Lomas, and the second (S1398) at La Jolla Glider port. I can’t remember the stop numbers for these locations used in 2008, so had better repeat that we found F. viridescens, in flower, both tallish solitary as well as squat and offsetting plants, casting a bit of doubt or need to clarify the differences between ssp. viridescens and ssp litoralis. Also there Agave shawii, Bergerocactus emoryi (S1397 only),  Carpobrotus sp. – an invasive African Mesemb that seems to be invading many temperate zones at the expense of the endemic vegetation, Mammillaria dioica, some in flower, Opuntia sp. (boring fa.), three different species of Dudleya, of which I’m sure one was D. edulis.  There were also some escaped Aloes, again African, that were conveniently being used as a feeding station for a hummingbird, close to where I was sitting.

Strange that an Old World plant (Aloes are restricted to the African continent) have become a favourite with the Hummingbird, a New World native, only found in the Americas. I’m sure somebody will tell me what pollinates Aloes in nature in their home habitat.

Apart from pressing camera shutter releases, we just lazed around and took in the sun in a light breeze, knowing what is in store in Europe in a few days time. Just topping up the reserves.

We’re spending the last 3 nights of our trip in a Best Western in Los Alamitos on the outskirts of LA. The off licence next door sells Belgian beer and Chilean wine, so we’ll be fine but may not be issuing many more Diary reports 🙂

Category:

USA - California

Monday, 2 March 2009 – Indio, CA to Tucson, AZ

Despite our late night, we were up at a reasonable time and on the road to Tucson a 362 mile drive. We made just two plant stops: S1293, near Cottonwood Springs, AZ, where we saw Ferocactus cylindraceus, many in bud, a couple in flower, Fouquieria splendens, Opuntia basilaris, including a few in flower, while most were bursting with buds, and Cylindropuntia ramosissima.

The next stop was another turning off I-10, signposted for Dome Rock, a popular location for RVs. The track took us between two rocky outcrops, the one to the north of darker probably volcanic origin had Carnegiea gigantea and Cylindropuntia bigelovii and C. echinocarpa or is it C. fulgida? or both? and Fouquieria splendens. Across the track, the rock seemed to be a bedded limestone, overlaying with quartz. There were no Carnegiea to be seen here. Instead, we found Mammillaria sp (M. grahamii or M. microcarpa?), Echinocereus engelmannii and Opuntia basilaris. This hillside also had Fouquieria splendens, and a few of the Cylindropuntia.

We had an excellent steak dinner, in the same restaurant where Alain & I ate in 2008. As Alain said: it was as though we had never been away.

Tomorrow we head for Mexico.

Category:

USA - California

Sunday, 1 March 2009 – Buena Park to Indio, CA

We had a not unusual panic when it transpired that I had left most of my field data, this time for Mexico, on my desktop machine at home in England. Once again Brian Bates saved the day so that we can attempt to name a few of the cacti that we’ll see in weeks to come.

Cliff & I are getting quite used to last minute packing for a trip – the secret is to never unpack. Eunice does not have experience yet, so was into a full last minute panic, while Cliff & I watched while enjoying the use of her fast internet connection.

Alain was due to arrive at 21:10, but at which Terminal? LAX has somewhere between 8 and 12 terminals! We looked up the flight number on the internet, but there was no such flight!. The problem is possibly due to the large number of airlines sharing the same plane, each with their own flight numbers (and pricing). We resolved the problem by positioning ourselves near the airport (Eunice wanted to post a few parcels from the 24 hour post office at LAX. We had already worked out that the majority of flight numbers commencing ‘US’ used the near by Terminal 1. So we relied on Alain contacting Eunice on landing to advice which terminal he was at. Great plan, but in the end his plane was early and his call came when he was already outside the terminal, looking for us to pick him up. We told him to sit tight, as we were only minutes away but had not counted on the very busy Sunday night airport pick ups and drop offs Eventually we saw him and got him and luggage on board.

Next, picking up the rental car. We have a Toyota 4Runner, a bit larger than last year’s Jeep Grand Cherokee, especially more leg room.

Then to Eunice’s place in Bellflower to load up the 4Runner, followed by a 121 miles drive on quiet roads to Indio, our jump off point for Monday’s drive to Tucson. We were all very tired, especially Alain who had been on the road for 28 hours!

Welcome aboard, Alain!

Category:

USA - California

Saturday 28 February 2009 – rest day at Buena Park

With all pictures safely backed up onto my plug in hard drive I was able to see that I have so far 16,575 images taking up 94 Gigabyte during the last 120 days, an average of 138.125 images per day. As you can tell, we’re getting bored.

Category:

USA - California

Friday 27 February 2009 – Long Beach to Buena Park

The plan for today was to rest, do our washing (so that we could enter Mexico with clean clothes) and catch up with writing the Diaries for the last few days. Great plan, BUT it turned out that the Motel 6 we were staying in at Long Beach did not have a Laundromat. A search on the internet revealed that the Motel 6 Buena Park – Knotts Berry Farm ticked all the boxes, and so Eunice kindly interrupted her rest day to pick us up and drive us over.

On re-reading my notes for 25 February, at S1287 I should have mentioned that we also found Opuntia sp. (probably O. chlorotica) and Grusonia sp. probably G. parishii.

Category:

USA - California