Christmas and New Years

This will be short. (Though whenever I say that I go on and on for pages and pages!) I took a lot of photos and feel more like sharing them than telling stories.

Both Christmas and New Years were spent in San Diego with Jon and Vanessa. And both were relatively quiet.

Christmas Eve we decorated the rosemary bush as a Christmas tree. Then we drove to Coronado, to the hotel, to ice skate. (Here's another tangent -- The Coronado Hotel is huge! and rambling structure. Beautiful, especially at night all lit up, in a late 19th Century style. I felt very much like Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon in "Some Like It Hot!" Coming from Chicago (where TC and JL witness the St. Valentines Day Massacre -- which occurred just down the street from where I used to work, by the way. We went for happy hour drinks at the Clark Bar which had a HUGE photo from the paper of the bodies in the garage where the "Old Folks Home" is now.) to the hotel where the film was, well, filmed.) What is more Christmas than ice-skating! Especially outside on the beach surrounded by palm trees?! The idea was great. The reality was a bit less. The rink was tiny and the ice so soggy that the hotel employees had to squeegee it constantly. "Where is the Zamboni?" I asked. Jon pointed to the squeegees. "I think they are the Zamboni!" It was also a bit expensive, so we decided to walk on the beach instead. That was such a great So. Cal. thing to do -- I went wading in the Ocean on Christmas Day! How many people can say that? (Other than all the other people on the beach I mean). Vanessa's friend Maria joined us and the four of us walked along the beach, enjoying the warm (almost) barefoot weather (it was a bit chilly). Someone suggested building snow men out of sand, and we considered it for a moment, but didn't. Then, just a little ways down the beach we saw two of them! Actually they were sand penguins, but the idea was there -- a friend and I in High School made a snow cat because our second ball was too heavy to lift onto the first one. We reached the end of the beach (traveling through the dog beach) just in time to stare in wonder at the beautiful red/orange sunset. The best of all, though was that as the sun was setting at least two, possibly more, dolphins came out to enjoy it too. Jon saw them first, then me and Maria. As we all stood pointing out the dolphins to Vanessa we saw one go up to the left, then immediately, from the same spot, we say another go up to the right. "There are two!" We all four cried out together! What an amazing and wonderful way to celebrate the year! (The strip of land, by the way, is the point that has the light house we visited at Thanksgiving and the dark blob in the water below the lighthouse is a dolphin.) On the way back we walked by moonlight. A quarter moon, waxing, but casting enough light so that I could see my Moon shadow! (I did not leap and hop, but reveled in it none the less) We finished our visit by sitting outside eating homemade ice cream at the hotel.

The day before New Years Day (does it have a name other than that?) We took a short tip into Mexico -- My trip around the world is now officially an international trip!). We got to eat real Mexican tacos and I got to practice my Spanish (which is pathetic -- though I can count to 20, say hello, good by and thank you.)

New Year's Day the three of us and the two dogs took a lovely walk through one of the canyons along what counts for a river in California, (read “stream" if you live in the Mississippi River Valley or east) to a Californian waterfall (read "rapids"). Our hike started by passing through a field that smelled of liquorish (always a good smell in my book). We continued past some sort of gourd and sycamore trees and then to the falls; the overall vegetation changing from desert scrub to grass land to big green bushes as we neared the water. The falls is lovely, though not really a "falls" by any but desert standards. The "river" flows gently though the narrow and rocky path it has cut through some tough rocks creating a rapids. We waded across the falls and enjoyed the ravine. Then we headed back as the sun was setting. Passing through the sycamores just as the smell of night (cold and wet and earthy and very welcome to me in dry San Diego) took over, the most amazing thing happened. Across our path -- only about 15 feet ahead of us -- flew a hawk! It glided, coasting down from the treetops to land in the tall grass about 20 feet away. Then after a minute or so (during which we all stood stunned with awe) it took off again. This time it drifted, almost lazily, into a tree nearby. Fantastic. So graceful. A good omen for the New Year I'm sure -- though I couldn't tell you what it means.

And now, some random photographs that I took and liked. Enjoy.

Here is the Coranado Hotel in its Day-Time glory.














This is a Poinsettia -- who knew they grew into a tree!














We saw this beautiful sand castle on the walk along the beach. It was guarded by a snow penguin.



















Its backlit and I'm wearing sun glasses, but I liked this picture anyway!














These just give a little view of what the beach was like.




























This is one of the strange fruits we saw along the trail.














And to end -- a photo of the Moon on New Years Day night. (I've never been able to get a good Moon shot until now)