Sunny Cal in February

Last weekend daughter A and I flew south to visit daughter B at Cal Tech.  There was a cold wind blowing as we drove to SeaTac with plenty of rain mixed in, as one would expect during winter in the Great Northwest.  After takeoff, we saw nothing but clouds until we were well into California when the overcast gave way to ridge after ridge of snowy mountains.  However, as our plane went out over the Pacific to circle back for a landing at Long Beach, the ocean was bright blue, the sky was cloudless, and Santa Catalina Island was clearly visible on the southwestern horizon.  I gotta say Southern Cal in winter is pretty damn close to paradise.

We hopped into our rented VW Jetta, and in true California style sped north on the Harbor Freeway to Pasadena with the sun shining and the radio blaring.  After checking into our cheap motel (the Saga Motor Hotel), we set off on foot to find daughter B and finally caught up with her near the Catalina Graduate Housing complex.

Daughter B in her room at Cal Tech

We visited her living quarters and then headed to the lab to see where she works and studies.












 There we met her friend, and doppelganger M, who is a fellow Northwesterner, Boston educated, was born on the same day as daughter B, and shares her passion for astronomy.  Sort of a matched pair, I would say and no doubt a force to be reckoned with in coming decades.

B and M looking smart in their natural habitat

B took us downstairs to her lab where she is working on her first research project at Cal Tech involving this apparatus:

Ladie

Using mirrors, beam splitters, interference patterns and lots of software, the goal is to measure the radial velocity of a target star to a higher precision than anyone has yet achieved.  The idea is to tease out the subtle signatures of heretofore undiscovered exoplanets. The acronym sounds like "lady" but the long version of the name has escaped me.

We took B and M out for a pizza dinner and found ourselves eating outside with outdoor space heaters nearby which were VERY warm.  People in LA really do not like to be cold which, by their definition, seems to be anything under 65 degrees.

The next morning daughter A and I went to a local farmer's market:

 

Southern Cal agricultural wealth

We bought some fresh oranges, avocados, and strawberries in FEBRUARY(!!) which needless to say were SO delicious!  Then we went to the Eaton Canyon Natural Area of New York Times fame and took a walk in the desert and the woods.  If we had had more time we would have hiked up to the waterfall but not beyond. NO NO NO!!

A non-threatening part of Eaton Canyon

By this time, B was ready to take time off from her studies to go with us to the Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens.  We picked her up at the lab and after a short drive we arrived to be greeted with this:

Flowers in February

The Huntington must have some of the most beautiful grounds anywhere as some of these pictures may attest.  We strolled, we admired antique books including this old thing,

Yes this is a Gutenberg Bible (1455)

we strolled some more,

More pretty stuff

Did you know that oranges grow on trees? Unsettling isn't it?

found a bamboo grove,

A and B with Bamboo

and saw more pretty stuff.

This is pretty

I noticed that the Huntingtons (1%ers back in the 1920s) had a large library of floor to 20-foot ceiling bookcases with hundreds (thousands?) of luxurious editions of books famous and obscure.  They look to be in mint condition too which leads me to believe they were more for show than literary enjoyment.  Do the rich actually read or are they mostly concerned with status and show?  Who knows?  Who really cares?

Daughter A was getting thirsty by this time, so I felt bad about asking her to leave the (immobile) refreshment line so we could go on to... the space shuttle Endeavour!

We drove down the freeway as if we knew what we were doing and found the California Science Museum which, it seems, is very close to the USC campus.  Why was I not made aware of this earlier in life?  Of course, I resent the fact that LA got the shuttle while we in Seattle have to be content with a lame training version made out of wood.  I resented even more that to get to the shuttle, we were forced to walk through a large gallery detailing how great it is that LA got it.  Needless to say, I averted my eyes as we scurried past.  Scurried may be the wrong term - shuffle is more like it since the place was wall-to-wall humans primarily of the rambunctious small boy variety.  I tried not to step on anyone.  What with the noisy crowd and dehydration, daughter A was getting close to a spirited child moment but, with no refreshment in sight, she soldiered on dutifully.  Finally, we made it to the building housing the spaceship, opened the door and... if this were a movie, a dramatic chord would have sounded as we saw this:

Space Shuttle Endeavour

We walked toward the tail looking up at all of the custom fitted heat shield tiles and I tried to imagine riding this machine through reentry with nothing but those tiles between me and flaming death.  Or do I exaggerate?  No, I do not.

Business end of the main engine assembly

At the tail we paused to admire the main engines.  I could easily stand upright inside any one of those nozzles.

Seeing this amazing spacecraft felt both inspiring and sad.  Inspiring because, to me, it symbolizes what this country can do when we put our minds to it.  We can accomplish big, important, and daring things.  I see the space program, both manned and unmanned, as one of the few unadulterated good things we have accomplished as a nation.  History will not look back on "shrinking government" as an important accomplishment if by some evil twist of fate it comes to pass.  The moon landings, the space shuttle, the probes to Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn - those will always be remembered.  It is sad that today we are focused instead on further enriching the rich, screwing over the middle class, and saying to hell with the poor.  This will not end well.

To round out the day, we headed out towards Santa Monica to visit niece K and admire the ocean.  Since we did this last year too, it must now be a tradition.

B, A, and K in Santa Monica

Notice the jackets and scarves - the temp was probably close to a bone-chilling 60 degrees!

The moon shines in Santa Monica too!

We had a charming vegan dinner and good conversation at a hippy restaurant.  A good time was had by all.

The next morning we breakfasted at a coffee shop in Pasadena, walked around the deserted city (it was Sunday morning) and B had to go to lunch with a hard-to-get-ahold-of professor.  A and I decided to go canyon driving in an apparently unnamed canyon just north of Sierra Madre.  The transition from suburbia to an extremely steep and narrow two-lane road was abrupt.  We stopped a few times at wide spots in the road:

Looking out at the LA basin

The mountains with tiny road at left

We were a bit concerned that we would never leave since there didn't seem to be anywhere to turn around.  So we kept driving uphill.  And uphill.  And further uphill.  Finally we arrived at a parking lot of sorts and were able to turn around and head back to civilization. Interestingly, there were cars parked everywhere along the whole length of that road.  I can only imagine that their owners were hiking or falling off cliffs somewhere.  We saw very few walking along the road.

Arriving safely back in the flat lands, we went back to Pasadena to await B, had lunch, debriefed B on her luncheon, and headed back to the airport.  As we sat waiting for our flight, we were paged.  A and I looked at each other significantly with "this can't be good" expressions.  However, the cheerful fellow at the Jet Blue desk merely wanted to inquire if we would like to switch to window seats in the emergency exit row to accommodate a family who wanted to sit together.  Naturally, we said yes to more legroom and the possibility of being the first ones off the plane in case of disaster.  How exciting would that be!

After a milkshake and an uneventful flight we arrived back at SeaTac.  The weather was cold and windy.