Santa Barbara

I took a short trip to Santa Barbara California for a meeting. The weather was gorgeous. Florida is just hot and humid in the summer while Santa Barbara is in the 70’s and lower humidity. I loved that they had bike lanes and great sidewalks for walking in town. Of course the bad part of living there is that the prices are terrible. Someone said that an “OK” house was $900,000+. The hotel room was $250 a night so I ended up staying in an Airbnb in an RV (!) that was still $100 a night.

Our group enjoyed a few hours on a sail boat. We saw both sea lions and seals (these are seals).

Random Pictures

We’re staying in Tucson while I do a conference in San Diego. On one morning bike ride, I saw 6 coyotes near the campground (only two in the picture and from a distance!).

 Solar panels are big in Arizona. One installation along the bike bath.

 

From my visit in San Diego to the Air and Space Museum, a moon rock is always cool. This one was pretty big.

A view of the hotel where many of the meetings were held.

What it is like to ride Greyhound

I have fun trying new things. I needed to travel to San Diego for a conference. My options were a flight ($550+), Amtrak ($400), or Greyhound ($99). I read the Greyhound website. The buses have reclinable seats, free wifi, and electric plugs at the seats. I can handle that!

OK, the reality…the seats are cushioned and slightly reclinable but it is still difficult to sleep. The wifi isn’t bad, but on an overnight trip you spend most of your time trying to sleep and you don’t really want to show-off a laptop (see hints below). The plugs on my first 2 buses were only every 4 rows. The outlets weren’t working on the 3^rd bus. The 4^th bus was good with outlets for both seats.

Hints:

--   Don’t dress up or show-off fancy electronics (smart phones are OK since everyone has them). The clientele of Greyhounds aren’t fancy and you don’t want to look rich. Jeans and an old jacket along with older luggage worked well for me. Also, don’t discuss your job. On flights, everyone talks about their job I don’t remember anyone discussing work. People mostly keep to themselves.

-         -- Bring a jacket, sweater, and maybe a light blanket and pillow. I hoped to use my jacket and sweater as a blanket and pillow but it was cold enough that I had to wear both on one of the buses.

     -- As soon as people stand in line at the gate/door in the station, get in line. This line is to get first choice on seats. Given the unique people, sometimes that can be good. On my return trip, only people near the front of the line got seats on the bus while the rest had to wait for another bus. They do this weird thing where you put your suitcase in the line to hold your place then you can walk around. No way could you leave a bag without a bomb scare at the airport but everyone does it at a bus station.

-        -- Be prepared for unusual people. I saw a guy with a Chinese-type coolie hat, people talking to themselves, a guy wearing long johns as pants, a lady talking about getting her son once he was “released”, and a major incident with a women yelling and cussing and calling for police so that she would be allowed to use the bus station bathroom (it was inside the security area and she had no bus ticket). I never felt scared and many were friendly and helpful, but it was a different crowd.

     -- Be prepared for lack of sleep and bring snacks. Most buses travel overnight. Who really sleeps well on a bus? Some stops have snacks or fast food, but time is limited at most stops. Drink sparingly. My 9 hour trip had 2 bathroom stops with everyone on the bus in line for a single gas station bathroom. There is a bathroom in back but I wasn’t brave or desperate enough to try it.

-         --  Don’t watch the app too much.  Greyhound has an app showing the location of the bus and expected arrival time. Over the day as my bus headed for my stop it changed from early to late to on time and to very late. The times no sense. Expect the bus to be late. BTW, at one point, the bus driver stopped the bus, stepped out, walked back and opened the luggage compartment. He started waving his hands and talking to himself. No idea what that was about.

     Overall, it was an interesting experiment. If I needed to do it, I’d ride again but I would check my other options first.

LA Trip

I had a business trip to Los Angeles. Dinner one night was at the dock (the others were late and at the hotel!).

This is the LAX Theme Building. It’s supposed to look like a space ship on large legs. I still can’t figure out how to get to it.

The car rental place is near Randy’s Doughnuts. I  can’t see it without looking for Iron Man.

My hotel is near the Armenian Genocide Martyrs Memorial. Quite a mouthful, but gorgeous.

California Trip

I had a short business trip to Orange County. Got to the Austin airport early in the morning and got to see a gorgeous sunrise. All the business zombies sat at the gates and didn’t notice the sunrise. But I went to the end of the terminal to take this picture and 5 people were taking pictures, so they weren’t all zombies. Ironically, coming back I got to the airport early again. I was working on my expense account and totally missed sunrise. I’m a business zombie! 

Right next to the hotel was an area that connects to a park with several miles of trails. I didn’t bring shoes to hike much, but it’s a nice area right in the middle of the town.

Living in a Hostel

While I’d love to stay in the $200 per night room in San Diego, I also love saving money.  A few years ago I stayed at a hostel in town.  I had so much fun that I did it again this year.

If you’ve never stayed in a hostel, you should try it sometime.  Yes, I was the oldest resident there but they accepted me.  I slept in a room with 4 beds (female, not a co-ed room).  Frankly, after growing up in a family with 8 kids, sleeping in a bunk room was not an issue.  When I had a chance to see my roommates, they were very friendly.  Two were in their early 20’s from Korea (though traveling separately and were in the room at different days). 

One rule of hostels is to keep lights off and be as quiet as possible in the bedroom while getting ready for bed or getting up in the morning.  That meant I needed to prepare my weeks’ worth of clothes when I got there since I left early and got in late several days.  Another rule for hostels is to bring ear plugs.  Between the noises of roommates getting up, snoring at times, and the bar noises right outside the window; wearing ear plugs all night made sense.

This hostel is full of art along the halls and room.  It has free internet along with a room of computers that you can use.  Breakfast is free everyday along with several suppers.  One night there was even free beer.  Given how much time I was at the conference, I didn’t get to do much of this but it’s nice that they do it.

 

In case you are wondering, there were two showers and two bathrooms on the floor.  The rooms were for only one person at a time, so they were co-ed but not really.  This hostel had a “hair dryer” room.  It had a wall of sinks to brush your teeth and get ready.  Again, it was co-ed.  Another rule is to clean up after yourself.  You even have to wash and dry your bowl and spoon after eating cereal.

Staying in a hostel isn’t for the meek, but I enjoy talking to young adults from around the world. I did a little traveling when I was young, but I’m always amazed at their boldness in traveling alone to new places.  Very cool!

San Diego

This week I attended a conference in San Diego.  Mostly I was at the conference, but I got to see some of the town as I walked to the conference or in the evening if I went out to dinner.

One thing about San Diego is how fit everyone was.  There were lots of people running at all times of the day.  The hardcore fitness people ran to the conventional center and ran up and down the steps.  I saw many of them run the steps and then do a series of sit-ups or crunches at the base.  Then they would hop up the stairs three steps at a time.  Hard-core!

The Gaslamp District is full of bars and restaurants.  And lots of people in the evening.  I enjoyed several good meals in the area.

The Petco Park stadium was close to where I was staying.  Opening night for the baseball season is a month away, but I got this close to the stadium.

 

While there is a lot more things to see in the area (USS Midway, San Diego Zoo, Balboa Park, the beaches), they will have to wait until later trips.

On the way home to Pensacola, Dirk Benedict sat across the aisle from me.  My seatmate recognized him since he used to race home from school to see episodes of A-team where Dirk played the character “Face Man Peck”.  Dirk also played “Starbuck” in Battlestar Galactica.  We asked him if he was Dirk, but he didn’t want to talk.  So we left him alone.  Apparently he was coming into Pensacola for Pensacon. 

I also saw Deep Roy on the plane.  He played the Oompah-Loompah in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Keenser (the creature/fellow Starfleet officer that Scotty yells at “Get off there”) in the new Star Trek movies, and several other movies.  I think there were several other people coming as guests for the Con, but I didn’t realize they would be on the plane or I would have looked more closely.

 

LA Fun

While in LA, I stopped at Randy’s Doughnuts.  This is the place that Iron Man hung out in the 2^nd movie.  It’s seen in several other movies like "2012" where the doughnut is shown rolling down the street.  It’s a 32’ diameter doughnut built in 1953 from steel bars and gunnite (like the material used in swimming pools).  Very cool!

I also visited a casino that was close to my hotel.  Since RV parking at a casino is free in many places, I’ve visited several in the last year.  Those casinos were primarily full of slot machines with only a few tables.  The casino in LA was completely different.  Instead of slot machines, there was room after room of different types of poker (hold em, stud, etc.) and tables for 21.  The tables were full on a weekday afternoon with serious looking gamblers.  Some were eating at the table rather than lose their place since there were people waiting to fill open spots.   I’m not used to gambling so slot machines intimidate me.  These games and gamblers REALLY intimidated me!

This space age structure is at the LA airport. It’s called Theme Building and opened in 1961.  It’s supposed to look like a flying saucer with four legs. Again it’s been seen in multiple movies and TV shows whenever the LA airport is involved ("Speed", "Hancock", etc.).  In the saucer is Encounter Restaurant along with an observation deck (only open on weekend), but I couldn’t find an easy way to get across the roads to get inside.

 

The World’s Oldest McDonald’s

Just for the fun of it, I went to the World’s Oldest McDonald’s.  It opened in 1953 as a franchise with the original McDonald’s owners, not Ray Kroc.

It’s just a few miles from the plant I’m visiting in LA.  The design of the place is unique.  You order at a counter outside, pick up your order at another window, and then eat in a different open-air building. 

 

There’s a sign outside explaining the history and it even has a museum.  It has stuff like this, a multi-mixer for shakes.  Because the McDonald brothers ordered five of these machines, Ray Kroc flew out to California just to see their operations and find out why it was so popular.  Ray Kroc bought out the business in 1955. 

Speedee was the original logo for McDonald’s.  Ronald McDonald came into being in 1963 with Willard Scott as the first Ronald.  Love his hat!

I haven’t eaten at a McDonald’s in years, but the food and service was good while the "ambiance" was great!

LA Driving

This is me whining again.  I flew into Los Angeles for a business trip without my personnel chauffeur.   Without John, I actually had to handle driving in LA traffic.  I grew up in the country.  We thought the traffic was busy when 2 cars passed our house in the same hour. I’m not a good driver so driving in busy traffic, trying to maneuver through the five lanes of traffic, and desperately trying not to die is tough.  Let’s just say there was some cussing going on inside my car (but not yelled out the window).  Luckily the drivers in LA were actually pretty polite and helpful when I made a stupid mistake. 

To top it off, I decided to be environmental and picked up a rental Prius Hybrid.  I’ve never driven one before but it sounded ‘cool’. First, it took me 5 minutes (or more) to figure how to turn it on and get it moving forward.  At one point in LA traffic I actually had to go in reverse.  That took some time to figure out.  Oh, and it beeps when you back up.  Plus, I’m still not sure why it loudly beeped at me in the middle of an intersection, scaring me while I’m trying to navigate all the traffic.

The car may be wonderful (I still haven’t figured out all the displays), but the rear view is terrible.  There’s a bar through the back window and the open area of the window is VERY small.  Here’s what I see in my rear view window.

Speaking of blind spots, yikes!