Tag Archives: Alpine SoCal

This morning (Saturday) we got picked up at the San Jose Elks Lodge by my cousin Beth and her husband Keith. They offered to act as our tour-guides for the day and take us to see the Monarch butterflies in Santa Cruz Natural Bridges State Beach. We also planned to check out the Mystery Spot in Santa Cruz while we were there.

We left little dog ‘Coach’ in the Coach since we planned to be back before suppertime.

We made good time getting to Santa Cruz on CA-17 and parked on the street opposite the Natural Bridges State Park (←link) parking lot, therefore saving ourselves the parking fee. It sure is great to have local tour-guides! 🙂

I took a picture of Stilla, Cousin Beth, and her husband Keith in front of the entrance sign…

then Keith returned the favor and took a rare photograph of Stilla and I.

Informational placard at the entrance to the State Beach.

The park website says that the Monarch Grove in the state beach park provides a temporary home for up to 100,000 Monarch butterflies. From late fall into winter, the Monarchs form a “city in the trees.” The area’s mild seaside climate and eucalyptus grove provide a safe place for monarchs to roost until spring.

We took the Monarch Trail in search of butterflies.

We came across the strangest tree while walking the trail. The tree had grown onto itself… don’t recall seeing that before.

We continued down the trail in search of butterflies… if anyone told me years ago that I’d be doing that – I’d call ’em crazy 🙂

We reached the boardwalk area of the trail:

And we soon found the butterflies… they were hiding behind all the people:

A lot of folks take their butterfly watching seriously; there were people with telescopes, binoculars, and cameras with telephoto lenses…

This guy really got down with the butterflies (literally) 🙂

Informational placards:

We sat down with Beth & Keith to enjoy the show.

More informational placards:

And some pictures of Monarch butterflies:

After getting our fill of butterfly watching, we walked over to the visitor center.

There were a few neat “live” displays in the visitors center:

OK, this one (below) wasn’t “live” but the caterpillars (above) were.

Beth aced the ‘Monarch Madness Quiz’ on the wall of the visitors center. I missed a few of the questions 🙁 But in my defense, Beth is a teacher by profession.

And as we have all come to know; all visitor centers have their exits through the gift shop:

We walked down to the beach from the visitor center:

It was a really nice beach. We hung out for a while.

Here’s the only remaining natural bridge (below) that the beach was named after. There were originally three of these.

Wikipedia® (←link) says that wave erosion carved the arches and then cut away the cliffs leaving only islands. Of the three original arches only the middle one remains. The outermost arch fell during the early 20th century and the inner arch collapsed during a storm in 1980.

Here’s a few ‘action’ pics of the waves breaking on the arch:

I even got a chance to get my feet wet while we checked out the beach.

We watched some younger folks that seemed to be going through some sort of initiation ritual, possibly a college fraternity.

We headed over to the Santa Cruz Wharf for lunch. You may recall that Stilla and I met an old Army buddy of mine here last Tuesday, I wrote about that in this post.

We had a great seafood dinner at Gilda’s:

Lunch at Gilda’s on the Santa Cruz Wharf with Keith & Beth.

After an awesome lunch we drove on over to the Santa Cruz Mystery Spot.

The Mystery Spot is a ‘gravitational anomaly’ located in the redwoods outside Santa Cruz according to their website. Check out what Wikipedia® says about this place by clicking HERE.

Car covered in Mystery Spot bumper stickers seen in parking lot near entrance.

The entrance fees were pretty reasonable.

Our tour-guide led us up the hill after entertaining us with a lot of ‘tongue-in-cheek’ humor.

He demonstrated that a couple boards laid out on the concrete slabs were level…

then he asked for volunteers to stand opposite each other and take note of who is taller than the other…

then he had the volunteers switch sides… and to everyone’s amazement; the person on the downhill side would ‘magically’ appear to be taller.

A couple other volunteers tried it out as well:

Beth & Keith checked out the ‘anomaly’ after the crowd left… I’m unsure of the result!?!

We marched up the steep concrete walkway.

Our tour-guide demonstrated some more ‘anomalies’ outside the tilted shack that he said slid down the hill to it’s present position… not quite sure I believe that one, do you?

Here (below) he demonstrates how a cue ball appears to roll uphill away from the shack. He demonstrated the same thing by pouring some water onto the board as well.

Then we got to play around in the tilted shack:

This heavy metal ball (below) was suspended from the ceiling. It was harder to push away from the wall than it was to push towards the wall from its natural level position. Weird, huh?

I was climbing the wall (literally).

We got one more demonstration regarding ‘perspective’ and some more bad jokes from our nice tour-guide, then he passed out bumper stickers.

At the end of the tour, we made the trek back down to the bottom of the hill… much easier going down 🙂

And then we did a quick tour of the gift shop:

After that unique and interesting experience, Keith & Beth drove us back to the Coach. We made pretty good time with not too much traffic. What a great day… I have to give Beth & Keith an A+ tour-guide rating. Maybe they should look into starting a side business as local tour-guides 🙂

We made plans to get together again for dinner at my cousin Phil’s house on Sunday evening. Check back for more on that…

California

17-Mile Drive; Pebble Beach; Carmel Mission (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

2015/11/14 davidhobden@mac.com

Friday morning we drove over to my cousin Phil’s house in San Jose and transferred ourselves to his car for another fun-filled tourist day of sight-seeing. But this time we have a local tour-guide (my cousin Phil)!

We drove south on 101 towards Carmel. But along the way, we stopped in Monterey for lunch at the Turn 12 Bar & Grill.

This place had a cool motor-sports vibe and motorcycle motif going on. Their website says it is designed to pay homage to Laguna Seca Raceways 11 turns. I liked it. And lunch was good too!

We did a short drive through Monterey and headed over to the north entrance to 17-Mile Drive.

17-Mile Drive (←link) is a scenic road through Pebble Beach and Pacific Grove on the Monterey Peninsula in California, much of which hugs the Pacific coastline and passes famous golf courses, mansions and scenic attractions, including the Lone Cypress, Bird Rock and the 5,300-acre Del Monte Forest of Monterey Cypress trees.

17-mile-map — Red arrow depicts north entrance where we paid our $10 for the privilege of going down 17-Mile Drive.

We drove south along the coastline and finished in Carmel. We didn’t do the inner coastal road. Maybe another time…

Here’s another good map that I found on a “Pin It” site courtesy of hotelcaliforniablog.com. This map depicts most of the scenic viewpoints we stopped at.

Follow along for a picture tour…

Stilla and Phil getting out of the car. We did this many times throughout the day as we stopped at numerous viewpoints along 17-Mile Drive.

My cousin Phil poses on the beach with Stilla.

Another rare photograph of David & Stilla in a picture together.

It appeared that seals or sea-lions took over one half of the island rock (below) and birds took over the other half. So much for desegregation in California, eh? 🙂

Wonder how much these homes cost!?!

The Ghost Tree.

We finally got to the south end of 17-Mile Drive (see arrow in pic above) and drove over to the Carmel Mission.

Click HERE for more info on the mission from my good friend Wikipedia®.

We had to pay a $6.50 entrance fee that helps support the Mission.

We then drove through the Mission Ranch Hotel & Restaurant (←link) located next to the Mission Church. It is reportedly owned by actor Clint Eastwood.

Notice the tree growing through the porch roof on the Mission Ranch guest house (below).

After our tour of Carmel Mission and the Mission Ranch, we did a drive-by of the beach and scenic downtown Carmel-by-the-Sea:

When we got back to San Jose, Phil treated us to a great dinner at a favorite pizzeria he frequents often. Willow Street Wood-Fired Pizza in Willow Glen.

Thanks for a great day Phil!

Stay tuned because on Saturday, Beth & Keith are coming over to the lodge to pick us up for another fun-filled day of sight-seeing…

California

Winchester Mystery House Tour (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

2015/11/13 davidhobden@mac.com 1 Comment

I don’t have much time to spend on today’s posting about our Thursday tour of the Winchester Mystery House. Cousin Phil has taken Friday off from work and we plan to meet up early this morning so he can spend the day with us. We’re looking forward to having our own personal tour-guide. 🙂

So follow along on a quick tour of the Winchester Mystery House (←link) located in San Jose, CA:

Sign off Winchester Blvd in the parking lot of the Mystery House..

Mystery House entrance kiosk on the side of the parking lot.

Informational placard on the Winchester House.

More information on the Winchester Mystery House.

Be sure to at least read the placard (above). Learn more about Sarah Winchester and the Mystery House from the Wikipedia™ link HERE.

We chose to take the “Best Value!” Grand Estate Tour and paid $84 after receiving a $4 military veteran discount.

Here’s the entrance to the house tour (below), next to the green screen where they take your picture before going in. There were basically two tours included in our admission price. Both tours are docent-led and after we finished our tour of the house, aptly named the Grand Estate Tour, we met another guide in the garden for the second tour that was named the Behind-the-Scenes Tour.

There were no pictures or recording devices allowed inside the house. So all the pictures today are of the outside of the estate and in a few of the out-buildings where we were allowed to take pictures during the Behind-the-Scenes portion of the tour.

The website describes the Behind-the Scenes Tour as a 55-minute guided Tour which shows much of what made the estate run. Tour stops included the Stables, Fruit Drying Shed, Garage, Greenhouse, and the unfinished Ballroom… the highlight of the Behind-the-Scenes Tour is a journey down into the basement which houses the oil burning furnace and an original hydraulic cargo elevator. The basement is also the location of many ghost sightings. We didn’t see any though 🙁

Garden-side views of the mansion:

Hollywood style styrofoam “mock-up” of Sarah Winchester’s actual headstone located in New Haven, Connecticut.

Fruit Drying Shed:

Old picture (pre-earthquake) of the Mystery House.

The garage and car wash building:

View of the Grand Estate through the garage window.

Our tour-guide points out a photo of the Winchester Estate carpenters.

Our tour guide tells us about some reported ghost sightings. The guy on the right in the picture (below) has been seen pushing a wheelbarrow in the basement by more than just a few folks.

Front view of the Grand Estate:

The christmas decorations are already going up throughout the estate. Many of the rooms we toured had their trees up already.

The front door. Reportedly never used.

Many areas of the house that were under construction at the time of Sarah Winchester’s death were abandoned and never completed:

More exterior photos:

Look closely at the windows in the pics below for any ghosts that may be looking down on us:

The door to nowhere. It’s a long step downnn…

Notice the vines growing where the brick chimney used to be. The brick chimney was destroyed during the 1906 earthquake.

Sarah Winchester’s bedroom where she passed away in her bed on September 5, 1922. All construction stopped immediately after her death at the age of 83.

What a crazy house with stairs that go nowhere, skylights in the floors, and doors that open up to walls! It was a really neat tour, I highly recommend it if you’re in the area. I wish the tour fees were a little more reasonable though.

Of course, our tour wasn’t complete until we checked out the Winchester Historic Firearms Museum located in an out-building:

Some revolvers: (These are for you brother Steven)

The WInchester rifle “Commemorative Series”:

After our tour of the Firearms Museum, we wandered through the huge gift shop:

Great tour, great day! We basically spent our entire Thursday here.

We returned to the Elks Lodge RV park with just enough time to walk our little dog ‘Coach’ before we met up again with my San Jose relatives for dinner.

We decided to take advantage of dinner inside the San Jose Elks Lodge. We went into the lodge with my cousin Beth, her husband Keith, and their daughters Daria and Anja. My cousin Phil joined us shortly thereafter on his way home from work.

The lodge had a veterans support event going on and was raffling off some quilts as we finished up our dinners:

We had three great choices for dinner which included a full soup & salad bar. The choices were Sirloin Steak, Fried Shrimp, or BBQ ribs. By all reports, the meals were delicious and they were all reasonably priced as well 🙂

Another great finish to a great day 🙂 Check back tomorrow to see where and what we get into with my cousin Phil acting as our local tour-guide…

California

Monterey Aquarium (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

2015/11/12 davidhobden@mac.com

Happy Veterans Day! Here’s a short YouTube® tribute that my Uncle Alan shared with me:

(Lexi, for Veterans Day)

Thanks Uncle!

We got a somewhat late start on Wednesday and headed down to Monterey to visit the Monterey Bay Aquarium (←link). This time we took our little dog Coach along.

We took the route highlighted in blue (above) and after about an hour drive, we saw the Monterey Bay (below).

Soon after, we pulled into the town of Monterey and followed the road signs to the Aquarium.

We found a parking lot just up the street from the aquarium. We had to pay $15 to park. Ouch!

Since today was Veterans Day, we didn’t have to pay the $79.90 entrance fee! That was a nice savings 🙂

Now enjoy a select number of photos we took on our visit to the aquarium today:

View of the tidal pool on the ocean-side of the aquarium:

No seals or sea lions hanging around today 🙁

We went to the upper level.

The waterfall (below) is supposed to simulate a tide. The water runs over a glass enclosure. You can also watch from the inside. Pretty cool.

View of the tidal pool from the upper level.

Back inside the aquarium.

This guy (below) seemed grumpy:

Flatfish (below): Did you know that one of their eyes migrate around or through their head during development!?! They can also camouflage themselves like a chameleon.

In the bird sanctuary area, we were told that these were all ‘rescue’ birds:

After finishing up our pleasurable tour of the aquarium we walked down Cannery Row (←link). Now don’t worry, we didn’t forget about ‘Coach’ who was waiting for us in the truck. I checked on him once while we were at the aquarium and we left the windows down a bit. We also had the sun shade in the windshield. It was a cool 60° all day at the most and partly cloudy. We also walked him before we wandered around Cannery Row.

We browsed a few of the shops and stores before we headed over to Fisherman’s Wharf (←link).

There wasn’t much going on at the wharf, so we headed back towards home (the San Jose Elks Lodge), which by-the-way we paid for an additional 4 nights ($88). That puts us out of here on Sunday unless we change our mind. My cousin Phil is trying to get Friday off, so maybe we can do something more together then.

On the way back, we stopped in Gilroy, CA at Applebee’s to take advantage of their free entree for Veterans. It sure is great that some of these major chains support our veterans by providing a service or benefit of some type. Kudos to them 🙂

Stay tuned…

California

Old Army Buddy Reunion & Dinner at Aunt Donna’s (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

2015/11/11 davidhobden@mac.com

We made plans today (Tuesday) to meet with an old Army buddy of mine that lives in the Santa Cruz area. So we left the San Jose Elks Lodge in time to meet on the Santa Cruz Wharf (←link) by 11 AM for a lunchtime get-together.

We drove through the toll gate and took a ticket to park on the pier.

We found my old Army buddy Adam Breed near the end of the pier with his fiancé Shivan and daughter Teagan.

We had a great lunch at Woodies Cafe on the Wharf while we caught up on old times.

After a fine lunch and lots of conversation, we did a little seal watching together from the end of the wharf:

Birds fighting over a fish with a seal off the Santa Cruz Pier.

Then we checked out all the seals that were hanging out below the pier:

The Santa Cruz Wharf has some convenient open areas in the middle for seal watching:

And of course, we had to check out some of the stores on the pier as well:

Art-deco water fountain on the Santa Cruz Wharf.

Shivan helped Teagan get a drink from the scary looking water fountain.

It was really great spending time with Adam and catching up on recent events. It’s been over 10 years since we were stationed together in Katterbach, Germany where we deployed for a year-long tour in Iraq together.

Here’s a few pics I found of Adam, both before and during our Iraq tour together:

DSCF2559 copy — Adam Breed in Katterbach, Germany circa. 2003.

Adam is a first-class welder/fabricator. Here he is making a protective .50 cal machine gun turret for the back of a 5 ton truck out of scrap parts.

And he fabricated these troop seats (below) to be mounted in the middle of a 5 ton truck bed, in order for the troops to be able to face out while being transported instead of towards each other with their backs exposed.

Adam in Tikrit, Iraq (2004).

He was my driver in the truck below during our convoy from Kuwait thru Baghdad to Tikrit in northern Iraq.

Here’s Adam catching some Zzzz’s on top of the truck during a rest halt.

Now this was going to be a project:

Adam and other members of the Service & Recovery (S&R) / Welding Section of the 601st Direct Support Battalion, 1st Infantry Division putting another battle-damaged HMMWV together.

Too bad we don’t have an ‘after’ pic, eh Adam?

We said our goodbyes and ‘see-ya-laters’… Adam had to get back home and start his night shift at work by 7 PM. Take care Adam… stay in touch and we hope to see you guys again soon!

After we left Adam and Shivan, we drove around the corner to the Mark Abbott Memorial Lighthouse and Surfing Museum:

The Lighthouse / Museum was closed so we just walked around the cliff edge and checked out the scenery and wildlife:

Then we were mesmerized by the crazy surfer antics in the Monterey Bay below us:

It was hard to believe these guys didn’t run over each other while catching some of those waves:

After watching the crazy, (or were they just skilled?), surfers for a while, we decided this wasn’t a sport we’d like to take up… so we headed north from Santa Cruz on Hwy-1 towards San Francisco.

It wasn’t long before we came upon the Pigeon Point Lighthouse:

We pulled into the parking area off Pigeon Point Rd and walked out to the lighthouse.

The website says this about the Pigeon Point Lighthouse: “Perched on a cliff on the central California coast, 50 miles south of San Francisco, the 115-foot Pigeon Point Lighthouse, one of the tallest lighthouses in America, has been guiding mariners since 1872. Its five-wick lard oil lamp, and first-order Fresnel lens, comprised of 1,008 prisms, was first lit at sunset, November 15, 1872. The lens stands 16 feet tall, 6 feet in diameter, and weighs 2,000 pounds. Now on display in the Fog Signal building, it sat in a lantern room constructed at the Lighthouse Service’s general depot in New York before being shipped around the Horn. Although the original Fresnel lens is no longer in use, the lighthouse is still an active U.S. Coast Guard aid to navigation using a Vega Marine Rotating Beacon.”

Land-side view of the lighthouse.

The lighthouse was closed for repairs so all we could do was walk around the grounds.
Per the CA State website: “In December 2001, a section of the iron belt course on the exterior of the lighthouse fell off. The lighthouse will remain closed until the structure can be restored. The lighthouse may still be viewed from the grounds. For more information go to Lighthouse Restoration”

Stilla on the whale-watching platform at Pigeon Point Lighthouse.

Sea-side view of the lighthouse and adjoining buildings.

Notice the huge fog horns protruding from the outbuilding (below).

Informational placards at Pigeon Point Lighthouse:

We walked down to the beach.

After we finished checking out the lighthouse and beach, we kept going north on Hwy-1 towards Half Moon Bay.

As soon as we pulled into the Half Moon Bay parking area, my cousin Phil texted us about dinner at my Aunt Donna’s house. It was already past 4 PM and we were expected for dinner by 6… we had to hurry back!

Traffic was good heading back into San Jose until we got about 18 miles from the Elks Lodge…

then it was stop-n-go traffic the rest of the way… I think our max speed at times was only 20 mph 🙁

I sure don’t miss commuting… what a mess! We made it back to the lodge by 6 PM or so. My cousin Phil met us there to transport us to Aunt Donna’s so we wouldn’t get lost. Thanks again Phil! We took our little dog ‘Coach’ who was happy to see us again after being alone in the Coach again for 8 to 9 hours 🙁 and jumped in Phil’s truck for a ride to Aunt Donna’s house.

We had a great chinese dinner waiting for us when we finally arrived. The whole San Jose gang was in attendance!

(L to R) Faith, Keith, Stilla, Donna, Phil, Tina, Nathaniel, and Anja at Aunt Donna’s house.

(L to R) Donna, Phil, Tina, Nathaniel, Anja, Faith, Keith, and Stilla at Aunt Donna’s house.

(L to R) Nathaniel, Faith, Keith, Anja, and Daria.

After dinner, some of the gang played a card game while others looked at old family photos, talked, and reminisced.

Little Coach even got to play with Phil & Tina’s little dog Boone(sp?). They really got along good together.

And then it was time for dessert! Yumm… and we even got to take some home with us 🙂 Thanks Aunt Donna!

It was another great day and an even better evening with all the relatives… stay tuned to see what we get into next 🙂

We were thinking of checking out the Aquarium at Monterey Bay… they have free admission for veterans on Nov. 11th according to their website.

California

Hiding from the Rain on a Lazy Monday (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

2015/11/10 davidhobden@mac.com

We just hung around the Coach and hid out from the rain today (Monday) until my appointment time with the Veterans Supportive Services Agency (VSSA) representative. I wrote about making this appointment in a previous post (HERE) when we went into the San Jose Elks Lodge to check out the Veterans Fair & Luncheon. The meeting went well and I gave the rep all my paperwork and we filled out some forms. The meeting was held at a combined VSSA and American Legion building. After the appointment, we found a post office to mail the documents off to the VA with a return-receipt request. Now all I can do is wait and see if my rating gets re-evaluated.

I was also contacted by an old Army buddy today that lives in the area. He is a ‘friend’ on Facebook and saw that we were here. We made plans to get together in Santa Cruz on Tuesday. I haven’t seen Adam Breed since before I left Germany in 2005. We were deployed to Iraq together a couple times. He was in my welding section when I was the Chief Warrant Officer in charge of a Direct Support Battalion operation in Tikrit, Iraq. Looking forward to catching up with him and his family on Tuesday… as I’ve said before – there’s no greater bond between men than having served in combat.

Around dinnertime, my cousin Beth texted about getting together again for dinner… Well SURE ! 🙂

Beth and her husband Keith (along with two of their three daughters) picked us up again at the Elks Lodge and drove us over to a local Mexican restaurant that they frequent often. Great food, great company once again! Man, what service… courtesy pick-up and drop-off… we’re getting spoiled 🙂

(L to R) Self, Stilla, Daria, Anja, Beth, and Keith.

Unfortunately cousin Philip and his wife Tina couldn’t make dinner because he was working… he’s still trying for that first million I guess 🙂 We still have time here to get together… and if we don’t we’ll just have to stay longer, right?

Check back later to see how our day in Santa Cruz goes… The rain stopped and it looks like we have good weather again for a while…

California

Sunday Post 2 of 2 – Tour of Fort Point, Golden Gate Bridge & Family Reunion Dinner (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

2015/11/09 davidhobden@mac.com

Authors Note: Warning – Another great “tourist day” with lots of pictures … as a matter-of-fact I had to split Sunday up into two separate posts to accommodate all the pics. This is post 2 of 2. Remember to use your laptop or desktop computer instead of mobile device to get the most out of the pictures… and if any of the pics don’t load, just refresh your browser.

After leaving Pier 33 where we parked the Silverado for our Alcatraz Island tour, we headed towards the Golden Gate Bridge since we still had some time before we were scheduled to meet up with my cousins for dinner around 6 PM back in San Jose.

We stopped along the way at a beach and caught another shot of Alcatraz Island.

And here’s the Golden Gate Bridge in the distance.

We drove towards the bridge and caught sight of the entrance to Fort Point. I’d heard of this fort and figured we’d stop to check it out.

We followed the entrance road to the Fort as the bridge came into view getting larger and larger:

Fort Point is located directly under the bridge on the south side.

We parked and watched the surfers trying to catch some waves just below the parking lot:

We entered the Fort and expected to have to pay for a tour, but found out it’s totally free 🙂

Here’s a National Park Service link for more information on Fort Point. (Click HERE).

The website says; “The Fort has been called “the pride of the Pacific,” “the Gibraltar of the West Coast,” and “one of the most perfect models of masonry in America.” When construction began during the height of the California Gold Rush, Fort Point was planned as the most formidable deterrence America could offer to a naval attack on California. Although its guns never fired a shot in anger, the “Fort at Fort Point” as it was originally named has witnessed Civil War, obsolescence, earthquake, bridge construction, reuse for World War II, and preservation as a National Historic Site.” Click link above for more information.

We climbed up the circular staircase (whew!) to get to the top of the Fort:

View down into the courtyard from the top.

Here’s some more scenic views from on top of the Fort’s massive walls near the gun emplacements:

View of San Francisco from the top of the wall.

And another view of Alcatraz Island from the top of the wall. The bird photo-bombed my pics 😉

I zoomed in for a pic of the opposite side of the bridge.

Another view on the top of Fort Point.

The (now) empty gun emplacements on the top of the walls. Stilla in the background.

Lighthouse on top of the Fort:

We walked down to the upper level (third tier) and toured some of the rooms:

Old barracks setup.

Building the Golden Gate Bridge info and displays:

We continued our tour on the next floor (second tier):

And once we were back down in the courtyard, we viewed some of the cannon and cannon related displays:

The mini-theater had a film running on the big screen. We only watched part of it since we had to get back to our little dog ‘Coach’ waiting in the Coach and our dinner date with relatives.

We left the Fort and drove back up to the entrance (south-side) of the Golden Gate Bridge. We checked out the parking lot to the visitors center but they charge a fee to park, so we just drove thru and entered the onramp to the bridge:

And then we drove across the bridge to the north side as Stilla snapped some pictures:

When we got close to opposite side, we saw a sign for Vista Point.

We pulled in, fought the other tourists for a parking spot, got out and took a couple pics:

View of Golden Gate Bridge from the north side looking back south from Vista Point.

We did a u-turn under the north side of the bridge and headed back across. We needed to be back in San Jose to meet my cousins for dinner by 6 PM.

We noticed signs that mentioned a toll (?!?) but the toll booths were empty. I went online this morning and found the following information at gocalifornia.about.com:

“If you’re northbound on U.S. Highway 101, it’s easy to cross the Golden Gate Bridge by automobile, but southbound, it’s more complicated.
In March, 2013, Golden Gate Bridge toll-takers stepped out of their booths for the last time, but that doesn’t mean they stopped collecting tolls. Instead, they’ve just changed the system and everyone who crosses the bridge by automobile pays using an electronic system.”

The website goes on to say: “Oops! I Already Crossed Without Paying – Don’t fret yet. You have at least 48 hours to pay your toll without a fine. You can pay using a credit card online or pay by telephone at 877-229-8655 (toll free) or 415-486-8655 from outside California.”
“If you cross and don’t pay, don’t think you’ll get away with it. The vehicle’s license tag will be photographed and an invoice will be automatically mailed to the registered owner of the vehicle. If that’s a rental company, you can expect a bill for the fine, along with a hefty fee from the company, too.”

So, I guess I’d better pay our bill, eh? Gotta love California 🙂

We made it back to the Elks Lodge by 5:30 PM and little “Coach” was happy to get out and take care of “business” after being left alone for almost 10 hours. He did great (once again) and didn’t leave us any ‘surprises’ in the Coach. 🙂

My cousin Beth had been in contact with us throughout the day, and we arranged for her (along with her family) to meet us at the lodge to pick us up for dinner.

Beth and her husband Keith picked us up by 6 PM and drove us over to Harry’s Hofbrau.

This is a nice German-themed restaurant with a neat atmosphere and pretty good food. The best part of course, was getting to see my relatives 🙂

The restaurant has a buffet-style serving line. The place must be popular because we had a pretty long line to wait in for our food.

While we were waiting in the serving line, my cousin Phil joined us with his wife Tina and son Nathaniel.

My cousin Philip Hobden (all he needs is a Bavarian Hat) 🙂

(L to R) Cousin Phil, his wife Tina, cousin Beth and then her daughters’ Anja, Faith, and Daria. Then my Aunt Donna, Beth’s husband Keith, and on the front right is Phil & Tina’s son Nathaniel.

(L to R) Daria, Aunt Donna, Keith, Nathaniel, Stilla, Phil, Tina, Beth, Anja, and Faith.

(L to R) Cousin Beth, Stilla, Tina (Phil’s wife) and my cousin Philip.

The restaurant was rather loud so it was hard to have any large degree of conversation, but it was sure nice to see my Aunt and cousins (from my Dad’s side of the family). We made tentative plans to get together again while we are still in San Jose. Looking forward to that! 🙂 And thanks again Keith, for picking up the bill. See you guys again soon.

California

Sunday Post 1 of 2 – Alcatraz Island Tour (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

2015/11/09 davidhobden@mac.com 2 Comments

We got up early (Sunday) to make sure we made it to San Francisco’s Pier 33 in time for our 10 AM ferry ride to Alcatraz. We gave ourselves a 2 -1/2 hour headstart in case we had trouble finding a parking spot. We left little “Coach” in the Coach for the day.

It was wet and drizzling by the time we completed the ~50 mile trip. We arrived with only a half hour to 45 minute cushion to board our ferry. We found a covered parking area just a block away from the pier but saw it was an outrageous $30 per day (Weekend Rate). So we drove around to find a cheaper parking lot. We found another lot that was farther away, but it was also $30 per day because we were “over-sized” per the attendant… so we went back to the first parking area and grudgingly paid the fee 🙁

We parked and made the short walk to the pier to pick up our tickets at ‘Will-Call’ that we had reserved before we left my brother’s house in Westley, CA last Thursday. The tickets for the tour were $31 per person.

I took pictures of the informational placards on the pier as we waited to board the ferry:

And here comes our ferry (below). We boarded and found a seat inside to stay dry.

Our first views of the Golden Gate Bridge. The clouds receded a bit and it quit drizzling. It looks like we got lucky for once with the weather 🙂

Our first view of “The Rock”.

Looking back at the San Francisco skyline.

Here’s a little history of Alcatraz Island that was posted on the wall in the ferry.

And here’s some info on the ferry itself that was displayed on the flat-screen TV.

We pulled into the dock and disembarked. The ferry ride was short and smooth. We were also able to get a quick breakfast onboard to help fuel our day.

Once on the island, we listened to a park ranger give us safety instructions and an introduction to the island. Then we headed over to the nearby theater for a short film.

There were several screens playing the film at the same time in order to accommodate large crowds.

Then we toured the lower part of the old fort. Learn more about that by clicking HERE.

This room (below) had information on the American Indian occupation of Alcatraz in the late ’60s to early ’70s. Click HERE for more information from Wikipedia® on that.

After touring the lower portion of the island, we walked up the walkway(s) to the main cell block building.

I have no idea what significance the old truck (below) has on the island of Alcatraz – but you know me… I just had to take a picture 🙂

View up to the main cell block building as we walked up the pathway.

The officers’ club is in need of serious repairs.

A lot of the old walkways and stairs were closed for safety reasons.

Many areas of the prison are in dire need of repairs:

View back down towards the dock (below) after we walked up the pathway to the upper levels and main cell block.

Once inside the main building we viewed the clothing and bedding issue area.

The communal showers.

And here’s where we got our headpieces and started the audio-tour (below). Follow along on our audio-tour with these silent pictures: 😉

Typical cell block with a copy of the stringent ‘Rules & Regulations’ booklet on the table.

We toured the cell blocks and listened to some of the inmates’ stories on our headphones.

We walked out into the recreation yard.

View of the Recreation Yard with Stilla in the foreground.

We took the steps back up to the cell blocks from the Recreation Yard for more audio-tour.

The infamous “D” Block – solitary confinement.

The prison library.

Cell re-creations with authentic personal items:

The Administrative area of the main cell block:

Check out the old ‘period-correct’ office equipment, i.e., phone, rolodex, typewriter, fan, etc.,

The visitation area.

Front door to the Admin area. This is where you had to go if you wanted to visit with an inmate.

Informational placard and island model in the administrative area:

Then the audio-tour talked us through the 1962 escape from Alcatraz… click HERE for more info on this infamous event.

The Anglin brothers’ cells (below).

More cell block pics:

How did she get out? 🙂

Entrance to the dining hall.

More dining hall pics:

View from dining hall window.

We finished the audio portion of the tour and headed down the stairs…

to turn in our headphones.

And of course, the exit goes through the Museum Store.

Souvenirs anyone?

We went back outside the main cell block building after getting through the gift shop and wandered around the grounds:

I think this was the old Warden’s building:

The old lighthouse.

The old parade grounds:

Walkway down to the west side gardens.

A couple nice views of the Golden Gate Bridge. The sun peeked out a few times during our time on the island. No rain at all 🙂

The stairs (below) go up to the Recreation Yard.

Another Golden Gate Bridge picture with sailboat.

Dilapidated guard tower on the corner of the Recreation Yard.

View of the old lighthouse as we came back up the path from the gardens.

I zoomed in on the San Francisco skyline from the southwest-side of the island. I thought these pics came out pretty good:

We gathered back down at the dock with the other tourists and waited for the next ferry. They run every 30 minutes.

We were herded back onto the ferry for our return trip to Pier 33.

Sign near the dock:

The island receded into the distance as we cruised back to the mainland:

Views coming back into port:

Pier 33:

After we got off the ferry, we went to check out the picture they took of us as we boarded earlier in the day. Everyone’s picture was posted in order of departure time:

We decided to buy the cheapest photo package ($20) for a 6 X 8 in a frame:

Stock photo of the dock on Alcatraz (below) was provided with our picture (above).

We were hungry after our long walking tour, so we walked into the Alcatraz Landing Cafe that was located right next to the loading area on Pier 33.

We shared our lunch with a couple pigeons that seemed to be at home on the floor of the Cafe.

Hope you enjoyed our tour of Alcatraz Island. We thought it was great! It was well worth the $31 pp fee, I just wish parking in the area was more reasonable.

After our quick lunch at Alcatraz Landing Cafe, we decided to check out some more of the area, i.e., Fort Point and the Golden Gate Bridge. Check my next post for a recap of those attractions. We also had a dinner date with my cousins and Aunt Donna later in the evening. I’ll try to get it posted asap…

California

Through the Forest & To the Beach… (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

2015/11/08 davidhobden@mac.com

We started out our Saturday here at the San Jose Elks Lodge by going into the lodge because we were told by the camphost (Glenn) that there was a Veterans Fair and luncheon from 11 AM to 3 PM.

I talked to a Veterans Supportive Services Agency (VSSA) representative and got an appointment for Monday to review my disability rating. This is something I’ve been meaning to do for a while now. It was nice to get this unexpected opportunity.

Then we toured the lodge and checked out the pool…

Very nice pool… too bad it’s closed for the season.

A nice lunch spread was provided for the veterans.

After we enjoyed some lunch and checked out the Veterans Fair in the lodge, we jumped into the Silverado with our little dog ‘Coach’ to make the most out of the rest of the day. My cousin Phil told us about a nice route to take towards Santa Cruz.

We went south on scenic CA-9 through the hills (or should I call them mountains?) and turned west into Big Basin Redwoods State Park on CA-236 which was basically a loop that returned us to CA-9. (see GPS pic below).

What a beautiful drive. The road through most of the State Park was very winding and narrow, we often had to stop at wide spots to let oncoming traffic pass.

We stopped briefly at the Park Headquarters:

The park website tells us that Big Basin is California’s oldest State Park, established in 1902. Home to the largest continuous stand of Ancient Coast Redwoods south of San Francisco, the park consists of Old Growth and recovering Redwood Forest, with mixed conifer, oaks, chaparral, and riparian habitats. Elevations in the park vary from sea level to over 2,000 feet. The climate ranges from foggy and damp near the ocean to sunny, warm ridge tops.

After our stop at the Park Headquarters and Visitor Center, we continued south on CA-9 until we reached the beach in Santa Cruz… just in time for the sunset.

Nice looking beach… we’ll have to come back here when we have more time. People were firing up their campfires as dusk closed in on us.

This is the Santa Cruz pier in the background (below).

And this is the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk Amusement Park (below). Check out the link. Looks like a lot of fun. We drove by the other side of the park later but didn’t go in… parking looked dicey and we didn’t want to pay just for a quick look.

The sign (below) near the beach access says the area is closed. Looks like the locals didn’t think so. What a difference from our time at the “no fun” beach we visited near L.A. earlier this year. I wrote about Manhattan Beach in this post.

After a quick drive by the Santa Cruz pier and amusement park, we headed back north to San Jose through heavy traffic on CA-17 where we stopped at a Korean restaurant for dinner. Another great day 🙂

Check back tomorrow for a full recap of our Alcatraz tour. We locked in a 10 AM (Sunday) tour a few days ago. Hopefully the weather stays nice. The forecast calls for rain 🙁

California

Moving Day to San Jose (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

2015/11/07 davidhobden@mac.com 2 Comments

We said our sad goodbyes to my brother Ronald, his wife Terry, and son James on Friday morning in Westley, CA and hit the road by noon. It was an uneventful drive to San Jose with the exception of the bumpy pothole-ridden freeways. We pulled in to the San Jose Elks Lodge about an hour and a half later.

There was only one small hiccup – at our last exit, the GPS said to turn right at the intersection and the Lodge would be on the left in a couple hundred feet. It wasn’t there! We found out (later) that the entrance to the lodge was directly across the street at the intersection after our exit. We didn’t see the lodge sign; put our trust in the GPS; and turned right. Arrgh! We had to turn around in a shopping center parking lot.

The Urban Escape Vehicle packed in at the San Jose Elks Lodge.

Once we pulled into the lodge parking lot, we saw all the rigs and started wondering if there was an empty spot. It turns out that a large portion of the parking area is also storage. I called the lodge the day before but only got a recording that said “first come – first serve” for the 28 RV spots with electric and water.

As I was walking around the lot to see if there was an open site left, the camp-host walked up to help us out. What a nice guy… and very talkative too 🙂 I think he told us his name was Glenn. He directed us to the last 50 Amp spot that was open. It turns out that there was a 30 Amp spot on the back side of the row too. So, I guess we were lucky. The only problem is that they don’t have a dump station on site. We should have dumped on the way here, but wrongly assumed that the lodge would at least have one dump station. Oh well; Glenn gave us very detailed directions to a nearby dump station, and after another 10-15 minutes of conversation, we disconnected the Silverado, parked it in our new site, and drove over to the dump station to take care of the dirty deed. We only got lost one more time. 🙂

When we returned to the lodge, the camphost Glenn was there again to direct us into our site and then he waited to supervise our hooking up the electric and water to make sure everything was alright. Nice guy 🙂

We paid $110 for 5 nights ($22 per night) by putting a check into an envelope that is available at a pay station alongside the RV parking lot.

Sign in front of Elks Lodge 522 (San Jose). Notice that the exit from the freeway (on the right) is directly across from the entrance to the lodge (behind the sign).

Shortly after we got set up, my cousin Phil texted that he was on his way home from work and would stop by if that was OK. Of course, that was OK 🙂 We haven’t seen Phil since our campout together at Lake Tahoe in July of last year. This was before I was doing the blog, so unfortunately, I can’t paste a link here like I usually do.

Anyway, it was great to catch up with my cousin Phil – albeit briefly. He had previous plans to go camping with his son this weekend so we won’t see him again until Sunday. We hope to get together again then for dinner. His sister, (my other cousin), Beth and her family are also here in San Jose, so hopefully we can all get together with them as well.

Second row of RV sites (behind our row) at the San Jose Elks Lodge.

Vehicles in storage at the San Jose Elks Lodge.

Someone here at the lodge parking lot put out food for all the stray cats.

After Phil left, it was getting dark and we hadn’t eaten yet. So we jumped in the Silverado and headed around the corner to find a small Greek restaurant. There was also a hair stylist next door, so Stilla jumped at the opportunity to get a quick hair cut while we waited for our food.

Good haircut, good food! We relaxed in the Coach for the rest of the evening because we didn’t see much activity (very few cars) at the lodge. Maybe we’ll go inside tomorrow (Saturday).

The only firm plans we have right now are for a tour of Alcatraz. We got on the website yesterday and found out the tours fill up quickly, so we reserved a tour for this upcoming Sunday. I’ll let you know how that goes with lots of pictures… meanwhile, there’s lots of other things to see and do here. Cousin Phil gave us some tips, so stay tuned 🙂

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Tag Archives: Alpine SoCal

Natural Bridges; Butterflies; & The Mystery Spot (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

17-Mile Drive; Pebble Beach; Carmel Mission (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

Winchester Mystery House Tour (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

Monterey Aquarium (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

Old Army Buddy Reunion & Dinner at Aunt Donna’s (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

Hiding from the Rain on a Lazy Monday (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

Sunday Post 2 of 2 – Tour of Fort Point, Golden Gate Bridge & Family Reunion Dinner (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

Sunday Post 1 of 2 – Alcatraz Island Tour (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

Through the Forest & To the Beach… (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

Moving Day to San Jose (Elks Lodge 522 – San Jose, CA)

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