Saturday, 3 October 2009

California, here we come...

Sorry it's been a long time coming, but here's a whistle-stop tour of our holiday, starting in LA and taking in Arizona, the Grand Canyon, the Hoover Dam, Yosemite and finishing in a favourite stop of ours, Santa Barbara.

The Getty Centre in LA, where we spent a whole day:

The architecture is really inspiring, and shows hints of the Classical past:

A beautiful Holy Family by Carlo Dolci, in fact they have a very good art collection:

Sculptures on the balconies that wrap around the building:



An old gas station at the Farmers Market in LA:

Firs in the grounds of the Hollyhock House by Frank Lloyd Wright:

The Griffin Observatory:



Sedona, where we were based for 5 days, and my favourite part. Just look at the colour of the rocks; every day they were a different colour, and the intensity of the red increased and decreased throughout the day:

The Four Vortexes:


The breathtaking Grand Canyon:

Part of an early 20th Century Hopi Mural inside the Desert View Stone Watchtower designed by Mary Colter:



A Squirrel posing:

The Hopi House, built by Native American women and now housing their crafts:

The Route 66 town of Williams:

We had a stopover in Vegas. This is inside the Wynn: It's not easy to see, but there are giant flower balls hanging from the "trees" (you're never quite sure what's real in Vegas, everything seems fake, like the grass outside the Wynn Encore where we were staying, which was plastic!):

On to Yosemite, for the second half of the trip. This is the staggering Half Dome:


From the Alpine summit down to the meadows in the valleys:

I thought the shadows in this rock face resembled a bird:

A Sterling Jay. We saw deer, lots of tiny yellow-bellied squirrels and these birds, but sadly no bears:

"El Capitan", another imposing mountain. We actually saw rock climbers on this rock-face:

From lush meadows to towering sequioas:


These trees are sooo huge that you can drive through them. This is now frowned upon, as it obviously severly damages the tree, but at the turn of the Century this is what they did:

"The Bachelor and the Three Graces". They're too tall to take in vertically!:

The last night's meal, shrimp cocktail at our favourite, Brophy's on the water in Santa Barbara, a great way to end:

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Rowan, what a fantastic holiday! I loved the photo tour.

Sedona really is one of the most stunning places. I was a teenager when I was last there, but yet I remember it very distinctly.

Vegas, Baby! You have to experience it if you're anywhere within striking distance. That said, a little dose goes a long way. I haven't seen the Wynn yet (or Encore), but it looks all posh and Bellagio-ish.

So glad you enjoyed. The closing scene in Santa Barbara looks amazing!