Queen Mary at Long Beach, Venice Beach and Santa Monica

 Long Beach downtown LA ,look at the smog it was shocking, picture taken from the Queen Mary.

Down the long long passage way almost had to take a cut lunch

The Queen Mary has been docked and has been a hotel for the past 40 years. She was build in 1936 and sold by England to the US in 1968.

 Beautiful art deco interior of one of the bars on the QM.

 Our State room, on the Q Mary, it was very spacious.

Venice Beach graffiti

 Lots of weirdos at Venice Beach

 Had to throw just one last sunset in for good measure this one from Venice Beach

getting late at Santa Monica Pier, the fog is rolling in.

Last photo on our holiday in America, we covered Nevada, Utah, Arizona, Colorado,New Nexico and Califonia. God Bless America. thanks.

Laguna Beach and Crystal Cove

 A character that we met at Laguna Beach, had Lee grooving to Black Betty bam alam.......woh woh Black Betty

 Another beautiul sunset or two or 700 !!!!!!! Sorry



just a few of the derelict  beach houses at Crystal Cove waiting for restoration.



Well blow me down it aint another sunset, its me at Crystal Cove, on the beach in boots,  a beautiful little beach resort, it has been taken over by the state and heritage listed, they are restoring the few dozen old beach shacks, its pretty cheap to stay here but you have to book 6 months ahead, we would love to stay here great little place. Had breaky here.

Balboa Park, San Diego

At  Embucadero San Diego, famous "KISS" at the end of world war 2.

Hard Rock Cafe, Gaslamp historic district downtown San Diego

Artist Village at Balboa Park, by wholesale from the artists, very quaint place.

We had a look at the Toulouse Lautrec's art display at Balboa Park

we spend a couple of days checking out San Diego before we park the RV up at Louis and Gretchens, we have a great meal at Louis's choice Veitnamese restraunt,great meal.
On our last night we cook Lee's famous ledgendary Chicken and Prunes, Louis and Gretchen are impressed.
our last couple of days, we hire a car and head off towards Los Angeles and home. Boo Hoo

San Diego

Weather this morning was still terrible until we get down into San Diego
, as we get lower down in altitude its starts to clear.

Very pretty coming into town.

We catch up with our friends Gretchen and Lois, that we met at Red Canyon at the begining of our trip, they take us on a siteseeing tour of Coronardo Island and the Torrey Pines golf course. 


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The Del famous hotel on Coronardo Island..

Lee taking a putt on the Torrey Pines putting green.

Bridge over to Coronardo Island

Tayler ( daughter of Louis and Gretchen)  at La Jolla

Sunset at La Jolla

  Bay seals at La Jolla, lots of issues with some people wanting the seals off the beach, what rubbish, the seals have more rights to the beach than us humans.

.We stay at Campland on the Bay for a couple of days and visit Balboa Park and it many gallerys and museums, the maritime museum, and the Gas Lamp district.

Tucson to San Diego

Lee downtown 4th street Old Tuscon

De Grazia Gallery out side of Tuscon

On the way to San Diego, massive feed lots for milking cows they never graze on growing grass, the field infront is cultivated and cut and fed to the millions of cows, these feed lots went for miles and miles.



the dunes around Gordons Well on the way to San Diego , where dune buggy

enthusiasts by the thousands gather



Desert landscapes constantly changing.



Devils Canyon just above San Deigo, another suprise, desert ....rocks....tropical....

We spent the night in the hills above San Diego,very windy area, lots of wind generators. Without a word of a lie it was the worst night of our entire trip, it was like being in the antartic, it was blizzard conditions,we thought the RV was going to be blown over. SCARY STUFF



Tucson Desert Museum, Old Tucson ( movies set) and desert sunsets.

Today is the 24th Wed, so today we had to get the car fixed another flat battery, we are doing something wrong, Wal-Mart replace it but when we try to start it later in the day its dead again, could be the alternator, we take it to a mechanic in Tucson ,its not the alternator, thanks goodness for that, just something minor. We went to the Desert Museum and get photos of the animals native to the area, and some of the desert, which is totally covered with giant cacti, also have another look at minerals, at least the 3-4 time but they still amaze us, AMAZING colours and formations, the miners of old must have worked in a fairyland of colours in the mines.

 

The Sonora Desert, as you can see it contains many varieties of cacti

                                                  Raptor display ( eagles and hawks)

Some of the exhibits at the Tucson Desert Museum, it is so well done, all of the American displays are

 

                                 Remains of an old movie set at Old Tucson town

                                    Sunset with Cacti, with the amazing colours thrown by the desert

Tombstone and Bisbee




Cameron, Mike and Wyatt, at Tombstone

Onto Tombstone ( of movie fame)which is just before Tucson, we stop off to do the cowboy

 thing and look at this wild west town, boot hill, all the outlaws and that sort of thing.

We had dinner in a saloon called “Big Nose Kates” who was the girlfriend of

Doc Holliday one of the men who was involved in the OK Corral gunfight killings

( 3 men dead). While at the saloon we met a lovely couple Cameron, Mike and

their son Wyatt, named after Wyatt Earp who was also involved in the above murders.

Hi guys hope you enjoyed the rest of your stay.

Lee dressing for the part of Wyatt Earp

We also went to Bisbee which is a more authentic town,

( most of Tombstone has been recreated) lots of crazys there,

was one of the biggest mining towns in its day when the

mine closed down in the mid 70's a lot of the

realestate was abandoned, hippies moved in and squatted

and some are stillthere today. Got some great sunsets later that

day as well, apparently it has something to do with being

in the desert and the how flat it is or some reflection, will have to

Google it to find out which is correct

This vehicle obviously belongs to a devoted Hillary Clinton campaginer

(note the cute house in the background)

One of the wild looking places inhabited by squatters from the 70's.

Some of the hundreds of great sunset photos we took.

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El Paso Texas The Thing



We wonder what this thing could be?



The landscape on the way to Arizona from Texas and New Mexico





Colour is very popular in New Mexico



A Ghost Town



there are millions of these Yuccas in New Mexico and Arizona


Driving from El Paso Texas we see billboards that advertises “The Thing”, our curiosity gets the better of us. It’s really pretty corny, but interesting, probably a crazy old man’s collection ( a little like Grandad’s large collection of walking sticks) this guy has collected interesting memorabilia from all over the world plus has made hundreds of so called creatures.



Joe at the Thing, gave him a taste of Vegemite, he didnt like it one bit, had to rush off to Dairy Queen for an icecream





Just another beautiful sunset





Me with one of the "Things", really its is an Alien, attacking.