SPRIIIIIIING BREAK! YEAH! (PT. 4)

Since the weather was clearing up, I decided to stop by the Mulholland Overlook to take a peak at the Los Angeles Basin. The view was more than I expected...


(Panoramic pic was taken with an my iPhone. Click the pic to get a BIG view)

This was the clearest view I've ever had of the city from the Mulholland Overlook. Due to smog, it's pretty rare to see Long Beach, the Palos Verdes Peninsula, and the Santa Monica Bay/Pacific Ocean from this view point. Unfortunately, the iphone camera didn't capture the ocean that well, but it's still somewhat visible. A Satellite map of the area in this pic can be seen here.

Also, on the punk history and geography tip, this is where Brendan Mullen gives his spiel in the Decline of Western Civilization. If you take the time to watch his bit from this link (starts @ 30 seconds), notice how you can barely make out downtown L.A. in the background from this same exact point.



Since the rain was clearing up at the end of the day, I made a quick stop by Beale's Cut once the rain subsided. Located in between the Santa Susanna and San Gabriel mountains, the cut was the original connecting route between the San Fernando and Santa Clarita Valleys.




Originally cut into a 30 ft deep pass in 1854, the Surveyor General of California deepened the cut to 90 ft, and then named it after himself-- pretty baller.




As a kid going to school in the SCV, this place was brought up a lot as a local point of interest especially whenever we went on field trips to the SCV Historical Society museum.




Oddly, we never actually went on a field trip to this place, so I mostly remember it as our favorite funny historical pseudo-pun, "Beale's Butt." The above picture is one of the most well known of the cut, a cut and paste composite of early Western star Tom Mix. Yeah, he didn't actually jump Beale's Cut.




This was my first time getting to see it up close. Unfortunately, it had caved in sometime in the late 90's so it's not quite the cut it used to be. You could say it wasn't quite cutting it anymore!




Here's the cut as seen from the backside, after I climbed up and over it. The caved-in area can be seen in the middle of it.




View of SCV and old Newhall refinery from the Beale's Cut road.




The 14 freeway as seen from Beale's Cut/Newhall Refinery Rd.




I have no idea exactly what this is, but I'm assuming it was made while deepening the cut.




Since it had just rained, all of the surrounding landscape was still ridiculously moist. These are the most ideal conditions for Southern California's infamous landslides and rockslides to occur. So, of course, only on the way back did I see this huge crack in the cliff face on south side of the cut, which scared the crap out of me, and made me realize how stupid it was of me to go here by myself. I'm lucky I wasn't engulfed in a sandstone rockslide.




Plaques for the site had been located on these monuments since the late 30's. Unfortunately, like most isolated interpretive sites, this one had fallen victim to vandals, so they have since been removed. Also -- surprise, surprise -- apparently there was a lot of illegally waste dumping at the site, so it was surrounded by an ugly, slapdash chain link fence. Bummer.

Needless to say, I miss California.

SPRIIIIIIING BREAK! YEAH! (PT. 3)

Rancho de Cahuenga- Signing place of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, the great Mexican land (smash and) grab.




It's somewhat telling about how salient Mexico is within the popular American historical narrative...



...when we decide to take a location that symbolizes a huge turning point in American-Mexican relations (in the state with the highest population of Mexicans, of course) and just run it over without much thought, every day.




Somewhat appalling, y'know?







OH! HAY! IS THAT THE UNIVERSAL STUDIOS BACKLOT ACROSS THE STREET!? OMG!


Anyway, the reason I was in this area was to help mi mama move some stuff around in her office. She's an accountant for a firm that deals in big time Hollywood entertainment law, and here's the guest lobby literature to prove it!




The best of the bunch.




The best of the best of the bunch. Appropriately, this was the only portrait sketch in the entire book. I was stoked.




The best of the worst of the bunch- Super Yacht World magazine-

Because not everyone can fit through the channels of succes:


"MAKE WAY FOR SUCCESS, YOU FUCKING TINY YACHT OWNING LOSER!"
I'm assuming this means that the next step up will be a yacht that resembles the Death Star both aesthetically, and in its dimensions.




This is a safe for all the watches you're s'posed to keep on the yacht. See, rich people are just as tacky as you and me.


Sometimes I wonder if my hatred for Eric Clapton is warranted, or if I'm just being a contrarian prick. I'm glad this magazine has inadvertently put the nail in the coffin of my great mental conundrum.




What can you say, dude clearly has the blues.




Yacht life is stressful. Time for some yoga.





Release party/reading for Sam McPheeter's novel, Loom Of Ruin



I highly recommend picking it up--260 pages of McPheeters' style storytelling at its best.




Also, this funny quote is tagged onto the back cover:
"Is Sam McPheeters our generation's Andy Kaufman?"- Kathleen Hanna




This mythical creature got on the phone with his lawyer as soon as I broke it to him that HORSE THE BAND had already been used. Oh, L.A.


My last day found me rained and snowed out of a 10 mile hike on the Pacific Crest Trail, so my alternate plan involved driving down Sepulveda Blvd from Sylmar all the way to Culver City. It was probably on the most interesting L.A. area drives I've ever taken. One day I'll drive the entirety of Sepulveda, and perhaps do a little picto-historical post about the experience.

The ultimate goal of the drive was to check out the latest exhibit at the Center For Land Use Interpretation".



CLUI's latest is Initial Points: Anchors of America's Grid, and is highly recommended.


They also have one of my favorite bookstores in all of L.A., filled with nothing but books on natural resources, infrastructure, landscape management, landscape sociology, etc. Unfortunately, every time I visit this place I seem to be unemployed and/or broke, so, you know, fuck my life!



Considering how broke I was, I decided to take an iPhone pic of this picture/essay zine, and more specifically an essay detailing the opening night of the Bellagio. Well, that didn't turn out too well, as most of this shit is indecipherable. Anyway, the essay ends by stating that the first song played at the inaugural Bellagio fountain show was "Hey Big Spender"- a song about prostitution.


Also of note is CLIU's rad bathroom decor...





...so make sure to take a dump if you're there!


I took a quick minute to stop by Headline records, where I discovered that this is happening-

SPRIIIIIIING BREAK! YEAH! (PT. 2)

Continuing on with the saga of wandering around in L.A. -

While searching for one of the least-visited areas in the Santa Monica Mountains, Tuna Canyon's Big Rock Lateral overlook point, I ended up inadvertently finding another gem, the Old Topanga Road Fire Lookout point.


A drive in the mountains behind Malibu is nice enough that you don't really get too worried when you realized that you might have missed the turn off you were looking for. Besides, maybe that unintentional side trip will have you encountering some massive dilapidated radio tower which leads you to wondering just how exactly you can get up to see the damn thing. Sure enough, I found an overlook spot maintained by the Santa Monica Mountains Conservation Authority that seemed to have a trailhead somewhere nearby. (By the way, click on the SMCA link if you ever plan on visiting this area, and then thank me later!)




After accidentally hiking around the perimeter of this hill to the base of a hill that provided no access to the tower, I did what I learned to do as a kid who grew up amongst the hills and the chaparral of Souther California-- I bounded straight up the damn hill. Yeah, it's not typically what I would endorse doing, but oh well. As an added bonus, after brushing up against all the vegetation on the way up, I was coated with a scent familiarly specific to chaparral vegetation--something along the lines of sage and other shrubs-- a scent that brings back awesome childhood memories of running around in the hills behind my neighborhood.



















L.A. Smog meets Santa Monica Bay fog.



Mt. Baldy as seen from Old Topanga Fire Lookout point.



Beautiful San Fernando Valley and the Newhall Pass way in the background.



As soon as I found my way down to the Tuna Canyon Big Rock Lateral overlook, I got a sweet view of the Radio tower from down below. Wow.



...As well as the fog creeping from over the Pacific as the sun went down.

(Fog creeping in .gif below)

That peninsula all the way in the background is Point Dume, home to John Fante's short story, "My Dog Stupid", and the "Dr. Seuss plant" (Giant Coreopsis).



Having to take my sister to LAX the next day gave us an opportunity to search around for someplace to eat before we bid her adieu. While subjecting my family to my El Segundo shortcuts, we stumble upon The Proud Bird. If you're into the history of corporate airline industry, experimental air craft, or the U.S. Air Force, it's worth a visit as there are interesting photos and artifacts to be found all over the place. Oh yeah, the food and drink was good, too, even if it was the exact same menu as another airplane-themed restaurant near the Van Nuys airport. I came to find out that a corporate restaurant chain owns both restaurants as well as a many other similar ones nationwide, of course.

SPRIIIIIIING BREAK! YEAH! (PT. 1)

A few weeks ago I went on a little spring break trip to visit my family in Los Angeles. A few things happened, followed by a few more, and so on. Here's a multiple-part photo journal of events that mattered to me while I was there. Enjoy!





After years passing this sign millions of times (at least) since the age of 6, I finally decided to indulge my curiosity and visit the mysterious highway exit known as Zzyzx Rd. Originally known as a government outpost Soda Springs, CA was rechristened Zzyzx in 1934. Zzyzx was founded by a crackpot evangelist who split his time between hosting a radio show in L.A. and managing his health spa and hotel in Zzyzx. Its strange name was claimed to be a real word, which he used to properly name his spa so that it would be "the last word in health".








Kelso Dunes as seen from Zzyzx.




After the federal government dubiously "reclaimed" the land on the technicalities of mining claim laws, the Cal State university system took the land over in 1976 and manages it to this day. CSU nows operates a Mojave Desert research center in the converted health spa and hotel facilities that the original owner built. Soda springs still exists on the grounds of Zzyzx, and is actually the last existing habitat for the endangered Mohave Tui Chub, the only fish currently native to San Bernardino County.



After taking my sweet time at Zzyzx, I decided to extend the usual, tedious trip between L.A. and Vegas into an extended field trip. Next stop: Vasquez Rocks.





While most recognize this place from scenes in Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey and a plethora of other films of varying quality, the Vasquez Rocks were initially known for being a favorite hideout for the notorious Tiburcio Vasquez. As a kid, the Vasquez Rocks were a favorite boy scout hiking spot of mine, to the point that I was pretty well-versed in the history of their infamous namesake.



Despite growing up in within the educated Spanish ruling class, at age 17 Vasquez descended into a outlaw lifestyle which included ample amounts of robbery, theft, prison breaks, and womanizing. Since he was usually on the run, he found the canyons around the Vasquez Rocks to be an ideal hiding place.



Siltstone conglomerate in the foreground. CA Hwy 14 and the San Gabriel Mts in the background.