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The nice thing about racing the sun westward to California on a big ol' jet airliner is that I can leave here at 7am, spend 6 hours on a plane, and still have it be 10am when I get there. Even so, I was at a bit of a loss for what to do with my time, since my initial driving-tour idea turned out to be untenable. But since I was flying into Los Angeles, I figured what the heck, why not check out Hollywood? So for a first stop, I headed down to Hollywood Blvd. and Highland Ave, where there was a museum that sounded reasonably interesting. But when I got there, I didn't much like it, nor did I like the look of the museum, so I just walked around the area for a few minutes and decided that was enough. There are probably parts of Hollywood I would enjoy, but that was not one of them.

So instead, I headed for Griffith Park, since the observatory there seemed like a nice landmark in itself, and a great place to get a look at the Hollywood sign as well.

The observatory really was pretty nifty--I wouldn't mind going back there to check it out more properly. It was packed, though!

A little way down the hill from the observatory was a small picnic area and bird sanctuary, so I pulled off to check that out. Lots of hummingbirds!

But I'd had enough of crowds and auto exhaust, and I was famished, so I headed out of town and stopped for lunch along the way. In-N-Out Burger. My second time trying it, mainly to verify my impression from the first time, which is that the hype is not justified. The burgers are good, don't get me wrong, but not THAT good, and the fries are just plain awful. And when all you serve is burgers and fries, they should both be pretty damn good, amirite? Anyway.

I'd wanted to check out Vazquez Rocks Natural Area for the past few visits, because it looked like a neat place, and because of its connections to television and film. Most notably the "Arena" episode of the original Star Trek series, in which Kirk is obliged to face the Gorn in combat with nothing but his hands and wits. Good stuff. And it was a really neat place with an almost alien feel in places. Plus I was the only person there, which always helps. After the hustle and bustle of LA, it was a nice change.

Compare:

I headed back to I-5 towards Bakersfield, and along the way spotted a sign for a park (Placerita Canyon State Park) featuring something called the Oak of the Golden Dream. Sounded too good to miss, and I had time for a detour, soo...

And this is the oak. The name refers to the story of a man who fell asleep beneath the tree for a siesta, and dreamed of gold, then woke up and found gold flakes clinging to the roots of the wild onions he was there to pick. This was in 1842, 6 years before Sutter's Mill and the subsequent Gold Rush, making this the first discovery of gold in California. Nice story; the tree itself, not very impressive. But I'm clearly spoiled by the Southern live oaks down here.

Nice little hike in the park, too. After that I headed to Bakersfield and it was dark, so I just grabbed a quick dinner and hit the hotel to relax.

The other nice thing about going to California is that thanks to the time change, I always wake up way early and find myself with time to go catch the sunrise somewhere before I need to head to the office. This time I ranged a little further, to Hart Memorial Park outside of Bakersfield--dating back to 1921, it's actually the oldest park in town, and used to be a full-on amusement park and zoo. These days there's not much to it, but it was still nice for a morning stroll, and nice to see a section of the Kern River that actually had water!

Note the graffiti. Punks everywhere!

After leaving the office, I again had some time to mosey down to Santa Clarita--I was flying out of Burbank in the morning, so I wanted to overnight fairly close. Along the way I stopped at Pyramid Lake--unfortunately I got there right after the visitor center closed, but the view was still lovely. I'd come back here to check it out more closely.

Once I hit Santa Clarita, it wasn't really late enough to just head to the hotel and crash, but it was too late to venture very far. So my initial thought was to try to make it to the coast and eye the Pacific again, but along the way I decided that was too far and I didn't want to waste what little daylight was left behind the wheel. Around that time I happened to spot an old steel-truss railroad bridge off to the side of the road, and I dig those. So I turned off to check it out, and that turned out to be a pretty good decision, photographically speaking.

The bridge was obviously retired and defunct, but safely negotiable on foot down to the point where you see foliage. There the plywood dropped off for a good 15 feet or so, and I could have tried my luck on the narrow beams, but I'm not quite that adventurous when exploring alone!