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Published: April 27th 2009
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23rd April
Well we can’t believe it’s finally happened - we’ve run out of time and places to go and we have to go home - at least for a while!
We’ve had yet another wonderful time in LA. It’s been especially great to be able to spend time with Dan and Liz. We were invited by Liz’s family to an Easter Sunday dinner and met lots of new people. We were straight off the plane from Roratonga, so weren’t terribly with it but it didn’t seem to matter, we were made very welcome by everyone.
We went to a concert at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in downtown LA. We saw the final concert conducted by Essa-Pekka Salonen who has been the Music Director for the LA Phil for 17 years. It was Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex and Symphony of Psalms and we were all totally engrossed. The building is an amazing structure, very beautiful inside, lots of wood and curves and large spaces.
Dan and Liz took time off and we all went away to San Simeon, Morro Bay and Santa Barbara for a few days which was great fun. We went to Hearst Castle- a very bizarre mix of
Topanga Canyon retreat 2
Dan & Liz at their front door cultures and styles, fascinating to see what you can do with a huge pile of money!
Dan treated me for my birthday and we went whale watching from Santa Barbara on a lovely small sailing yacht - and we hadn’t been out of the harbour a minute before we saw some grey whales nearby. We coasted alongside them up the coast for about 1½ hours. There was a mother and 2 calves and we saw lots of breaching and one superb moment when one of the calves raised his head out of the water vertically with his mouth open. It made up for Kaikoura in the South Island when we had 2 abortive attempts to go whale watching.
We went wine tasting in the valleys behind Santa Barbara and tasted some lovely wines in very pretty settings. It was particularly hot that weekend so it was very pleasant to sit and drink in the sunshine. One place didn’t pour tasting sips, they gave us about a ¼ glass each time - and they offered 5 different wines at their tasting - so you can imagine we were very happy by the end of
Hearst Castle
some swimming pool!
and there's an indoor one too. the afternoon.
We went on a visit to the Getty Villa here in Santa Monica, which was built as a copy of a Roman villa and has just had a 10 year overhaul, so it was looking superb. Another very rich family!
We have eaten in some lovely restaurants. Dan seems to have been learning the local restaurants by heart and has taken us to some of his favourites. We’ve learned to order one dish to share rather than one each, as the portions are very generous. We’ve had lots of seafood, shrimps as big as small lobsters, oysters, burgers, salads, ribs, you name it we’ve tried it.
We had a bit of fun one day as we went for a mani/Pedi treatment in Santa Monica. Dan persuaded David that if he was up for extreme jumps he should be able to manage a pedicure! So we sat next to each other - I wish I’d taken a photo and David had his first ever beauty treatments.
Dan and Liz are moving to a little house in the woods up in Topanga Canyon, one of the hills behind Malibu a bit further
Elephant seals
There were hundreds of them, all cuddled up together. up the coast. We’ve been up to see it and it is a lovely place -very rural compared with the urban settings of their current places. They are excited about the move and we wish we could be nearer to help them with some of the jobs. We helped Dan pack up his house as they are moving on Sat. 26th - just a couple of days after we leave.
And that is it - we are now at home having survived the flight back to the UK and been met by Jean & Alan who kindly delivered us to our door. Jonathan has been keeping house here while we’ve been away and he was here to welcome us back. We are still trying to get our time zones sorted out but that will happen over the next few days and then it’s back to normal life; until the next time.
Thanks for following the blog, it’s added a new dimension to our travels, we’ve enjoyed doing it and we hope you’ve enjoyed sharing some of our stories and pictures. We now have several thousand photos to sort - so don’t come over to see them yet - you could
Wine tasting
We enjoyed sitting in the California sun, sipping wines all day! be in for a long session.
Until the next time.
Love to all David and Lynne
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alan
non-member comment
Fin
Enjoyed the blog, it was a good idea!