Blogs from California, United States, North America - page 1169

Alta California, the present-day state of California, was claimed for Spain by explorer Juan Cabrillo in 1534. (Hence Cabrillo Beach in San Pedro today.) Spain paid little attention to this distant possession for the next two hundred years. By the middle of the 18th century, Britain and Russia were expanding their claims to territory along the Pacific Coast of North America. Charles III decided it was time to enforce Spain's claim to Alta California. In 1769, Gaspar de Portolá was dispatched to lead an expedition northward from Loreto in Baja California and establish a permanent garrison at Monterrey Bay. A company of Soldados de Cuervo (Spanish colonial troops who wore a distinctive leather jacket), and Franciscan missionaries set out on an overland trek to a place as described two hundred years previously. The route they followed ... read more

In 1965, when I was a teenager, my mother and I traveled on a cruise from Los Angeles to Nassau aboard the P&O liner M/V Oriana. We made a port call at Acapulco and transited the Panama Canal in the process. I'd taken travel photos before then, but I like the photos from this trip as they represent my first set of travel photos that tell a complete story. In this blog I'll use the photos to show you what it was like to travel though the Panama Canal. So, let's step into the WAYBAC Machine and take a look at cruising in the 1960's. In the 1960s, cruises typically were not self-contained round trips as they are now. Instead, sections of longer line voyages were sold as cruises. Oriana was traveling on an eastward round-the-world ... read more