Today we took a trip out to Joshua Tree National Park with San, Mike & Jasmine. Check out our previous hiking entry from the Santa Rosa Plateau. It is located in the high desert northwest of Palm Springs. It is named after the Joshua Trees which grow there. You can find out more about the Joshua Trees here.
It took us about 1 hr 45 mins to get there. We were supposed to meet
San & Mike at the visitors center, but on the highway on our way,
they just happened to pull up behind us! They passed and we followed
them to the Vistors Center, left our car and went the remaining 5-6
miles to the park.
How to get to Joshua Tree from Murrieta
More Joshua Trees
We decide to stop & hike at the Hidden Valley hiking area. Hidden Valley is an enclosed valley, that had an opening blasted years
ago to allow access to the valley. It was presumably used by horse thieves to escape the law in
the early days of the west. Hidden Valley has a one mile hiking loop, but we spent most of our time climbing among the rocks.
Hidden Valley
Elly, San, Jasmine & Mike taking a Water Break
After hiking and climbing we had a picnic lunch and then went for another small hike among the boulders. They were huge!
People climbing on a large rock
Elly in front of a large rock formation
Before we left, we took a ride to the a Viewpoint in the park. From this vantage point you can overlook the entire Coachella Valley. This is a similar view that we had back in October when we took the tram to to top of the mountain, but now we were on the opposite side of the valley.
The View Point Parking Area
View of the Valley with Mt San Jacinto in the background
We had a fantastic time! Joshua Tree National park is a remarkable place and we must really thank San & Mike for sharing one of their favorite Southern California places with us.
Mt San Jacinto from the highway on the way home
Elly took this video of the Palm Springs Windmills on the way home.
With the 12-14 ft ceilings in the condo, I decided to try may hand at a remote control indoor helicopter. Here's what I can do so far. Not too good at it yet.
Every day or so I seem to be reminding myself or Elly of the old Bert & I comedy sketch "Which Way to Millinocket?", in which the old New England saying "Can't get there from here" or "cahn't get theyah from heeah" originated. You can listen to this classic bit below:
Out here in California, this New England saying often rings true. The Pacific Ocean and the beaches are only 22 miles from where we live, as the crow flies. It takes a little over an hour to get there without any traffic. There's a big mountain in the way, and you either have to go over or around it. The preferred route is around it!
Palm Springs is 45 miles away, again as the crow flies. But again there is a mountain range in the way, so it takes 1 1/2 hours to get there. Again the preferred way is around the mountains, not over them. This is always the case here. Mountain ranges or mountains are always in the way of a straight road. Even the hills which are often as big or bigger than Mt Wachusett in Massachusetts get in the way, and they are everywhere! So you CAN get there from here, just not easily!
The other problem we seem to be having is getting used to the 4 lane roads that seem to be all over Southern California. The main streets in any town are 4 lanes, usually with a median between them. They widen to 6 lines to allow for 2 left hand turn lanes! If West Boylson, Mass. was in California, Rt 12 would be like Rt 9 in Framingham around Shoppers World. Even in a small towns like Murrieta, once you pull into a group of stores to buy something, you can't just pull out a go home the opposite way. You have to find the right way out of the parking lot that enables you to cross traffic and head the other way. All the parking lots are connected, so we find ourselves driving around parking lots a lot trying to find a way home thinking to ourselves that "we can't get there from here!."
Google Maps is wonderful on my Motorola Xoom, but a lot of road construction has outpaced the ability of Google to keep updated. Following the Google maps voice to get on the highway, I get into the left lane to turn onto the on-ramp for I-15. But, low and behold, the overpass was recently changed (long before we got here) and now the on on-ramp in on the right. Now I am four lanes away (2 plus the 2 left hand turn lanes) from where I need to be and "I can't get there from here". Needless to say, even with the Google Maps, we make a lot of wrong turns and backtracking. As we learn the area better, we shouldn't have to rely on Google so much. Oh well, it's part of the adventure!
At times we thought to ourselves that "nobody else but us lives here on the pond" because we hardly ever see anybody on their patios, except for one guy down the pond that sits on his deck every afternoon. Last week, our neighbor across the pond called and invited us over for an impromptu wine drinking party. About 10 other neighbors showed up and we finally met a few of the other people who lived here. They were all really nice. Some have lived here for over 15 years and still love the place! The neighbor that held the party move in 1 1/2 years ago and completely redecorated the place, it was gorgeous and amazing what she did inside. Elly and her hit it off immediately and I am sure they will become good friends in the near future.
Last week the same neighbor taped an invitation to everyone's front door in our little community, called "Country Club Villas", inviting them to an open house. Last night we went to the open house and found out that a lot of people really do live here! Its just that they have busy lives also and for lack of a formal get together, they just wave to the neighbors. The open house provided us an opportunity to meet everyone as well as for all the neighbors to meet each other. A lot of them had never met before.
Open House Condo across the pond from us
I found it also curious that from the open house's patio, a lot of them had difficulty identifying where they lived just across the pond. They had never seen their own condo from that perspective before. A few couples we met have lived here for 25 years when the first phase was built (our condo was in the first phase) and are still here. There was plenty of food, wine and dessert for everyone and even though there were a lot of people, I estimate around 50, there was plenty of room both inside and outside for all. The weather cooperated, it was 80-85 degrees during the day and the evening cooled off just like it always does from the breeze that swoops in every afternoon making it a little chilly outside. When we left around 8:00, it was warmer again because the breeze stops, like it always does. The weather may get a little boring here, but Elly is not complaining!
We use www.estatesales.net to find estate sales in our area. It works for anywhere in the US. We found an estate sale in Covina, about an hour from here, that advertised that there were about 5,000 books in the estate. We thought that maybe we could buy the entire lot before the sale. We emailed the estate sale company and asked them if they or the consignors were willing to sell all the books as a lot before the sale. We eventually called them and set up a meeting for Tuesday at 9:00AM. I looked at all the pictures that were posted online to try and count the books. I counted about 2500 in the pictures, and I am sure there are more books not in the pictures. We especially liked the Astrology books that we saw and hope the rest were non-fiction of different categories as well!
On Tuesday we drove to Covina at arrived around 9:00. We immediately recognized the people running the sale, Robert & Sandy, as the same people that ran the sale in Hemet that has all the Shirley Temple stuff that Elly bought and did so well on eBay with. We methodically started in one room and moved successfully through each room. Our hopes were dashed as we came upon shelf after shelf of book club fiction. Books you can buy an Amazon for a penny. But nowhere to be seen were the astrology books we saw in the pictures! I asked Robert where they were, and he pointed out that he moved them to the terrace room. Whew!
Well in took us only 1/2 hour to realize that we were not going to make an offer on the entire lot, but were still interested in the astrology books. We made an offer to Robert for all the astrology books, and were told that he would ask the family as they have the final word.
On Wednesday, Robert call and said our offer was accepted and that he and Sandy would pack the books up for us and we could pick the up on Friday during the sale.
Today we went and got the books and a few other things that Elly bought. Now we have to put them up on Amazon. This was an easy way to get books, almost as good as the Homeopathic books we got at The San Diego Auction.
I haven't posted in a while, we've been busy with estate sales & auctions. I was looking through my pictures & I thought this one was interesting It gives a perspective of the area around where we live. West Murrieta is real nice, and it has its own micro-climate due to its being tucked into the surrounding hills. The entire valley gets a nice breeze everyday around 4:00 as the ocean breeze comes up the valley from the shore and clears the air. Consequently there is no smog here like in LA or Riverside. Also the Bear Creek area gets shade as the sun sets behind the hills in the picture. So it will be sunny in downtown Murrieta and Temecula but shady in West Murrieta. We've been told that this is desirable especially during the hot summer days. Looking forward to the hot summer days.
Downtown Murrieta is not that exciting. It's still mostly the old Murrieta with some new buildings and updated street lights. We like it that way. Not too much traffic like the shopping mall areas.
Just got back from San Diego. We got a few boxes of books at the auction. We stayed a little while to see how the upstairs auction progressed. It was going real SLOW! So we left to get something to eat. We found the Blue Water Seafood Grille (click here and here for their websites). You go in, wait in line and order first before sitting down. Elly says it kind of reminds here of the "soup Nazi" on Seinfeld. Everything is cooked to order especially for you. Elly ordered the Blackeened Red Snapper salad and I ordered the Bronzed Local Halibut. Both meals were delicious.
The outside of the Blue Water Grille
The counter where you order
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This restaurant was also featured on Diners, Drive-In & Dives. Watch the video below:
