Close, But Not Exactly Paradise

I wouldn't call Huntington Beach paradise. It is a cool place with a perfect climate and a lot to offer, but there is some unique ugliness to the landscape. Some of the most visible ugliness is within clear view of the famous beaches. There is a tall stacked power plant very close to the beach. Actually it is on the beach, and it is visible from a distance.  from just about anywhere along the beach in most of Huntington and points south. It recently converted to a natural gas facility which decreases pollution greatly but the tall stacks and the ugly facility are still visible.

Also quite visible are two offshore oil platforms, named Ella and Emma. They are less than two miles offshore and are still active.  Huntington Beach was an oil town before becoming kind of an epicenter for Southern California beach culture. Oil still is a big part of the local economy.

In addition to the platforms, the city is dotted with these oil pumps known by a number of names. Officially they are called pumpjacks, but they are also called nodding donkeys. Their up and down action explains the name. They are surprisingly quiet, and apparently they can be run by hand. The motors to run them are usually electric and are only one or two horsepower. These pumps often occupy lots in the center of nice neighborhoods, sometimes wedged in single lots between houses.  A number of these have been removed in recent years as the oil is drying up a bit, but there is still enough oil to keep such activity profitable. The Huntington Beach High School football team is The Oilers.  While the action of these devices are quiet, there is the faint odor of oil when standing near these things.

A cleaned up lot only a few blocks from the beach where a nodding donkey or two once operated.  This will certainly be developed soon. 

Disneyland

There are interesting differences between Disneyland and Disneyworld other than one opening in 1955 and the other in 1971.

The differences were notable even before we entered the park. Anaheim is built up all around the two California Disney parks, Disneyland and Disney's California Adventure. Parking in the Disney parking lots felt a lot like parking in a large mall parking lot.  The bus ride from the parking lot and the parks involve driving down city streets. At Disneyworld the experience is completely different. The parking is separate from the world around it. You realize that you are entering the happiest place on earth even before your car reaches the parking lot ticket booths. The transportation from the parking lots to the park is similarly removed from reality. Disneyworld is situated like an island in a largely wooded area while Disneyland seems like a piece cut out of a sprawling suburb.

I kept wondering as we were approaching Disneyland why I couldn't see the castle. Well, we got our answer as soon as we got to Main St. USA.

 
Honey, who shrunk the castle? It is about 1/3  down of the castle at Disneyworld. It is a mini castle. In addition, it doesn't look like the castle that the fairy sprinkled with pixie dust in the opening credits of Disney movies and specials. The castle at Disneyworld looks that way. This one, not really.

It is still Disney however. The staff is helpful and genuinely cheerful, and the attention to detail at every attraction is amazing. I could see how the individual neighborhoods at Disneyland grew into separate parks at Disneyworld.

All in all, it is an incredible park, but it isn't Disneyworld.

One thing Disneyland has that Disneyworld does not is Disney's California Adventure. Cathy and I visited this when it first opened in the 1990s and with the exception of one ride, it was lame. It has expanded greatly, and has one of the more amazing attractions I have seen, Cars Land.

Cars Land, in the same vein as The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal, is an attraction within California Adventure park that is recreated from the movie with unbelievable accuracy and detail. I am very familiar with the movie Cars, and I couldn't believe my eyes while walking around.

Here is Cameron eating lunch at Flo's V8 Cafe. Do you see the view out the window behind Cameron? That isn't a mural. Those are "mountains", scaled like real mountains, with real vegetation, and it looks exactly like the mountains surrounding Radiator Springs.

   
Here is the view down the main street of Radiator Springs. Everything here is to scale, and all the places in the movie are represented. It is incredible.

Here are a bunch of pictures.

This is while waiting in line for a Cars ride. The rock and cliff in the background is a good distance away and is very large. Essentially it is up that "mountain" behind Cameron.

In Luigi's tire shop. They had a good selection of tires. 

Laguna Beach - Tide Pools at Heisler Park

We could have spent the entire day looking at the creatures in these tide pools left behind until the next high tide. There are sea urchins, crabs that resemble hermit crabs, and rocks that look to be rocks until they start to move. We drove 15 miles south from Huntington down here to catch the sunset. This is a beautiful spot.

Mullosks, mussels, Fiddler Crabs, Sea Urchins, fish, and all manner of intertidal creatures are in here. The mussels seem to be permanently attached to the rock. This area is protected. No fishing or collecting is allowed, although we didn't find that out until after Cameron had claimed a shell.

Cameron has been making quick friends everywhere we have gone. 

and the obligatory sunset shots

    I don't know why the sun looks jagged in this photo. It looked like that in real life too. Something in the atmosphere is causing this effect. When viewed in the photo it looks like an imaging artifact, but it isn't. 

Back to the beach ...

After a haze of cramped flights, layovers, and an insanely long wait for a rental car, we get out of LAX and arrive in Huntington Beach. We didn't even put our stuff down when we pulled the bikes out of the garage and headed down to the beach. We forgot a few things. There are no helmets and the bikes are all adult size, but Cameron had good enough control that we felt confident. One of the 3 bikes was completely missing a chain and my bike was missing a pedal.