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such a lovely place, such a loving face ,
| Introduction |
I can say out of my own experience: California is an amazing state; one you cannot afford to miss. There are great differences in landscape and weather: one moment you are in the dryness and the heat of Death Valley, and the other moment you 'll have to put on extra clothes because you find yourself in the cold snow of the Sierra Nevada.
California is the 3rd biggest state of the US with a surface of 156.256
mi² or 404.808 km². However, it is the most important one; in
the past with the goldrush (California was called "the Golden State") as
well as in the present, with a flourishing economy and with huge cities
like L.A., San Francisco, San Diego and the capital Sacramento. California
has the largest population of all American States: 30 million people.
It has also many extremities: the lowest point, Badwater Bassin, with its 292 feet or 89 m below sealevel, lies in Death Valley and is only 87 mi or 140 km away of the highest point of the US (outside Alaska): Mount Whitney (14491 feet or 4418 m above sealevel) ! You can find also 'extreme trees of the world' in this state; the oldest: Methusalah of 4600 years old; the biggest: General Sherman Tree with its trunk of 272 feet or 83 m high and its circumference of 79 feet or 24 m; and the tallest: Tall Tree with its height of 376 feet or 112 m.
The northern part of California is mostly known for the vineyards, forests and lakes, but the central and southern part exist mainly out of deserts, mountains and plains containing almost all the big cities.
There
are 2 ways to visit this page:
1. You just read all of it; a journey of about 15 days, starting in Los
Angeles through San Diego, Las Vegas and
ending in San Francisco.
2. You just click one of the links below to the city, town, National Park,
... you're interested in. To go back to this
page, use the 'back'-button of your browser.
Los Angeles
Death Valley
San Diego
Mono Lake + Bodie (Ghost Town)
Palm Springs +
Joshua Tree National Monument
Yosemite National Park
Las Vegas
Monterey + Carmel
Grand Canyon + Hoover Dam
San Francisco
| 1) Los Angeles |
If you're making a 15-days tour in California, 3 days in Los Angeles still are a minimum to be able to visit the most important sights of this huge city. When you're lucky enough to arrive in LA by plane just an hour before sunset, even your pilot, who has flown this traject probably a hundred times, will proudly report that you're flying now over LA, the weather is very nice, about 80 degrees F (26°C) and that, on you're right, you can see the skyline of downtown Los Angeles. And out of your plane window you would see all the little houses, never ending (about 9 million people live in LA), all those blue shining pools, reflecting the light of the setting sun, and a few miles away you'd see the silhouettes of the high buildings that rise above the city...
There are a few things you just can't miss out on during your visit of LA. For instance:
a) beaches
At Venice Beach you can lie or walk along miles of beautiful "blue-sky"
beaches with a lot of little shops at the edge of the beach. In a special
part, called "Muscle Beach", all the future Schwarzeneggers and Van Dammes
are working out and showing off to the girls.
At Santa Monica Beach you can find many beautiful palm trees. The Santa
Monica Pier may be very famous, but in fact California has other, far more
beautiful piers than that one, for example in San Francisco.
When you've got to choose between those 2 beaches, just take Venice Beach.
Santa Monica's more famous, but it certainly has known better times in
the past.
b) the movies
Always wanted to know how and where moviestars live? Just take a ride with
your car through all the streets of Beverly Hills and admire their beaurtiful
villas. On the street corners near the border of Beverly Hills or in Hollywood,
you can buy a map that indicates where your favourite movie star lives.
Of course you can also take one of the 'guided tours' through Beverly Hills
on a tourist bus on which you'll get the same information as on the map.
Also worth a visit: the Beverly Hills Hotel, built in 1912. In its Polo
Lounge a lot of movie contracts have been and are still being made.
If you'd like to run into someone famous, just go walking on Rodeo Drive,
where all the celebrities go shopping.
Then there's Hollywood.
Although
it has become an impoverished neighbourhood, it lies very beautifully in
the hills of LA. On Hollywood Boulevard you can find 'The Walk Of Fame',
all the famous stars their names written in the red stars on the sidewalk.
Really cool, but quite long if you want to read every single one of them!
Mann's Chinese Theatre is also great; not for the fake Chinese architecture,
but for the hand- and footprints in concrete of famous people like Clint
Eastwood, Bruce Lee and Doris Day. Not far from this theatre you can also
visit the Museum of famous people in Wax and the Guinness Records Museum.
Last but certainly not least: Universal Studios! This really is worth the
entrance fee. Get a terrific 3D-experience at the Terminator 2 attraction,
become really wet while admiring Jurrasic Park sets and get the ultimate
experience during the Back To The Future ride! When you just want to ease
down, you can go sit in a little train and take a look at a lot of sets
of famous movies and series like Matlock, Back To The Future, Psycho and
many others! You also get to know how some special effects work. For example,
you can watch a metro-tunnel collapse or see the streets suddenly turn
into a river raging down on the train you're sitting in! To visit Universal
Studios profoundly, you'll certainly need a whole day.
c) downtown
You can't
leave Los Angeles without having driven between the buildings of downtown.
Just take the freeway Downtown and make sure you enter Downtown on Willshire
Bld. That way you get a beautiful view of the buildings.
Just
drive around in Downtown to let the atmosphere get to you...
| 2) San Diego |
can border. Before you arrive at the center of the city, you can hold still at 'La Jolla', a little beautiful town by the sea, west of San Diego. As you enter the city, you will notice that the city is smaller than L.A., but much cosier. In 'the oldest city of California', there are a lot of buildings that remind of the Spanish rule two centuries ago:
* In Balboa Park, the Spanish Artists' Village and the California
Tower are surrounded by beautiful gardens. You can shoot great pictures
here, especially if you come on a sunny day.
* You
should also visit Old Town, the historical part of the city. Many
of the houses are still original from the time when the Spanish first came
to California. If you like the Mexican culture (and their food), the 'Casa
Bandini' will be the place to eat: with waitresses in Mexican clothes,
live music, ... .
The world
famous 'San Diego Zoo' is very big, but if you can't get enough, you can
also visit the 'San Diego Wild Animal Park' in Escondido (north of San
Diego). And if you prefer wateranimals, there is of course 'Seaworld'.
It 's really fascinating to see a killer whale of an enormous weight jump
more than 15 feet or 5 m high; but probably the best show is the 'sealion-
and seaottershow'. It 's special and funny, because a trainer and a sealion
perform together a nice piece of acting.
A
short trip to Mexico is also one of the possibilities when you're staying
in San Diego. You drive straight toTijuana (Mexico), but you stop at the
last American parking. There you take a tourbus and after a quick ID-check
by the Mexican customs officer (just a quick look in the bus to see if
there aren't any shady characters), you're in Tijuana, Mexico ! The difference
with American cities isn't hard to figure out: the streets outside the
touristical center are much more neglected, and in the touristical center
you get approached all the time by obtrusive salesmen. Some of them even
try to get you in their buildings where parties are going on in the middle
of the day.
When
you re-enter the US, the ID-check is done much more thoroughly; everybody
has to get out of the bus and is then checked individually. However, Tijuana
is definitely worth the ride.
If you still got time and money left, you can go shopping downtown, at
the 'Horton Plaza', a mall in a modern archi- tectural style.
| 3) Palm Springs + Joshua Tree National Monument |
To everyone in Southern-California, desert means Palm Springs and the other
rich oasis Palm Desert. Before the early 1920s Palm Springs was nothing
but a little health resort. Then it was discovered by Hollywood, and it
became the most popular area to spend the winter. It is certainly 'not
done' to show up here before Christmas or after Easter. However, if you
want cheap prices and high reductions, it is strongly recommended to stay
there during this long period. In June, July, August and September temperatures
easily rise above 100-110°F (40-45°C), so during this period Palm
Springs isn't exactly 'the place to be' if you want to spend a sun-bathing
holiday. But you surely should visit it to get the party- atmosphere that
reigns at night. And to see all the streets surrounded by thousands of
palm trees (of course!).
Surely not to miss: a ride on the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway! The Tramway takes you 1 mile above Palm Springs on the Mount San Jacinto. From up there you've got an extremely beautiful view and you sure get the full meaning of the word 'oasis'. Don't forget to take a sweater; it can be 30-40°F (10-15°C) colder on the top of the Mount San Jacinto.
When staying
in Palm Springs, a nice thing for you to do is drive through Joshua Tree
National Monument. In this National Park you'll see a lot of nice things
that nature's created. It's a very impressive park with beautiful rocks,
mountains, special trees. In the 'Cholla Catus Garden' you can walk between
a whole field of cactusses. This park got its name due to the amount of
Joshua Trees that grow over here. The tree is named Joshua Tree 'cause
it holds its branches up the way the profet Joshua would have done with
his arms. When you get out of your car, watch out for rattlesnakes. You'll
probably see one of those cute looking coyotes. Please follow the rules
of the Rangers and do not feed them. Otherwise they would become dependent
on the food the tourists give, and they won't survive.
| 4) Las Vegas |
Although
Las Vegas doesn't belong to California (it is actually located in Nevada),
you can easily pay a visit to the 'Gambling Capital Of The World' without
losing too much time. Since gambling was legalized in 1931, Las Vegas became
the biggest city in Nevada with its 465.000 inhabitants. Yearly, around
12 million people come and try their luck on the slots, the so called 'one-armed
bandits'. The casinos claim that the slots pay back 98 % of your money,
and that they can survive with the 2 %, because of the enormous sales.
When you arrive in Las Vegas by car and you stop in a little town about
10 miles (16 km) before the city, you can see even slots in the supermarkets
!
Gambling
is legalized, but only for adults, this means you must be at least 21 years
old. If you 're younger, you can walk fast through the casino, but you
are not allowed to hang around, nor sit on the chairs and gamble. It's
not the casinos fault (because they would love to increase their returns),
but they risk a fine of more than $ 5000 if an inspector sees a minor gambling
! Everything is directed at the gambling, and you'll find bars and restaurants
(mostly fastfood) in the casinos, so you don't have to leave the casino
to eat. You can even keep gambling when you are at the bar, 'cause some
bars have built-in videoscreens ! And if you want a quick marriage: just
go to one of the dozens of weddingchapels and leave there as husband and
wife.
Most
of the casino-hotels in Las Vegas are situated on 'the Strip', the Las
Vegas Bld. You can just walk in and out the hotels and casinos; everybody
does. It 's best to visit them indoors by day, because it 's too hot to
stay outside then (in summer). When you see the Strip when all the neonlights
are turned on, you really know what Las Vegas by night means: just incredibly
cool ! Some hotels on the Strip you certainly have to visit:
- New York - New York: This hotel-casino is absuolutely fabulous
outside; it exists out of copies of different buildings, including the
Empire State Building, joined together and with the statue of liberty placed
in front of that all. Inside, you 'll get the impression of being in the
streets of NY !
- MGM: The huge fake-golden lion before this hotel is the most particular thing on the outside of this hotel. Many shows of famous people (Backstreet Boys, Alanis Morissette, ...) were and are still going on in the dome of the MGM.
- Treasury
Island: Everything inside makes you think you are on an island. From
the outside, it 's not that special, but you just must see the pirate show,
performed practically on the street. You experience a fight between 2 ships,
and they manage even to let one sink !
- Paris: You 've seen it right: they even made a copy of the Eiffel Tower and the Arc Of Triomph for this hotel. Once inside, you 'll think yourself outside in France, with nice terraces. This effect is caused by painting realistic blue air with clouds on the ceiling.
-
Luxor: This hotel is very impressive, because all of the rooms are
located in a pyramid, with a giant sphinx in front of it. Especially when
you go inside and look up to the top of the pyramid (there are no floors
in the middle of it), the view is mighty !
And these
are not the only ones ! Also take a look at: Cesar's Palace, Mirage, Bellagio,
Circus Circus, ... . For those who thought they could: you cannot do Las
Vegas in 1 day !
| 5) Grand Canyon + Hoover Dam |
According
to some people, you haven't been to West-America if you haven't been to
the Grand Canyon. If you stay in Las Vegas, you can take the airplane
from Las Vegas airport and make a one day excursion to the Grand Canyon.
After your airplane with about 50 passengers has taken off, you 'll fly
over the Hoover Dam, an enormous dam of 738 feet (225 m) high. It supplies
the power of all the lights in the nearby...Las Vegas ! Then you make a
tour over the Grand Canyon and after a flight of 1 hour, you touch ground
at the edge of the Grand C. There you take a bus that takes you to the
beginning of a trail with magnificent views at the Grand C. You can make
your choice there, whether you walk or whether you take the little tourist
busses that transport you from view to view. After that, you take the bus
and the plane again and you 'll arrive back in Vegas around late noon.
However this is not the best way to get a good look at the Canyon and the Hoover Dam. If you 've got a few spare days, you should drive to them. That way, you 'll see much more of it, 'cause the plane flies far too high to have a really good look. After your visit to the Dam, you can stay at the edge of the Grand Canyon and make the descend to the Colorado River on a donkey (reserve a year in advance !) or fly (almost) in the canyon with a chopper.
Anyhow,
if you 're at the edge of the Grand Canyon, you can only have admiration
for the work that the Colorado River has done over millions of years.
| 6) Death Valley |
Although you might get frightened by the name, very little people died in this valley. It was Christmas of the year 1849 when the first American looked down over Death Valley. The 'Death Valley Party' existed out of 4 families and a group of young men; 26 covered waggons entered the valley, but only one came out. However only 1 person died and it's said that the valley got its name when one of the Party members turned his head and spoke: " Goodbye, Death Valley".
In more realistic terms we can assume that the valley got its name because of the few life that can be found in it. Almost nothing is able to survive in this ultra-dry landscape, 'though you may find some desert plants that can. In 1913 a record temperature of 133°F (56°C) was measured and summertemperature easily rises above 118°F (48°C). When you get out of your car, you'll feel a constant warm and dry wind blowing over your skin.
Some things you just HAVE to see in Death Valley:
* Badwater: This is the lowest point on the western hemisphere (292 feet
or 89 m below sealevel). It is
covered with a huge salt lake in summer, but if you come here at the end
of the summer, you'll
probably only see the salt; the water will be gone.
* Devil's Golf Course: Here you'll find strange salt forms and piles. As
if even the Devil would want to play golf
here...
* Artist's Drive: A sandy road leads you along the most colorful landscape
of Death Valley. Many minerals have
come out of the ground and show a beautiful spectacle of colors and light.
* Dante's View: From up here you've got a marvellous view over Death Valley!
You can see the whole landscape
begging for water... This point is called this way 'cause it looks much
like the way Dante
describes his 'Inferno' (hell).
* Scotty's Castle: At the northern edge of the Valley, a villain and gold
digger, nicknamed 'Death Valley Scotty',
convinced millionair Albert Johnson to build an extravagant house in Spanish
style. Scotty had
lured Johnson with wild stories about gold. But once arrived there, Johnson
noticed the climate
did him well, he forgave Scotty and they became friends for life. The house
has got 25 rooms
with a huge living room, a music room with an organ with 1600 pipes and
little waterfalls all over
the house; the airconditioning of those times.
* Ubehebe Crater: A vulcanic eruption caused this crater of 394 feet or
120 m deep and with a diameter of almost
0.6 mi or 1 km. When you walk to the edge of the crater, you'll get a dramatic
view.
* Zabriskie Point: From this point you've got a magnificent view over the
southern part of Death Valley. Surely a
point not to be missed!!!
The best
thing you can do after a day of driving in the Valley, is spending the
night in the Valley! There are only 2 villages: Furnace Creek and Stovepipe
Wells. If I were you, Stovepipe Wells would be it! It's a little village,
existing out of a shop, a motel, a restaurant and a gaz station. It's lovely
to stay in that motel, to get the feeling to be in the middle of nowhere
and to watch the most stars you'll ever see in this non-by-light-polluted
area. Enjoy!
| 7) Mono Lake + Bodie |
The best spot to visit the lake is South Tufa Area.
If you've always wanted to visit a ghost town, don't look any further. Once you've seen 1, you've seen them all, so why not going to the best one? Calico's fine, but quite commercial. If you really want to FEEL what it was like in those days, go to Bodie. The road up is miles away from any highway, and you'll surely get the feeling to be in the middle of nowhere as in front of you little wooden houses arise. Bodie really is worth the trip! Untill 1876 this was a flourishing miners' town, and people lived here untill the early 1940s.
Just walk between the houses where you get a good feeling how hard life
was in the 1800s. You can walk around in some houses, and you can buy a
little map with information of who lived in which house.
Bodie was called the 'Bad Town', 'cause there was a lot of crime, and it
was also difficult to survive up there. Temperatures go down 'till -15°F
or -40°C in winter! And even in summer it's not that good over there.
By day it's 75°F or 25°C, but at night temperatures go below the
freezing point! Pretty hard, especially when you have to live in wooden
houses.
I'm sorry, the pictures of Bodie were made little time before sunset. If you're going to Bodie and you're gonna take any pictures, I'd be very happy if you'd mail me some...
To visit
Bodie properly, you should at least take half a day.
| 8) Yosemite National Park |
Another
national park you should visit, is Yosemite National Park ! The best way
to enter Yosemite is from the east, over the Tioga pass of 10.102 feet
or 3080 m high. Once entered, you'll see beautiful nature around you: in
the beginning still mountain-views with beautiful lakes, and more to the
west, mainly woods and rocks. There are also sequoias (mammoth trees),
the largest trees (in mass) on the 'face of the earth ! Standing next to
one of those, you feel very small ... .
In the
Yosemite Valley, there 's a tourist village, where many of the hiking routes
start. If you 'd like to see waterfalls of about 2600 feet or 800 m (the
water falls in 3 times: Upper falls, Middle falls and Lower falls), come
in spring or early summer, when they are the most impressive. The melting
of ice and snow in the upper mountains cause a wild stream of water. In
fall, the falls are dry, so you don't really have to stop there. But you
must stop a few miles further to see the mountaineers climb the 'El Capitan',
that is believed to be the biggest monolite on the earth. The walls are
almost perfectly vertical, and it takes 2 days to climb this rock of 3280
feet or 1 km high; the mountaineers have to sleep in nets. Don't forget
to take your binoculars or a camera with a great zoom, because they look
like flys, and can hardly be seen.
Make
sure you go to 'Glacier Point', so you can have a great view over the Yosemite
Valley and over large parts of the national park. The sunset is amazing
here, and you can ask questions to a real ranger, who invites you to stay
till after the sunset and listen what he has got to say about the stars
(no pollution of light !).
Anyhow,
if you come to Yosemite, don't forget to bring good hiking shoes; it can
take a walk before you see the most amazing things (sequoias, ...).
| 9) Monterey + Carmel |
It is probably written down in each single travel guide about California: the '17-mile drive' (Pebble Beach) along the coast on the peninsula of Monterey. This is a very touristical route by car: you have to pay a fee to use the road in this part of the peninsula. Signs along the road indicate which way you have to follow, and the points of interest are also marked.
Pebble
beach exists mostly out of villas of rich Californian families (but nothing
special compared to those in Beverly Hills) and golf courses. The most
interesting things about the 17-mile drive are the views over the sea and
the cliffs, but the weather has to be good to enjoy these totally. You
can also enjoy yourself with the gulls, and if you're not to noisy, even
the squirrels who come and beg for bread.
The
most famous tree of the 17-mile drive is the 'Lone Cypress', 
a
cypress standing alone on a bare looking hill. It has become one of the
most important points of recognition of California. The 17-mile drive ends
in Carmel, a very special village that tries to remain old-fashioned. It
has got no neonlights, no advertisement posters, no traffic lights, no
house numbers, no parking meters and no mailmen. Every citizen has to pick
up his own mail at the post office. There are even rules about eating on
the street and high heels ! (no fastfood here) You can also take a look
at the 'Mission San Carlos Borromeo', an old mission post with a little
church built in the 18th century.
Monterey
(the city) has got also a lot to offer to the tourists: the Fisherman's
Wharf, the Monterey Bay Aquarium and lots of other things that 've got
to do with the ocean. Just take a look in the local tourist center, and
you won't know what to do first !
| 10) San Francisco |
"San Francisco's everyone's favourite city", a traveller guide told me before I'd been there. And I thought "Yeah, whatever". But once there, I loved every single bit of it ! The city is situated on a dozen of hills and is bordered by the sea at 3 sides. From practically every point you get a magnificent view on those little hills the streets are made on. Within 2 years after James Marshall had discovered gold in the Sierra Nevada, the population grew from 900 to 25 000! Now about 800 000 people live in this gorgeous city.
If there's one thing that could be bad for the reputation of San Francisco,
it's the weather. When it's hot in august in California, that doesn't mean
at all it's warm in San Francisco. Even in summer a thick fog can appear
from the ocean and block the sun away. But San Francisco is the city where
I noticed the least what weather it was. I mean, I saw the fog, but it
seemed like the city is build that way to make you forget about the weather,
especially when you're walking on Market Street.
The cable cars are THE stereotypic thing of San Francisco. These trams
are pulled up the hills by a big steel cable that runs under the ground.
Whenever the driver wants to stop, he pulls his clip up so he isn't connected
to the rolling cable anymore. When he wants to get pulled up, he just lets
the clip down and the tram gets pulled forward. The first cable car drove
on the streets in in 1873, and at the beginning of this century about 800
miles of rails were being used. Now there's only 11 miles of rails. On
the trams you can find nowadays a lot of tourists, but also a lot of the
inhabitants that live along those streets use the cable car.
People who have never been to California often speak of Los Angeles and
San Francisco as if it was the same. However, no 2 other cities differ
that much geographically, culturally and politicallly as LA and San Francisco.
There
are different ways to visit San Francisco.
The best way to get an impression of it, is by following the 49-mile drive.
You can buy a detailed map of this touristical route everywhere in San
Francisco. The drive is also indicated by blue-white signs with '49-mile
drive' on it, but (again out of own experience) it can be very dificult
to find these signs in heavy traffic, and sometimes the signs are not very
well placed. So a map is definitely necessary. When you follow this drive
you'll pass along the major sights of this city like Chinatown, the Golden
Gate Bridge, Twin Peaks (from where you get a 360° view of San Francisco)
and the Oakland Bay Bridge.
It would be a shame to only visit San Francisco by car. You should at least
walk in the eastern part of Market Street and it's highly recommended to
walk along the following sights. It'll take about 2 hours, but at least
you'll see the most interesting places of San Francisco.
* Crocker Galleria: This mall with a dome made out of glass is created as a copy of the Galleria in Milan.
* Transamerica Pyramid: The highest building of the town. At the 27th floor
there's a platform to look out over the
city, but recently acces has been denied to that floor. Instead you can
stay at the ground
floor and move with arrows the 4 cameras that are placed on that 27th floor.
It's nice, but
it's not the same, and if you want to make pictures, you'll have to take
pictures of a
screen. It'd be better if that 27th floor became back accesible for tourists.
* stairs on Filbert Street: Go up the stairs 'till you reach the top of
Telegraph Hill. On that hill you've got a
beautiful view over the city. If you want a better view, just go up into
th Coit Tower.
* Coit Tower: In this tower you can see wall paintigs of the 1930s. From
the top of the tower you've got a
magnificent view over the city and the bay.
* Chinatown: Stockton Street is the real Chinatown. Here you can find a
lot of chinese shops, groceries and
shopping Chinese. Grant Avenue is the Chinatown for the tourists with gift
shops, jewellers and
restaurants.
Although
I've tried, the beauty of San Francisco cannot be described that easily.
You just have to be there before you can fully understand it...
| Outroduction |
California is a wonderful state that is really worth a visit! I hope I've helped you to understand California better, or to prepare your holidays with these pages.
Suggestions
or comments are always welcome at vannoppen@pandora.be