Where I Take Visiting Friends

I like Thalia Street Beach in Laguna Beach because there’s not much of it. Twisting stairs lead down from the street. The walk to the high water line can’t be more than thirty feet. I wade in to my calfs. Well, that’s my intent.

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Jon and Mary Lyn Wolfert slipped in for a few days. They’re passing through from Alaska.

Tonight they’re Dallas bound. They were on-the-ground making a fuel stop at Cavern City Air Terminal in Carlsbad, NM a few minutes ago.

Their Mooney has been dodging storms, but should be good the rest of the way. The sky will be getting brighter when they land after 5:00 AM local time.

SoCal is a pretty area. Out-of-town guests get taken to see the sights.

I like Thalia Street Beach in Laguna Beach because there’s not much of it. Twisting stairs lead down from the street. The walk to the high water line can’t be more than thirty feet. I wade in to my calfs. Well, that’s my intent.

Perfect weather. Beach jammed. Lifeguard stands, not evident a few months ago, out of storage and in the sand.

Everything about this beach says Southern California!

We left and drove past homes somehow fastened to hillsides. We were heading up. Prices were going up. Views too. Up high you see a lot.

Civilization ended at the top of the hill. We walked into the Aliso and Wood Canyons Wilderness Park. One side faces the Pacific, the other the basin that holds much of Orange County and the mountains that define its border.

More people stop by now that we’re in California. People like coming here. I understand why.

3 thoughts on “Where I Take Visiting Friends”

  1. Not to impugn those who don’t live near seacoast (I’m sure the MT’s are beautiful in their own way)…but there is something so special about living on or close to the sea. My father used to say when you are on the seacoast you’ve arrived at a point – you think about what’s on the other side of that ocean.

    We had family come in from Denver, CO for the holiday week. They arrived on Tue and immediately wanted to head to the windswept beaches of Rhode Island (we live near Saybrook). As they watched the crashing surf a thousands beach umbrellas chaffed in the wind, the kids in the group wanted to know (non-stop) what is where from the Rhode Island coast – due south (San Salvador in the Bahamas), due east (Portugal) …etc. They are on a one month Holiday down the East Coast, going to Biltmore Inner Harbor, then to Charleston, SC, then to the Gold Coast of Florida. The kids keep collecting seashells and it cracks us up as if it’s gold to them, lol. Yet, I have to remind myself what we on the coast take for granted they have never seen in their life.

  2. Of course you have more visitors now—So Cal is a destination. And getting to an airport is fairly easy. How many folks do you know who have visited NYC and yet never made the trip to Hamden to see you.
    When I was young and travelling, my folks loved it when I went to places like Miami, or So Cal—gave them a destination to plan a trip to. Enjoy your visitors and being a tour guide. I never got tired of it, as each time out I’d find someplace new.

  3. I agree with the comment above about getting more visitors if one lives in destination state….but the sad thing I found since moving to the USA is that most folks inside the USA seem to think that only Florida and California are worth seeing.

    We should not forget that there are Mts in the Western states, old historic subtropical seaports on the Gulf and south Atlantic, cool misty forests in the PNW, rural town in upper New England, desert cities, southwestern Ghostowns, Mid Atlantic navel towns…the list is endless in the USA.

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