Sunday morning in California we enjoyed a leisurely breakfast in our hotel restaurant. Breakfast buffets chain-wide at Hiltons are nice, but in California in particular there was so much fresh fruit from which to choose. This particular hotel has an agreement with local farmers and had baskets of practically every fruit known to man on the buffet. We had watermelon, honeydew, pineapple, grapes, strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, gooseberries, figs, pears, apples, peaches, plums, and that's just all I can remember. Aidan took great advantage of both the scrambled and hard-boiled eggs, he and Jim didn't skimp on the bacon, and Esme made her own trail mix for breakfast using the toppings on the oatmeal bar - two different kinds of chocolate chips, walnuts, pecans, golden raisins, dried cranberries, almonds, pumpkin seeds. There were also sausage, waffles, pancakes, toast, dry cereal, muffins, danish, scones, croissants... it was hard not to have some of everything.
We headed for Santa Monica after breakfast. When we went to Chicago on spring break in 2010, we made sure to show the children the place where Route 66 begins. Santa Monica pier is the traditional ending of Route 66, and so we went there to "complete the voyage," as it were.
Esme was very concerned about the traffic passing by next to the sidewalk on the pier.
And here we are! Since the pier is a pedestrian area these days, Route 66 actually ends a few miles up the road, but there is a kiosk here with information about the history of the original Mother Road.
We spent a few minutes looking out over the ocean from the end of the pier, which was very busy with fishermen. They are a quiet bunch though, and it was a still and hazy grey day at the coast. We saw several sea lions, attracted by the fishermen. It turns out the fishermen weren't having much luck, because as soon as they would get a fish on the line, the sea lions would poach it right off the hook! We also saw brown pelicans, flying in twos around the pier, also looking for fish.
As we were leaving, we decided to continue our tour of Southern California's public restrooms and just as we walked toward the side of the pier we actually saw dolphins leaping out of the water. There were five or six in the pod and they swam all the way around the pier - we followed them around until we couldn't see them any more. Later when we met up with the Roizenblatts, Roberto said that even when he lived in Santa Monica for two years, he never saw dolphins in the ocean!
We drove up to Los Angeles, hoping to see the Hollywood sign in the hills on our way, but it was too hazy inland for us to see much of anything but the road on which we were driving. Jim took us downtown and showed us the Union Bank building where he works, the hotels he has been staying in, and some of the restaurants where he has been eating - including the Nickel Diner, where he tried out one of the bacon-maple doughnuts we saw on the Food Network. :) We also parked in front of the LA Times building and took a short walk to see Parker Center, where the LAPD is headquartered and which we have seen many times in The Closer, one of our favorite shows. There were Occupy Wall Street protesters camped out in front of LA City Hall so for a Sunday morning it was pretty busy downtown.
Next we headed for Pasadena, where we were meeting friends for lunch. Naturally we had to find and drive by the Rose Bowl, where they were holding some sort of craft or art fair outside. Pasadena is a very pretty, clean town. We went back into town and parked, then found Mi Piace, the Italian restaurant where we met Roberto, Sharon and Alex Roizenblatt for lunch. Jim worked with Sharon on an IBM project in North Carolina a couple of years ago, and her and Roberto's son Alex is just five months old and very sweet. He was so good during lunch and even let me hold him for a few minutes. Lunch was delicious too!
After lunch we went to Glendora to visit our cousins the Thompsons - Dawnette and I share common ancestors: Israel and Jemima (Stevick) Hollopeter. We have worked together for many years on the Hollopeter genealogy and had the good fortune to meet in person five years ago when Jim and I vacationed in Southern California. Her husband Glen and kids Madlin, Katie and Joe are just as personable and fun to be with. We spent an enjoyable afternoon hanging out at their house and chatting, then visited their doughnut shop - The Donut Man - which we have also seen on TV. We made sure to wear our Marge's Donut Den t-shirts and Dawnette got a great shot of us there with Joe wearing his Marge's shirt! Then we went to their downtown area and saw the locations - the pet shop and pizza shop - where the Judy Moody movie was filmed. We even had dinner with them at Domenico's Jr., the pizza place where the movie takes place for a few minutes. The movie is set in Virginia, but don't let them fool you...it was filmed in California, of course!
It was hard to say goodbye, but it was a school night for the Thompsons and we were tired too. The only thing the kids had to say in the car on the way back to our hotel was "when can we hang out with them again?"