Petersen Automotive Museum

1889 Benz car

Yesterday we went to see the Petersen Auto Museum. Ros said "Not more cars!", but when we got there it was actually quite interesting. Lots of cars from movies and TV shows, as well as some esoteric vehicles indeed. To the right is where it all started for the internal combustion car, Carl Benz's 1889 tricycle car with a single cylinder engine. Top speed - 10 mph! Still this was twice as fast as a horse. Not much shelter from the elements.

1901 Car

12 years later we had graduated to four wheels and added an extra cylinder. Top speed 15 mph, still no protection from inclement weather. Also note lack of safety equipment, no seat belts, no airbags, not even doors! At least it had a dashboard and headlights.

Early electric car

Electric cars are not new! Here is a fine example from the 20's steered with a tiller from the back seat! Gives a whole new meaning to the term "back seat driver".

Ford Model T

Here's yours truly seated in the car that changed the world for the masses, the Ford Model T. Was the world's first mass produced car, thus lowering the cost so that the man in the street could afford to buy one. Easy to drive, one pedal for forward, one pedal for reverse and poor brakes. Stamping on the reverse pedal was more effective. Also very uncomfortable to sit in.

Green Hornet

Lots of cars from movies and TV series. This one from the Green Hornet. Kato, his assistant, was played by Bruce Lee. Checkout the size of the beast, and the guns mounted on the front.

K.I.T.T

Here's K.I.T.T from the Knightrider series. We almost have autonomous cars now, perhaps this series was more visionary than we thought?

Robocop

This is the car that Robocop drove in the eponymous movie about a future where policing had been outsourced to private firms.

Flying police car

And who can forget Back to the Future II, complete with flying cars. We were promised flying cars in the 50's! Where's my flying car?!

Jurassic Park

Dinosaurs anyone?

Minority Report

I can remember Tom Cruise getting trapped in an assembly line making this car to the left in the film Minority Report.

Honda 50

Finally, there were some blasts from the past. Anyone remember the ubiquitous Honda 50
motorcycle? They were everywhere when I was growing up. In Asian countries it was not unusual to see whole families riding these, Dad driving, Mum behind him often holding a baby while an older child sat behind Mum hanging on for grim death.

Mirror bike

Just one more, anyone fancy riding this motorbike, covered in mirrors. Can just imagine the chaos that would cause on public roads.
Ros and I had lunch at the restaurant there before wending ourselves back home for a well-earned rest.

Ostrich Farm

Ostriches

Monday, Joshua took us to see the local ostrich farm, which has a large collection of them, including emus as well. Male ostriches have black plumage and red legs and toes, which is more prominent during mating season. Females are a drab grey. Although they have large wings (unlike emus which have vestigial wings) they are flightless, but their long legs enable them to run up to 45 mph. Ostriches can live up to 40 years and the oldest on record lived to 81.

Feeding time

For one dollar you are allowed to feed the ostriches. Instructions include hanging onto the feeding dish handle tightly with both hands as the enterprising birds will attempt to take the whole bowl from you. Once they realise you have a good grip, they then feed on the pellets which disappear rapidly!

Squirrels dart in and out of the enclosures, feeding on the pellets that the ostriches drop.

Largest eye in nature

The ostrich eye is the largest in nature, giving it good eyesight to detect and evade predators, although it would be a brave predator that took on a fully grown angry ostrich as they stand nearly nine feet tall and have a vicious large central claw on their feet. Predators usually target eggs and young chicks than take on fully grown birds. One kick of an ostrich can disembowel a fully grown big cat.

Male ostrich

Here's a male ostrich strutting his stuff.

Female ostrich

And here's a female ostrich spreading her wings.

Emus

And of course, can't forget the emus.

Only two toes

Ostriches are unique in the bird world in only having two toes on their feet. All other birds have three toes, including emus. Here you can see the main central toe and the smaller second toe. You can also see the red on the legs and feet of the male ostrich.

Rows of flowers

Later, Josh drove us to a chicken farm as he is planning to get some chickens for his farmlet. We spoke to the very knowledgeable owner discussing chicken coops, keeping them safe and how to raise them successfully. Nearby were these flower farms which I thought were worthy of a photo. What I couldn't get a photo of was a deer in the opposite garden contentedly dining on lettuces. It gamboled off before I could focus on it.

After that it was tea at a local burger joint, Eddie's Burgers (which was delicious, by the way) before driving back for a quiet evening playing table tennis and watching TV, before returning to LA on Tuesday. Tuesday night we all went to my favourite restaurant again, the Wood Ranch BBQ and had a great night there.

More Solvang

Yesterday when we got back to LA, I fully intended to update the blog, but unfortunately Luke and Khristina's internet service was down. I restarted the router (more difficult than it seems as it was buried in a cupboard, behind a panel which was obstructed by a set of shelves loaded down with stuff), but this did not solve the problem. Only when Khristina contacted AT&T and they got her to restart the "white cable box" did the problem resolve.

Anyway, what have we been up to? Last Friday, Khristina generously took time off work to take Ros to get their nails done and basically get pampered. I was offered the same but wisely declined, not sure what happens with secret women's business.

We drove over to Luke's work in the late afternoon and Joshua drove us back to Solvang for the weekend. Saturday we basically took it easy and did nothing. Sunday Luke and Khristina joined us for lunch as they had driven up earlier on Friday and were staying in another house they had rented.  This was the first time they had seen Josh & Sam's new house. They stayed until mid afternoon then left to drive back to LA as they both had to work in the morning.

Typical US home

All of us went for a walk in the afternoon around the neighbourhood. Here's a typical US home, complete with flagpole adorned with the Stars and Stripes (Americans are fiercely patriotic) and several trucks in the driveway.

Mailbox flag

The US Mail works differently than here in Australia. Mail gets delivered normally but you may have noticed in American movies that US mailboxes have a red flag on them. Instead of traipsing off to find a public mailbox to post letters, they are just put into their mailbox and the flag is raised to indicate to the postman that there are letters to collect. To the left you can see a mailbox with the flag raised. The postman collects the letters and lowers the flag. Brilliant I reckon, would never happen in Oz.

Rose garden

Nearly everybody keeps their gardens looking lovely, this one with beautiful roses caught my eye.

RV

Just about everyone has an RV (Recreational Vehicle) in their yard, the one at left is typical of most models. Caravans are rare and one house even had a huge two story RV garage!

Josh & Sam's letterbox

Josh & Sam's letterbox is of a more modern and secure design, the flag is the little red square poking out of the bottom right of the letter box. Letters to be collected are reached by opening the top section and they are in a little pocket at the front, whereas delivered letters are pushed past that so they drop into the bottom of the secured section. Quite ingenious.

Life in the big city

Here we are back in Solvang with Josh and Sam. Not much happening, just relaxing. I upgraded the memory in an old iMac Josh acquired then upgraded the OS to El Capitan, the highest it can go. For a machine 12 years old, it runs surprisingly well. Ros has been helping out in the garden with Josh and Sam. As you may know, I'd rather have a tick on my eyeball than garden, I just caught up on reading, something I rarely get to do in my busy life back home.

21 floors straight down

Life in a big city like Los Angeles is different to Perth back home. Luke and Khristina live on the 26th floor of their apartment building, but actually it is really the 21st floor. How come you ask? Well for starters, buildings in LA don't have a ground floor as we would call it, they call the ground floor the first floor. The first floor in this particular building is called the ground floor, even though it is the first floor. Confused yet? That's because there is no first floor in the elevator. In deference to other visitors, this building has actually labelled the first floor as ground floor. It then jumps to the 2nd floor. So that accounts for one floor missing, what about the other four? Well there is no 13th floor, which is commonly omitted because of triskadekaphobia, which is Latin for "fear of the number 13". But the 4th, 14th and 24th floors are also missing. Why you ask? Because in certain Asian languages, the number 4 sounds like the word for death, so they are omitted as well.

Nighttime view of LA

The view from the apartment at night is phenomenal, with floor to ceiling windows giving a view like this. A million dollar view if you ask me.

The Grace Building, which is what Luke and Khristina's building is called, is like most high-rises downtown, a secure building. You can't get in without a security dongle to open the front door, you can't go up the elevator without the dongle, and even the apartment has no keyhole, the dongle unlocks the door. The garage doors scan your car for a parking permit and open automatically when you drive up to it, going in and going out. You can't even get to other floors with the dongle, except for the communal 6th floor and the parking garage on the 2nd floor. Not sure if you make friends on another floor how you would get down to visit them or vice versa. (Edit: Khristina informs me that the other floors are accessible with the dongle).

Homeless camp

Another thing that is visible in a big city like Los Angeles is homelessness. I know we have that problem in Perth, but it is not as visible as it is here due to the larger population. Sights like this one are common around L.A., some whole streets are lined with camps like these. This homeless person has camped out opposite the Grace Building. It's more of a problem here as unemployment benefits are not the same as back in Australia. It's a lot harder to apply for it here, and a lot of homeless people have little to no education, have mental issues or PTSD and are simply incapable of navigating the minefield to gain access to benefits. We also see lots of beggars, many of them handicapped in some way, and often hanging around busy intersections holding up cardboard signs describing their plight. It's heartbreaking to see and even more heartbreaking to realise there is no easy solution to this problem. The next day I saw two police officers moving this black gentleman on. He started to pack up while they were watching him, but when they finally left, he just climbed back into his makeshift shelter and went to sleep.

Driving in L.A. is an experience compared to Perth. We have nothing to compare to the big interstate highways. Our freeways pale in comparison to them. I've mentioned before that some may be 8 lanes wide at some points, especially where two interstates intersect. Exits are not always on the right hand side (remember cars drive on the right hand side over here). When we are returning to Luke & Khristina's place from Luke's work, we have to take the middle lane to exit to downtown, and there are three lanes to the left and three lanes to the right of the middle lane!

Speed limits, as I have mentioned before, are only a suggestion. I have found myself doing 10 to 15 miles per hour over the speed limit on the interstates. If you don't do this, you risk being rear-ended by other traffic that is going that fast - and remember 15 mph is 25 kph. Do that in Perth and you risk a large fine or worse, getting your car impounded. Just as quickly though, you can stop dead on the interstates, especially during peak hour.

One thing I do like here about driving is the "turn right on red" rule, which I wish they would implement back home (only it would be "turn left on red" there). If you are turning right at a red light and it is clear and safe to do so, you may proceed through the red light. In fact, if you don't, you will be quickly reminded of the rule by the horn of the car behind you! It really does help the flow of traffic and I can remember many instances back home waiting to turn left at a red light with no traffic that would impede such a turn. Sigh!

Another peculiarity is the 4-way stop. Unlike WA where one road will have right of way and the intersecting road will have stop signs, in L.A. (and the rest of the U.S. I imagine), some uncontrolled intersections have stop signs on all four roads. Which car goes first, you ask? Who ever gets to the intersection first. If two vehicles arrive at the intersection simultaneously, the car on the left has to yield to the car on the right (that's another thing that's different over here, you don't "give way", you "yield"). What happens if four vehicles arrive simultaneously at such an intersection? I honestly don't know and I have yet to see it happen, thank goodness.

Roundabouts are rare. I have only seen them in two places, one at Ikea the other day, and in Michelle's gated community, Park La Brea. Luke tells me Americans do not understand roundabouts at all, which is why they are so rare, probably. Because they drive on the right here, you go around the roundabout anticlockwise. Takes some getting used to, I can tell you.

Sirens and traffic

For anyone who has never been to Los Angeles, living in the heart of big American city is certainly an experience. In the last 24 hours since we've been back from Solvang (which was blissfully quiet) I reckon we've heard sirens at least every 20 minutes throughout the whole day. A little less frequently at night, but still there nevertheless. Even one fire tender roared past me whilst I was driving today. In Perth, you're lucky to hear one a day and almost never encounter one while driving.

Talking about driving, the traffic here in L.A. has to be seen to be believed. We collected Augie from school today, it was nearly a two hour round trip for a 6.5 mile journey! The freeways clog up every morning and evening, so it is best only to use them in the middle of the day or late at night. However, the L.A. motorists are very obliging and let you in to their lane if you indicate, and nearly every road is much wider than back in WA and have this extra lane in the middle which you only use when turning left. Consequently the main lanes are never blocked by turning traffic, allowing traffic to keep flowing. Well that's the theory anyway, it can still back up for blocks at a time.

1901 Toledo

Anyway, yesterday Josh suggested we visit the Nethercutt Motor Museum near Luke's work place, so we went there yesterday afternoon. Well what a collection of old cars, all of them in absolute pristine condition. Ranging from this 1901 Toledo on the right. up to 1980's Rolls Royce's and everything in between. Mr Nethercutt started out by buying these old cars, and eventually his fame spread and many older owners of these sort of cars donated them to him because they knew they would be looked after.

Steering wheel controls

All the old vehicles of yesteryear have these steering wheel controls, one for the throttle and one for the spark advance. As the car and engine went faster the spark to ignite the fuel had to be "advanced" so the fuel had time to burn during the power stroke. It was a bit of a hit and miss affair to get the right settings so the engine didn't overheat or labour too much on hill climbs. And every car was different in how these controls were positioned on the steering wheel and how they were set.

Instrument panel

No standardisation in those days, if you got a new model car, you had to learn how to drive it all over again. Today's computerised automatic cars would have appeared magical to those early drivers. Nor were the instrument panels any better, often placed below the dashboard in the centre column so you had to take your eyes off the road to look at them. Looking at the complexity of the one on the right here, you can see why mostly men drove them in those days.

Mirror on tyre

Nowadays, anybody can get into any car and drive it straightaway due to the standardisation of controls and gauges. Even mirrors were attached differently - here we see a common way was to strap it to the spare tyre which was usually positioned just in front of the driver's door. But I also saw cars where the spare tyre was next to the driver's door making it impossible to open it and forcing the the poor driver to enter via the passenger door and slide over to the driver's side.

1930's caravan

You could also hitch up a 1930's caravan and tour the country. Caravan design has certainly changed since then.

De Lorean

Anybody who's a fan of the Back to the Future trilogy will no doubt recognise this car as the time machine used to catapult Marty McFly backwards and forwards in time. The car is finished in brushed stainless steel.

Unfortunately Mr De Lorean's design did not appeal to the greater motoring public and he quickly went bankrupt.

Edison jukebox

This museum doesn't only house cars though, here is something I have never seen and did not even know existed - an Edison phonograph jukebox using the original wax cylinders before flat records came into existence! Not sure how many plays each cylinder would produce as they were fairly soft.

Gas pump

My father's generation would recognise this early device - a gas (petrol) pump. The attendant would use the lever on the left side to pump the amount of fuel you requested up into the glass container at the top, then it would be gravity-fed into your tank. A labourious  and time consuming task compared to today's electric pumps, but electricity wasn't everywhere when these old pumps were around, so I guess they worked OK.

Futuristic design

Then there were car designers who tried to imagine what cars would look like in the future and here is one example of such a design, complete with central tail fin. I guess we've still got a little ways to go yet until we have these sort of designs.


After the museum closed at 4.30 pm, we joined Joshua in going to Ikea for one of their famous and cheap meals. I tried their tasty meatballs and sauce with green veggies and mashed potato, polished off with a hazelnut chocolate dessert. And it certainly was cheaper, about $US11.50 per person, far cheaper than some of the other eateries we have frequented. Josh also stocked up on food there as you can buy all the restaurant items frozen for consumption at home. With his busy lifestyle and long drives to and from L.A., these meals can be quickly knocked up when one is tired and hungry.

Not much happening

Hi good folk, just taking it easy at the moment. We spent the remaining two days in Solvang helping around the garden. While Ros and Sam worked on the vegetable garden, Josh and I went over the reticulation system to get it ready for the hot, dry summer to come. There are no less than three reticulation controllers on the property, each with 6 stations, so yours truly wore out the path between the controllers to run them while Josh found problems and fixed them. The third controller down in the paddock area did not appear to do anything so we left that for another day.

Lunch on gazebo

We had lunch on the gazebo on Sunday as it was a beautiful day. Whilst we were sitting there enjoying the view, we could here this constant "clicking" noise. At first we couldn't work out what was making it, but finally I managed to capture a picture of what was making the sound.

Clicking bird

Here is the culprit, this beautiful little black-faced bird sitting in the nearby tree, clacking his bill together repeatedly. I call this my "Dances with Wolves" shot as one of the Indian characters in the movie was called Kicking Bird.

We guessed that the noise was some sort of mating call, because before long another bird joined him nearby.

Clicking bird's mate?

Here she is on the fence next to the tree he was in.

We've also had a few hummingbirds around but I haven't been quick enough to capture these fleeting, very fast birds.

Voodoo fuchsia

We bought Sam a lovely hanging basket full of fuchsias, which the store owner informed us was called a Voodoo Fuchsia. Not sure how the name originated, but it is beautiful just the same.

Japanese Maple

There's also a lovely Japanese maple tree next to the front door and I did some experimenting with
my camera's macro setting to get this close-up picture of the leaves in their glorious red spring colours.

On Monday morning we got up early as Josh had to drive down to L.A. for work, so we joined him for the drive back to Luke and Khristina's place.

We took it easy that day, did some washing, had naps to catch up on sleep then went out for tea with Joshua after he had finished work. He took us to a genuine Southern style restaurant where we had corn bread, I had a Pimento cheeseburger and Ros and Josh shared a whole southern-fried hen with spicy carrots and fried asparagus. I learnt later that night that southern fried food does NOT agree with my stomach and spent half the night sitting up, finally getting to sleep at about 4.30 am. The trouble with Luke and Khristina's apartment is their blinds are not the block out type, so as soon as the sun rises, the bedroom is blasted with light. It's fortunate that we are on Summer time here, so the sun doesn't rise till 5.30 am. Anyway, I'll be having an afternoon nap to catch up on some sleep before Luke and Khristina return from New Orleans tonight

Solvang

Hello good people, yesterday (Thursday) we farewelled Luke and Khristina as they flew off to New Orleans for a 5 day holiday. We just did some washing and basically relaxed, as you are meant to do on holidays. At 4pm, I had to drive Luke's work van back to office as the other employees would need it for transporting various organs and keyboards. This was an experience during peak hour - a 30 minute drive normally took nearly an hour!

View from back yard

Joshua met us there (he works there a few days a week) and drove us up to Solvang to see the new house he and Sam have bought. We stopped in Ventura for a meal at a Thai restaurant and took enough home with us for lunch the following day. We arrived at Solvang around 9pm, had a tour then hit the sack as we were very tired from all the driving.

Woke up this morning to some wonderful vistas - this is the view from the backyard with the mountains in the distance. The picture does not do the view justice, you'll have to come over here yourselves.

Gazebo

They also have this gazebo that overlooks the scenery and the paddocks at the bottom of their property. If you click on this picture to enlarge it, you can see the vase of flowers that was knocked over in the wind and shattered. I did not notice this whilst taking the picture, only discovered it later and managed to cut my finger picking up all the shards. Down below you can see numerous ground squirrels darting through the grass. Unlike their tree-dwelling cousins, they dig underground warrens and live there.

This is the view from the back of the house, our bedroom is the last set of windows on the

Rear of house

left. Floor to ceiling windows give us a grand vista to awaken to every morning. This morning we flung open the curtains to see the view only to confronted with fog obscuring just about everything. It lifted a few hours later to give us the view above.

I gave Josh a hand setting up his wireless network in the house which took us a few hours of patient work, but every part of the house now can access the wireless network.

"Shed" and Ros

Later we drove into Solvang to purchase some garden supplies for the house and Ros and Josh have been busy in the garden all afternoon.

The house has a shed (really a granny flat) that is built in the same style as the house. Josh is going to set it up as a workshop to work on some of Luke's keyboards so he can avoid commuting down to LA several times a week.

Kitchen

Here's a view of the kitchen. So far, Sam says, she's only used the stove to boil water.

Lounge room

And here's a view of the lounge room. Note the wood panelled ceiling and the face brick fire place.

Tonight Josh and Sam are taking us out for a meal at a local restaurant. Looking forward to that.