Outdoor seating area at Sip Malibu

Los Angeles is not a place that makes you think “wine tasting!  Yeah!”  But more and more hillside property in Malibu, northwest of the city, is being converted into grapevine territory.  Sip Malibu, located adjacent to the Rustic Canyon General Store and Grill which is popular with motorcyclists, is the tasting room of the Malibu based Cielo Winery.  For $10 through $18 plus tax, you can sample a variety of the wines every day until 8:00 or 9:00 PM.

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Lakers vs. Bobcats, 2008

A few years ago, a relative was visiting and said he might as well catch a Dodgers game while he was in town.  I was surprised, because it had never occurred to me that living in a big city carries with it the advantage of professional sports teams in residence. I’m not sure how I missed that – every other car, grown man, or child is festooned with Lakers purple and gold around here.  Maybe it’s because I’m more into college sports.  But thanks to that relative, now I have officially accepted professional sports as a Thing To Do in Los Angeles.

Now home to two NBA teams (the Lakers and Clippers), a WBNA team (the Sparks), and a hockey team (the Kings) as well as the Dodgers, Los Angeles has five times the opportunity to experience a professional game.  Read More »

Drawing the Line in the Sand at Leo Carrillo State Beach, CA

As with most state-run agencies, California’s state parks are suffering from the dismal budget crisis that slashed its funding and raised its fees.  The governor almost shut the parks down completely to save money.

How is it that we’ve come to this point?  That lands set aside for the public can be closed to the public? That nature is off-limits to the humans who live near it, who crave it, who require it to survive?

In the movie “Into the Wild,” young punk Christopher McCandless headed out to kayak through the Grand Canyon without a permit and completely blowing off all the rules.  During most of the movie I thought the kid was pretty much a jerk, if for no other reason than he renamed himself Alexander Supertramp, but I had to agree with him when he showed disgust for The Rules.  I’m not saying that all rules are bad:  our parks have rules for safety, maintenance, and to preserve the lands for the enjoyment of others.

But when you simply close a forest because there’s no money to pay the rangers or the janitors, that’s just ridiculous.  It’s Earth.  How can you shut her down?

But without money, how can you keep her open?

When we went camping at McGrath State Beach in Ventura earlier this year, the garbage cans were overflowing, the bathrooms were too disgusting to shower in, and there was no firewood for purchase at any of the advertised stations in the park.  Yet, the place was full.  At $35 per campsite per night, they DO have money coming in, at least sometimes.  But the $1 billion backlog in repairs and maintenance state-wide is making all parks suffer.

Enter the voters!  We can save the day!  At least that’s how it usually goes in California, where the Wrath of the People is heard if not at the ballot box (the percentage of registered voters who actually vote is consistently low) then online, in political fliers, and in television ads.  Yes For State Parks – otherwise known as Prop 21 and not to be confused with Legalize Marijuana! which is Prop 19 – aims to create a fund to help stem the tide of disarray suffered by our 278 state parks by charging most vehicle owners in California a new annual vehicle license fee of $18.  For outdoor lovers like myself who can afford to pay the fee, this seems like no problem.  In return, California drivers get free day use at any park.  That saves parking fees for Leo Carillo State Beach, the one that we use most often.  All of this money and the administration of it will be subject to a yearly audit.  Can we place our faith in a legislature and administrative body that has screwed up royally thus far and put the parks into the sad condition they’re in now?

Here’s hoping.  Unless somebody else has a better idea.

[photo by Kim Tracy Prince]

A Vegetation Vacation

Scene:  the coastline of Dana Point in Laguna Niguel, where everywhere you look there’s something beautiful.  A family of four rambles down a path through a dense growth of indigenous vegetation that looks dead.  In fact, however, it is only mostly dead, and with a nice rain will come back to life and bloom once again.

Mostly Dead Bush

(For photos of the area in spring, please see Tracey Clark’s photo walk of this area, which, with its artful capture of natural beauty,  is what inspired me to accept the invitation to visit the Ritz.)  We are guided by an energetic young naturalist who knows the name and life cycle of every living and mostly dead plant we see.  He tells us that this clifftop is the habitat of the California pocket mouse, and we look very carefully to spot one.  The 5-year-old is disappointed when the tour is over, and we haven’t had a sighting of the thumb-sized rodent.

It's NOT This Big

We are guests of the hotel and the Ambassadors of the Environment program, a project of Jean-Michel Cousteau, that aims to “create opportunities for each participant to learn about Southern California’s unique ecosystems, while demonstrating their connection to the larger global systems.”  I worry that my little one was too young to understand the complexities of these ideas, but I don’t have to.  There’s something for everyone here. Read More »