Mal and Lauren

September 22, 2025

Our friend Nick is visiting, so we decided to take him on a walk through the neighborhood where we live. California Heights is Long Beach’s largest historic neighborhood with nearly 1,500 homes built in the 1920s and 1930s, predominantly in Spanish Colonial Revival style. Here is a sampling of some of the neighborhood homes.

This home had a pomegranate tree, something we hadn’t seen before

While this homeowner appeared to have a particular antipathy toward female dogs. Apparently, male dogs can pee wherever they like.

September 19, 2025

Seal Beach is in Orange County just south of Long Beach. It is a charming town with one of the widest beaches we have ever seen. So wide that the ships lined up offshore, waiting to get into the Port of Long Beach, appeared to be sitting on the sand.

The beach is lined with large homes.

The houses not on the beachfront aren’t quite as elaborate. Some maintain that old beach town feel.

The Main Street is very quaint.

With a local navy base and a number of evangelical churches, the town is unsurprisingly conservative. All of the stores we went into were playing country music and one store had the following sign outside.

Any doubts we have had over the political inclinations of the town were removed by the merchandise in this store.

Here is the classic car of the day.

September 11, 2025

On the campus of California State University Long Beach, this pretty Japanese garden was opened in 1981. It has everything you’d expect from a traditional Japanese garden, including a beautiful pond

With bridges and viewing platforms

It is stocked with over a thousand koi

There were also waterfalls and fountains

a tea house

A zen garden

and bonsai trees

August 28, 2025

Located between Newport Beach to the north and Laguna Beach to the south, Crystal Cove State Park stretches for just over three miles along the coast. Sitting below cliffs, it is for the most part not visible from the Pacific Coast Highway (locally known as the PCH) that runs along next to it. The Park includes a historic district where over forty 1920s beach cottages have been preserved and can be rented (demand is high, however, so you first need to win a lottery). Many of the cottages reminded us of classic New Zealand baches. There is also a restaurant on the beach called Beachcomber which has excellent food in a fantastic location.

One thing that we hadn’t realized about California until spending more time here is that on any given night you can head to the beach and be treated to a spectacular sunset.

And if the sunset is not entertaining enough, you can also watch a movie on the beach.

August 24, 2025

Manhattan Beach may not resemble its namesake in New York but they do have, at least, one thing in common. They are both expensive places to live. In fact, more homes exceeding $1 million were sold in Manhattan Beach than any other city in California, including such famous places as Malibu, Beverly Hills and Bel-Air. Not surpisingly then, it is a very pristine place, with little of the homelessness and trash that you find in other parts of Los Angeles.

August 21, 2015

At Huntington and Malibu, they’re shootin’ the pier

(Surfin’ Safari, The Beach Boys)

Apart from Hawaii, perhaps no place is more associated with surfing than Southern California. And in California, Huntington Beach is the center of surf culture. Each year, it is the site of the World surfing championships and has earned its nickname of “Surf City”. People have been surfing there since 1914 when George Freeth first paddled out along side the iconic pier. On a hot summer day, we headed to the beach.

Point of Interest: At one time an encyclopedia company gave away free parcels of land (with the purchase of a complete set for $126) in the Huntington Beach area. The lucky buyers got more than they had bargained for when oil was discovered in the area, and enormous development of the reserves followed. Although many of the old reserves are depleted, you can still spot skip jacks bobbing up and down at various spots. In fact, the Chevron corporation remains a major land owner in the city.

August 20, 2025

California Heights, where we live, was once part of a massive ranch. In 1784, the King of Spain granted 300,000 acres to a former soldier named Manuel Nieto as a reward for his military service and to encourage Spanish settlement in California. On his death, his children inherited the property and his daughter Manuela Cota received the 27,000 acres known as Rancho Los Cerritos (Ranch of the little hills). In 1842, Manuela’s heirs sold the property to Massachusetts-born John Temple. Temple built a two-story Monterey-style adobe house that still exists and is now a museum. We decided to pay the nearby Rancho a visit.

The inside has been furnished like it was back when the house was first built. On a very hot day it was surprisingly cool inside even with no air conditioning.

We were surprised to see in the library a copy of Peter McIntyre’s West. McIntyre was perhaps New Zealand’s most popular artist of the twentieth century. In the 1960s he produced a number of books of his paintings that were popular in New Zealand including one covering New Zealand and one the Pacific Islands. In 1970, an American publisher produced Peter McIntyre’s West which contained scenes that McIntyre had painted across the western states.

August 13, 2025

The Orange County Fair has been going since 1890. It is now one of the biggest fairs in the world with an attendance of over 1 million visitors during the 23 days it is open each year. There are the traditional farm animals and vegetable competitions.

But the main attractions are the terrifying and nausea producing rides.

Of course, no fair is complete without a giant Ferris wheel.

The other main attraction is the massive variety of junk food. Hint: Save the food until after the rides.

April 27, 2025

We went for a hike along the Shotover River with our brother-in-law, Bill. The river gets its name from one of the early European settlers, William Gilbert Rees, who named it after his business partner’s English estate, Shotover Park. It has a particularly beautiful Maori name, Kimi-akau, which translates as “looking for the coast”. During the New Zealand gold rush in the 1860s, the Shotover was one of the richest gold-bearing rivers in the world. These days, it continues to provide riches but now they are in the form of tourist dollars, paid to the operators of the bright red jetboats that fly up and down the narrow and shallow river. These very fast and agile boats are propelled by a jet of water that is ejected through the back of the boat. Because there are no propellers, the boats can operate in very shallow waters. Fun fact: the first modern jetboat was developed by New Zealand engineer, Sir William Hamilton in the mid 1950s.