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California’s Island: Catalina Islands
Catalina Islands just never gets old, regardless of how many times I visit it. It’s a place where I and other mainland “locals” can temporarily say goodbye to everyday stresses of work/life and pretend to have a vacation, even if it’s just a one day getaway thing.
Getting to the islands can easily be done by air or sea. I have always utilized Catalina Express’ service to get to/from Avalon, CA (Catalina Islands). While there are other companies that provide water service to/from the islands, I’ve always chosen Catalina Express for two reasons:
- The company offers free rides to/from the islands on one’s birthday.
(Update: As of 2017, the company offers a different type of birthday promotion.)(Update: It seems they no longer offer birthday promotions.) - It’s more convenient since you can choose from 3 ports (Long Beach, San Pedro or Dana Point) to depart from.
The Long Beach Port that Catalina Express departs from happens to also be the same port that Carnival (cruise ship) departs from as well, or so I believe. Parking at the Long Beach Port is plentiful albeit pricey. But I suppose parking cost shouldn’t be an issue should you decide to go on-board the Catalina Express on your birthday. ;]
While I assume that many mainland “locals” are aware of Catalina Islands, I realize that there are still many “locals” who’ve never set foot on the islands before, let alone know that such an island exists an hour away from the California coast (if departing from Long Beach Port).
I was quite surprised to learn that many of my coworkers had never been there before and were wondering whether one had to stay overnight in order to enjoy Catalina Islands. In the beginning of this post, I mentioned how some “locals” visit Catalina Islands as a one day getaway type of thing and it certainly is possible to enjoy the islands in one day.
However, I recommend first time visitors to stay for more than a day. If lodging expense(s) will be a burden to your wallet, I recommend visiting the islands for a day but to make it a very long day. (Translation: Depart from your port of choice on the 1st or 2nd earliest trip and leave the islands on the 2nd to last or last departing trip. If you get bored, you can always attempt to leave on an earlier trip, however you’ll be charged $5 for a trip change.)With Catalina Islands now offering public transportation via “The Garibaldi”, an electric bus, you really have no excuse to not explore what the island has to offer you as a visitor.
With rides costing $1 per trip, I managed to visit Catalina Islands’ Botanic Gardens and Wrigley Memorial for $2. It was great!
For those that are unsure of utilizing public transportation or simply just prefer to get around with more privacy, Catalina Islands offers a variety of other alternatives. They just may be a lot more pricey…
Similar to lodging, food on the islands is quite pricey regardless of where you choose to dine from. (There isn’t a fast food joint on the islands, so don’t think you can save money on food by visiting a Mc Donald’s or something.)
On my most recent trip to the islands, I had a bad craving for Mexican food and chose to order from Mi Casita. It was expensive, obviously. However, to make matters worse, service from Mi Casita wasn’t good whatsoever. It’s one thing when I receive good customer service from an establishment that charges a lot of money but it’s another thing when I receive poor customer service. I’m not sure where to begin with my experience with Mi Casita. Let’s just say that I had to wait a ridiculously long time before I was able to even order my food. And when the time came for me to order, the employee (female) just stared at me. (I kid you not!) It was almost as though her starring was a cue/signal that I should now be ordering. (I should mention that before the starring crap began, she had told me she would take my order in a moment. Apparently, she wanted to do something with the cash register prior to taking my order. Okay, whatever…) The service was cold, off-putting and rude. Perhaps I am looking in to it too much, but I wonder if this attitude/poor service came about simply from the possible fact that they (or she, I should say) thought I was Mexican/Spanish speaker as well? I question this because the female had initially spoken to me in Spanish. Uh, first of all, I’m not Mexican. Second of all, mi espanol es no bueno so I’m not going to try to speak in Spanish. (2 semesters of Spanish does not equate to me being able to converse well.) Third, it is so rude to just talk to someone in Spanish just because you think someone is Mexican or some other Spanish-speaking ethnicity.
Despite the crapola service I received from Mi Casita, I can at least say the food was good. (Oh, but no matter how good the food was, I’ll definitely make sure to never give my hard earned money to Mi Casita or any of their affiliated restaurants again.)
Despite my bitter customer service experience at Mi Casita, my trip to the islands was overall good. While on the topic of customer service, I’d like to give a so-called shout out to US Bank as their teller gave me superb customer service on the island. <3In my next entry, I plan on writing about my visit to Catalina Islands’ Botanic Garden & Wrigley Memorial. Do be on the look out for that. 🙂 - The company offers free rides to/from the islands on one’s birthday.
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The Griffith Observatory
People will dislike me for saying this but the Griffith Observatory is overrated. I honestly do not get why people rave over this place. I just don’t get it…
I think a part of the problem is that I don’t care much for astronomy. I also am not fond of having to search for a parking spot. A parking spot that will most likely require you to hike up to the Griffith Observatory. This may not be an issue for some people but for practically everyone in my party (translation: everyone but me and one other person), the hike was a bit of a challenge. Kind of like an unexpected work-out that you just have to force yourself to do… Not sure if that made much sense, but yeah.
Parking (wherever you end up parking) is free.
Admission to the Griffith Observatory is also for free.
As a freebie tourist destination, it makes much sense as to why you’ll encounter drama with finding a parking spot.
The stress of finding a parking spot as well as hiking up to the observatory from the parking spot made me look quite horrid in all of the selfies I took of myself. Fortunately, you can’t see that but I’m choosing to confess this to you anyway.
The Griffith Observatory has a cafe, called “Cafe at the End of the Universe”. Available food options are quite limited and to make matters worse, whatever food is available for sale just doesn’t taste good. I find it somewhat “funny” that the cafe is supposed to be associated with Wolfgang Puck, yet there is nothing that is Wolfgang Puck-ish. (I’ve eaten at one of his restaurants before in Orange County and must say it’s quite different from whatever they were serving here at the cafe…)
In my attempt to be fair to the cafe, I will say that someone in my party did find their curry to be good. I can’t help but to wonder if it really was good or if that was her hunger that was doing the complimenting. Then again, there are people (not me) who have palates that can be pleased quite easily.
I had the macaroni and cheese and was quite disappointed with it simply because it just didn’t taste good. It tasted dry/bland. Talking about dry, the top parts of the mac and cheese were literally dry. (It was dry to me but I wonder if that dry-ness is what people consider to be “al-dente”?)
I honestly was not sure what to make of my mac and cheese. A part of me was wondering if I was just used to crap macaroni cheese (think processed mac and cheese from Kraft) and thus couldn’t find the cafe’s mac and cheese appetizing. I wondered…but alas I realized that even if this were the case, it still did not make up for how bland the mac and cheese was. Ugh!
Views seemed to be a big thing among practically every visitor to the Griffith Observatory. This, I totally get especially if a visitor comes with a good camera. (I’m not talking about cell phone cameras…)
The one view I found to be amusing was the iconic Hollywood sign. Yes, you can see this iconic sign from the Griffith Observatory and to be honest with you, I found it amusing that so many people were taking photos of the sign from the grounds of the observatory. It was amusing to me because the sign doesn’t necessarily need to be viewed/photographed from the Griffith Observatory. In fact, I don’t think any photos of the sign taken from the observatory grounds would come out good. (See below as an example.) But then again, who am I to say such a thing when I was one of the few not sporting a fancy camera…?
The architecture of the Griffith Observatory was nice and all, but if you were to ask me if I’d like to visit the place again, I’d have to say no.
No, unless it’s for a hike or something.I can just see myself parking on Fern Dell Dr. in order to hike from Griffith Park up to Griffith Observatory.I can also sort of see myself hiking from Griffith Observatory to the Hollywood sign…
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Fullerton Arboretum
Shortly after my trip to the Earl Burns Miller Japanese Garden, I decided to visit the Fullerton Arboretum. Considering how disappointed I was with the Japanese Garden’s small size, I found my visit to the arboretum to be a major treat as the arboretum was huge!
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Hidden in Long Beach: A mini Japanese Garden
It was time for me to take a day off and spend some quality me time. Although this quality time was rather short lived, it was indeed much needed. One of the places I chose to visit on my day off was the Earl Burns Miller Japanese Garden located on California State University, Long Beach’s campus. -
Conquering Culver City Stairs
I came to Culver City Stairs (actually called Baldwin Hills Scenic Overlook by non-Angelenos) for the very first time and I conquered those darn stairs.For hardcore workout people/hikers, what I just said up there may seem like a bad joke. After all, the Culver City Stairs contains only 300 steps.