Short Today...

     Hi! As the title says, this post will be short. I'm writing this post at 8:31 Sunday night. We've been super busy this week since Wednesday, and I haven't gotten around to this until now. I don't have much time to type this post so what I'm going to do is pretty simple. I'm posting on TAJ today, so here's the link to the post if you want to check that out: My Top Five for Summer.

     Again, this is a follow up post for the one I did at the beginning of May.

     We went to a safari park in San Diego recently, so I may post some pictures from that as well. If I do it'll be either later today or on Wednesday/Tuesday.

     Thanks for reading!!

Palm Springs Aerial Tramway

     This Friday two events took place. First, it was my brother's birthday. Happy birthday shout-out to Jack! And second, we went on a field trip to Palm Springs to ride the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway. It was really fun, and I thought I'd share a few pictures with you, as well as some of the Tramway's history.

     The man responsible for the construction of a tramway was Francis Crocker. He was a young electrical engineer when he first thought to build a tramway up to Mount San Jacinto in 1935. It was soon dubbed "Crocker's Folly" by a newspaper, but O. Earl Coffman, co-manager of Palm Springs Desert Inn, helped Crocker's dream turn into a plan.

     When World War II started, plans were postponed. But in 1945 a new tram bill was passed, and by 1950 technicians were moving ahead on designs for the tramway. Funds for construction were raised by selling $8.15 million in private revenue bonds. No public funds were used.

A view of one of the towers from the tramcar.

     The Korean War posed another delay, but the project began to take form in July 1961. Helicopters were used to erect four out of five of the towers. They flew some 23,000 missions hauling men and materials needed to build the towers and the Mountain Station.

The view toward the Mountain Station.

     The inaugural ride of the Tramway took place on September 12, 1963. Francis Crocker and O. Earl Coffman were both present, as well as various local and state dignitaries. In September 2000, the Tramway got an upgrade. Passengers now rode in the world's largest rotating tramcars.

One of the first tramcars used. These did not rotate.

     Since 1963 almost 18 million people have ridden the Tramway up the chino Canyon to the San Jacinto State Park. From the Mountain Station, you can look out over the San Jacinto Mountain Range or take a number of small hiking trails.

     Below are some more photos. They start from at the top, where our family and some friends took a short hiking loop. It was really pretty and not too hot.

On the trip down, I took a lot of pictures. You can see really cool mountain formations, and the city of Palm Springs from the tramcar.

Palm Springs... It would be cool to take the Tramway at night to see all the city lights.

That's the tramcar's shadow. There were two windows that were open, and I took several pictures out both. It kinda scared me sticking my camera out the window, but I had a good grip on it, and it is still in my possession. 

And this is a completely random flower that I thought looked pretty. :)

     This was a super fun field trip, and the views were amazing. Thanks for reading this, and be sure to check out my post next week at TAJ!! I'll be posting my summer post. I wasn't able to post it in the usual rotation over there, so I had to move it back a few weeks. But if you enjoyed my school post, I'd check this one out!

     Thank you for reading!! 

Camping

     This past Saturday to Monday we went beach camping at Carpinteria. It was pretty awesome, and I'm going to share a few pictures from the weekend below.

     I found this on a sign downtown, and since it describes a bit about Carpinteria's history and name, I thought I'd share it:

The Chumash indian village of "Mishopshnow," discovered by Juan Rodriquez Cabrillo, August 14, 1542, was located one-fourth mile southwest of here. Fray Juan Crespi of the Caspar de Portola expedition named it "San Roque" August 14, 1769. Portola's soldiers, observing the Indians building wooden canoes, called the village "La Carpinteria", the carpenter shop. 

     Here are the pictures:

 Right after we got there, we went down to the beach. The water was cold at first, but not as bad once you got used to it.

 Luke's pants were really wet... :)

 Here they're trying to build a sand castle that will withstand the waves. It didn't go too well.

 After we got cleaned up from the beach, we went on a little walk along the beach and into downtown. The picture above shows some Harbor seals. I got a lot of pictures of them, which I may be sharing in a future post.

 I think this is one of my top five favorites from the whole trip.

 Another of my favorites... 

 Mom said I should take pictures of our family, too, so I took this when we were walking. Love the expression on Luke's face!! 

 This is another of my top five. It's a Baptist church. They had some pretty awesome stained glass in the windows.

 Random fact: This is a Wardholme Torrey Pine. It's the largest known Torrey Pine in existence. Planted in 1888, it now measures 126 feet tall, a 20 foot 5 inch circumference, and an 130 feet branch spread. 

 Following Mom's advice to take pictures of people, I took the following the first night when we were sitting around the campfire.

 This picture was taken the morning we left. Mom and I sat around and read. :)

 Sunset on the beach... It was so pretty!

Mom and Dad. Mom was cold. :)

 Then I went on a selfie spree. First just me... 

Then I pulled Leah into it...

And finally all my siblings. All of whom look very nice in this picture, except for Luke, who looks like he's had too much sugar or caffeine.

 The next day we went up ten miles into Santa Barbara, where we visited the Santa Barbara mission. It was cool!

 Love the wood on this old door...

 Apparently Juana Maria, which the book Island of the Blue Dolphins is based off of, was taken here after living alone on an island for eighteen years. She died here, and this is a memorial to her.

 Lots of famous people came to Santa Barbara mission, including the Von Trapp family (above) which the movie The Sound of Music is based off of. A lot of presidents have also visited, as well as Babe Ruth and Queen Elizabeth II.

 After seeing the picture in the mission, I just had to go have my picture taken in the same spot. If you look, the columns and other things are almost exactly arranged as they are in the Von Trapp picture. 

 There was a big grassy space with some rose gardens outside the mission. I took pictures, and this is my favorite. It's also in my top five for the trip. 

 The mission in the background, the grassy space mentioned above in the foreground.

 And the inside of the tent trailer. Specifically, my sleeping spot. Yes, it is usually this messy. I don't like it, but it's hard to keep clean. :)

 This was the second sunset we saw, and my final picture from my top five. I love the way the sun is reflecting off the wet sand and the ocean. 

 The family (except for me) walking along the beach.

     Those are the highlights from our camping trip!! I had a blast, but it felt really good to get home and shower. I do not like sand in my hair. Ugg! Again, I'm sorry this post is late. I was tired yesterday, and busy unpacking, so I didn't get around to it.

     As a side note, because of the camping I was not able to post my summer post at TAJ, but I will be posting that on May 23, if you want to check it out.

     Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoyed the pictures!!