Author Archives: Louisa

Florida Coastline Exploration

February 2, 2013 – What to do in the middle of winter in Boston, MA? Head to Orlando, FL – warm, sunny, and great for spotting winter birds. The adventure began at 3:30 on Saturday 02 February. Fortunately, traffic to Boston Logan was light that early in the morning, and we made good time to the airport. We were also fortunate to beat the rush through security – apparently they had 2 lanes for all of A terminal until after 5am (we only knew this because there were about 5 people who ran to catch the plane; at least all of them were glad that the plane waited for them).

We made it!

The flight was uneventful, as was getting the rental car. Well, apart from the older man who somehow drove his private car into the car return garage. As with any Orlando weekend trip, we made a quick getaway from the city itself to check out some of the more natural destinations within a few hours away. This time, we decided a trip to Merritt Island to check out the ocean and the wide variety of birds that call the island home. Along the way we stopped for a late breakfast/early lunch at a little diner called Country Cookin’ Diner.

If you are looking for Osprey in winter time, Florida won’t disappoint.

The diner doesn’t look like much from the outside – we actually drove by it – and the ambiance is old-school formica and soda fountain tables inside. The food, however, is fantastic. The chicken fried steak with gravy, home fries, eggs and a biscuit was some of the best chicken fried steak we’ve had. You also can’t go wrong with biscuits and gravy. The coffee was fresh, hot, and decently strong. We’d definitely be back any time we’re in the area.

Immature Bald Eagles look a lot like Golden Eagles.

Once we reached Merritt Island we stopped to watch an osprey flying, and a few dozen coots swimming. At the visitor center we took the short boardwalk trail around the pond, and saw a few gators and a turtle. We also spent some time camped out by the bird feeders, and were rewarded with a few female and one male painted bunting. By that point we decided the trip was a success and anything else was just a bonus.

This Painted Bunting was the star of the show.

The bonus material included a hike by a hammock trail, where we saw an Eastern Meadowlark popping its head up in a meadow about 10 yards from us. It kept popping its head up and then ducking back down.

We were surprised by the size of the Eastern Meadowlark.

By this time it was mid afternoon, and Canaveral National Seashore was waiting for us. After a walk along the ocean we headed towards the hotel for dinner at High Tide Harrys. The beers were good, and the seafood was excellent; if gumbo, shrimp, or scallops are on the menu, we highly recommend all three. Dinner was so good, actually, that we went back Sunday night to watch some of the Super Bowl and get dinner.

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Los Angeles to Las Vegas

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November 21, 2012 – Wednesday was another driving day, this time from Thousand Oaks to Las Vegas. This meant we got to experience some of the infamous LA traffic, although it still wasn’t too bad (perhaps because it was a holiday week). We did discover that we prefer the area north and west of the city over the more industrialized, slightly more run down and tired feeling area to the east. Once we were outside of LA the scenery became standardized – fairly flat road surrounded on either side by distant mountain ranges.

Our destination was the Vdara Hotel.

We stopped for lunch at The Mad Greek, a family run restaurant in Baker, CA. We managed to beat the lunch rush by getting there a little after 11; the food was excellent, we sampled the gyros (I recommend the sandwich over the platter, it comes with onion, lettuce, and tzakiki), which came with a side of lightly seasoned rice. The gyros platter also came with a salad, whose star was the single stuffed grape leaf.

Our rental car did not have a good sun visor. Louisa fixed that problem.

After lunch we took a detour through the Mojave desert. The desert was pretty neat, with metamorphic rocks, cinder cones, and lots of Joshua trees.

They do exist!

We reached Las Vegas by the early afternoon, just after 3pm. This is a great time to get to Las Vegas since the traffic is usually pretty light. Our hotel was Vdara, which we like because it’s a non-smoking, non-gambling hotel. That night we had dinner at the Mirage buffet. The Mirage is within walking distance of Vdara, and has an excellent dinner buffet. Favorites were the wonton soup, shrimp bisque, chilled jumbo shrimp, albodingas (meatball) soup, fried wontons, dim sum, and meat station. The desserts, particularly the chocolate gelato, were also excellent.

Restaurant Review: Silver Palate Pizza

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We’ve been trying to find a good pizza place. What’s good pizza? Flavorful sauce, good crust (thick or thin, as long as it’s slightly crispy and appropriately chewy, and can hold up the toppings, it’s good in our book), cheese (lots of cheese) and spicy pepperoni = a good pizza. Silver Palate Pizza makes good pizza – check out the pepperoni and meatball toppings. One word, the meatballs are sliced thin, but they’re good. As is the pepperoni. And the chewy crust.

The garlic cheese bread is well seasoned and cheesy, and served on a submarine roll (no French bread here). We might not get the bread again, but we’ll be back for the pizza. Oh, and they’re cash only, so either make sure you have an emergency $20 in your pocketbook, or an ATM card.

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Los Angeles: Tar Pits, Coastline, and Food

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November 19, 2013 – We’d heard that rush hour traffic into Los Angeles was something to avoid, so our first destination was Malibu. We found a spot along the a trail to park and walked to the top of a small overlook. We could hear, but couldn’t see, what sounded like sea lions. There were about a dozen seals floating on their side, one flipper raised in the air. There were also two groups of seals swimming very slowly, and periodically ducking under the water; the behavior confused us, and we weren’t sure if they were following a whale, searching for fish.

We started the day with a drive into the hills.

After the break we continued on to LA, by way of Santa Monica. As we got closer to the city we noticed the smog noticeably increase, although it didn’t seem too hazy once we were inside the city itself. We parked by the Page museum, home of items recovered from the La Brea Tar Pits. They have an interesting interpretive video there, as well as a few reconstructed skeletons, including a saber tooth cat, mini horse, North American camel, and woolly mammoth. You can also walk outside and see some of the pits which are still undergoing excavation, which is scheduled for the warmer summer months.

This colorful warbler was found at Point Dume State Beach.

After the museum we walked across the street and found a few good food trucks, as well as part of the Berlin wall. Tony had Indian food – curry and an appetizer roll/wrap. I had bahn mi, a traditional Korean sandwich with sweet barbecued pork, pickled veggies, jalapenos and aoli, served on a toasted roll. The meal also came with shrimp spring rolls (shrimp and veggies, wrapped in rice paper) with peanut sauce for dipping. The food was all excellent, and set us up for some driving through the city over towards the history museum.

Don’t be fooled, this pond is actually a tar pit.

The Natural History Museum of Los Angeles has an impressive dinosaur exhibit. We also enjoyed the rose garden outside, which was still in bloom (though past peak) even during the middle of November. Another bonus of going to the history museum is the science museum is next door. We were fortunate to get two same-day timed tickets to see the space shuttle Endeavor. The shuttle itself is huge, and we both enjoyed walking around and under it.

No bones about it, this is a good exhibit.

We decided to get dinner closer to our hotel, since it was nearing rush hour when we left the science museum. Fortunately, traffic going out of the city was quite light, while the expressways into downtown were packed. Our dinner destination was a local burger chain called The Habit. While Tony still prefers Five Guys overall, this may be Louisa’s new favorite fast food burger spot. We got a mushroom and swiss burger, and the teriyaki burger with grilled pineapple and swiss. Both burgers were great, and the fries were good – the sweet potato fries were even better.

The space shuttle is one of the most impressive achievements ever done by mankind.

After dinner we walked next door to an Hawaiian ice shop called Shave It. We got a root beer float – root beer ice surrounding a cone of vanilla ice cream. The ice itself is quite fine, not “crystally” at all, and the ice cream was fantastic. It was so good that we tried another flavor combo – coffee ice cream with vanilla ice. The ice cream was very coffee-y, almost bitter; Tony really liked the vanilla ice, but I didn’t think it was sweet enough or strong enough to hold its own against the ice cream.

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