My Beloved, Philly

I visited my sister in Philly, and I finally got to see the Liberty Bell!  That's right, I had never seen this before.

I have to admit that the crack wasn't nearly as wide as I thought it would be.  It was worth standing in the cold for a little while to see.

Yet Another Return to Mount Wilson and LA!

And then...I returned to LA for work, but not all work.

I successfully obtained observing time spread across November and into December.  I got to observe for most of it, but I had to fly back in the middle for classes, which I didn't appreciate.  Those extra flights did get me to an elite member on Delta.  That might be useful.


Anyway, I spent a lot of time there, most of which involved bad weather and no observing.  Here are some pretty pictures.  I again went hiking in inappropriate shoes.  I really need to get hiking shoes.

I discovered the Monastery, which Edwin Hubble had built for astronomers to be housed in.  Hubble didn't want the wives of astronomers interrupting the work, so the wives couldn't stay on the mountain.  The Monastery was a men's only residence.  In fact, the cabin that I stayed in over the summer and for this trip was built because a famous astronomer (Kapteyn) would not come to Mount Wilson unless there was a place for his wife to stay.  Anyway,  the Monastery is a really old building that astronomers still stay in (Einstein also stayed there).  I was going to spend a few nights in it, but it turns out Mount Wilson owns it and charges CHARA, so I stayed in the cabin, which I will never complain about.

At the very end of all of this time on the mountain, I continued my epic adventure of seeing Endeavour.  The temporary exhibit of the space shuttle had been set up at the California Science Center, and I had a red-eye back to Michigan.  I spent the afternoon around a ton of screaming children and a giant machine that went into space.  The space restroom exhibit was particularly poignant.

 

Another Return to LA

 I scheduled a trip to LA conveniently when the space shuttle was going to be moved through the streets.  Really, it was just a coincidence.

Endeavour got delayed when making a turn, so I walked two or three miles to see it in person where it was stopped.  Endeavour is the space shuttle that I spontaneously flew to Florida to see its final launch in 2011 (and it didn't launch that day -- here).

I was with a bunch of engineers, so we played spot-the-nerd along the way.  I thought I would be the most excited of the group, but these guys knew a disturbing amount of specifics of the shuttle.  I was impressed.

 To continue my trend of poorly-shoed hiking, we went to the mountains for an afternoon.  Most of the time was spent driving through the curving roads, but there was this lovely reservoir.  We also found a nice little lake.  I'm always amazed by now abandoned these beautiful places are when they're right next to this gigantic city.  

Philly for a Weekend

With only a few days notice, I flew to Philly to attend a party in September.  It was a well-timed quick trip, and it was really fun to surprise my parents by just showing up!

This is my sad good-bye-Philly-as-the-Sun-rises picture at the airport.

One of Many Returns To LA

I returned to LA in August before classes restarted; this time I was a tourist.  The first stop was Griffith Observatory because I'm a giant nerd.  It is a beautiful old observatory perched on the top of a hill within LA, which means it is actually completely useless, except for the solar projects they were doing.  Naturally, because this was an observatory, I was overly critical of the exhibits, or rather those explaining the exhibits.  I held my tongue.

From the back of the observatory, I saw the test fly-over of the planes that were going to accompany the space shuttle Endeavour as it was flown into LA on the back of a 747.  That was oddly convenient timing.

Anyway, the view from Griffith Observatory was quite impressive.  The view includes the Hollywood sign, which I was a little excited to see.  This was my fifth (I think) trip to LA, and my first time seeing the sign.  I was satisfied, and then gawked at the observatory some more.  Since I have a habit hiking in inappropriate shoes, I walked up the mountain a little bit where there was a nice path in flipflops.  I didn't make it too far.  

The next day was the La Brea tar pits!  There are these tar pits in the middle of LA.  It's so weird, but awesome.  The tar has a ton of fossils in it, including mastodons (you can see a model of that in the tar pits picture to the left).  Obviously, it smelled bad.  The Page Museum, where they have the fossils excised from the tar.  It turns out that mastodons have giant teeth.

Then there was a trip to Malibu.  The cliffs are pretty impressive.  I entirely get why there are rehabilitation centers there; it is just beautiful.  This particular cliff was descended, and I watched the waves roll in for a while with a picnic.  Once the Sun started setting, the cliff was ascended.  Next to a city full of millions upon millions of people, I was on a beautiful cliff watching the sun set on a Sunday night with something like five other people.  I question the ability of people to appreciate things like sunsets.  

Southeastern Michigan

After Morocco, my sister came back to Michigan with me.  We ate a lot of food, of course.

We went to the Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield Village.  This museum is crazy.  Henry Ford had all of these huge machines shipped to Michigan for the museum and houses (and windmill) to Greenfield Village.  For example. this train with a snow plow.

The next day, we went to Windsor, Ontario to learn about prohibition from the Canadian prospective.  We got our passports stamped and spent a whole three hours in Canada.  Here's Detroit from Windsor.

Then there was a trip to Frankenmuth!  A Bavarian-themed town full of cute little stores and a disturbing amount of food.  There was a riverboat...because that makes sense.  We learned all about the history of Frankenmuth, the festivals, and why the town has a riverboat.  

After Much Delay, Morocco!

For being my one planned international trip (among what felt like a million domestic ones) of 2012, this was pretty fantastic (except for that excursion to Canada that will come in the next post).

In July, we spent part of the week at a resort in the Atlas Mountains, which are situated in the Sahara Desert.  This resort is on a manmade reservoir, so it was pretty much an oasis.

We spent a lot of time at this pool drinking mojitos.  Since it had been forever since I had been on a real vacation, I was so glad to just sit around doing nothing for a few days.

But it wasn't all doing just nothing.  Since we used a Groupon to go on this trip, there were all sorts of bonuses---tea service, massage, and other spa-like activities.  There was also a boat ride!  There was then swimming in the reservoir.  The European tourists kept saying how cold the water was.  Wimps.

Another part of our deal was a trek through the Atlas Mountains.  From what others had said, it was a nice little jaunt up the hill and back down.  Well, it was a nice little jaunt up, but the descent was actually a trek.  There was a variety of cacti to avoid and rocks to scale.  It was not an easy adventure.  

After we didn't spend enough time eating delicious tajines, couscous, and chicken wrapped in filo dough and covered in powdered sugar and cinnamon, we left for Casablanca.  There are a few things to see in that city, Hassan II Mosque, a nice little market with my favorite kind of tacky souvenirs, and Rick's Café (designed after the café in the movie Casablanca).  

I miss the mint tea.  A lot.