March 26 - Setting Sail!

We were up not too early, and this morning gave us high clouds, it was calm, and 60° F.

Sunrise over San Pedro Harbor

After going down to the motel’s breakfast buffet, where they had scrambled eggs, bacon & sausage, etc., and my morning coffee, we packed up and left our bags at the motel while we took a walk before going down to the ship, as we didn’t need to be there until 2 p.m.  We headed south on Gaffey, commenting on the L.A. smog

What ever happened to the Clean Air Act?

to Angels Gate Park, birding our way and getting good looks at the local Black Phoebes, Hooded Orioles, Mockingbirds, and the local sparrows and finches.

White-crowned Sparrow

Male House Finch

The Marine Exchange is a prominent feature above the road.

We dropped off the hill from the park and down to the Joan Milke Flores Park picnic area at the Paseo del Mar, and along the bluff.

The ocean is truly Pacific

We saw some people with optics focused on the cliffs, and stopped to see what they were seeing.

Photographers are as bad as birders?

It was a big female Peregrine, perched at a favored crag above the water, and there were several photographers there who apparently shoot her pretty regularly.

Peregrine Falcon

As we departed, the male came streaking by, and they both flew out over the sea before coming back to Point Fermin.

Such a beautiful bird . . .

The headland was given its name by the British explorer George Vancouver, who visited here in 1793 and decided to thank Father Fermín de Francisco Lasuén de Arasqueta for his hospitality at the mission in Carmel.

Random lizard

We came down the bluff, past the “Sunken City”, an area along the Paseo that slumped into the ocean in 1929, and where one can see the remnants of the street, sidewalks, gas and water lines, and such.

We got to sort through the Tern flock at Cabrillo Beach

We walked through Cabrillo Beach Park and past Fort MacArthur, which serves as a residential community for personnel of the Air Force Space Division Based at El Segundo, then back up the hill to the motel, retrieved our bags.

The Emerald Princess berthed at Pier 92

Walking down West 1^st to the harbor and over to the World Cruise Center at Pier 92, we stopped for some strange reason at a Taco Truck for a quick lunch (as though we wouldn’t get enough food on the ship…).  We checked our bag and went through the line to be processed by TSA-type security before boarding the Emerald Princess.

The lines were much shorter than I remembered from the last time I made this trip

The check-in runs pretty smoothly, and we made it to our stateroom on the “Aloha” deck in room 749.  Our Steward was Savio, who was from Goa, and was very informative and accommodating, and made certain that we had all our bags and ensured that all our needs would be taken care of.  We attended the compulsory safety and information briefing, where all passengers gather in their “Muster Stations”.

All important meetings should take place in a bar . . .

Anders paid rapt attention to the presentations, and we know that we are all safer for having watched the video.

Anders is all ears for the safety briefing

We went up on deck and watched a container ship come into port, which had to clear before we could leave.

Captain Martin Stenzel eased the ship off the dock at 4 p.m. by the aid of Crowley tugs,

the thrusters kicked in, and we moved out of the harbor past the U.S.S. Iowa and the US Coast Guard docks.

USS Iowa - BB61

US Coast Guard ships with their distinctive paint jobs

The Los Angeles Police Dept. K-9 unit made certain we left.
The pilot disembarked at 5:27, and we were on our way north to Vancouver, past Palos Verdes Point and the Rolling Hills.  There was a pretty stiff 23-26 knot SSW wind, and we watched from the Deck 8 “Promenade” bow as Los Angeles faded into the distance, and went inside.  We decided to eat at the Horizon Court buffet and had a drink at the Wheelhouse Bar before going to bed fairly early, as it’d been a long day.

Angel’s Gate Park eBird Checklist is Here

Joan Milke Flores Park eBird Checklist is Here

Cabrillo Beach Park eBird Checklist is Here

Los Angeles Harbor eBird Checklist is Here

March 25 - Coming in to Los Angeles . . .

The alarm went off ‘way too early at 4:30 this morning, but I woke energized, because Anders Price was picking me up en route to Sea Tac Airport, for our trip to Los Angeles.  He showed up at 5:45 a.m., I said my goodbyes to Marty, and we drove up through not too bad traffic.  There was a bit of slowdown in Tacoma due to an earlier accident (4 cars remained on the shoulder), but other than that, it was an uneventful drive.

Anders left his Volvo parked at Wally Park on International Boulevard, and took their shuttle to the airport where we checked our bags at the Alaska Airlines desk.  Neither of us was TSA Pre-screened, so it was a moderately long line to get through Homeland Insecurity, but we passed TSA with little problem.  Our early start allowed plenty of time for me to get a latte, but if we’d been running on a tighter schedule, we would surely have hit bad traffic or something.  I’d rather relax with a little time before the flight, rather than be stressed about getting through Homeland Insecurity and making my plane on time.

No 737 Max's on the tarmac today . . .

We boarded Alaska Flight 1158 on an Airbus 320 at 10:20 a.m.  The airport is full of Airbus, with the Boeing 737 Max planes all grounded due to the crashes.  For once, I think I’m glad to be flying Alaska…  The 959 mile flight to L.A. was at 37,000 feet and was pretty uneventful.  I watched a bit of a movie without sound, read, and dozed before we landed at 1:10 p.m. at LAX & got our bags.  I had made reservations with Prime Time Shuttle to get transportation from the airport to the Best Western in San Pedro, and texted them as soon as we landed.  Then we waited.  And waited.  And . . . well, you get the idea.  I called their number several times, only to get a message that they were “experiencing heavy volume of calls” and my call would be answered in the same order received.  After over an hour, I finally got through, and the person said there was a shuttle that would be there in about 15 minutes.  OK, I can wait.  After half an hour, it was pretty obvious that they weren’t going to be there any time soon.  In this period, we’d seen plenty of the competing Super Shuttle vans go past us, as well as innumerable Lyfts and Ubers picking people up.  Anders had Uber on his phone, so hailed a ride from them, about the time that Prime Time called to say that their shuttle was 20 minutes out…  I told them that we had been waiting nearly 2 hours and to cancel - without any cancellation penalty!  To their credit, they did so.  But, I will likely not ever make reservations with them again.

The Uber ride to San Pedro was through pretty busy traffic, and we finally arrived at the Best Western Plus San Pedro Hotel on Gaffey Street.  From this hotel, it is a straight walk down hill to the Cruise dock, so we decide to check it out and make certain we had the timing down.

We walked from the cruise dock, south along Harbor Blvd. to the Krusty Krab, then back up to Gaffey and decided to eat supper at Rafaello Ristorante.  The motel had a deal with them if you mentioned the motel, they’d give you a 10% discount on your meal, so I had the Basa in red sauce.  Pretty good fish, professional wait staff, and a family-run place with a 1960s ambience.  We finished our walk back to the motel and I was asleep pretty soon thereafter.

San Pedro eBird Checklist is Here