Fun dinner in Old Town

At dinner. Em is entertained by the live musician who is singing in many strange languages. My favorite was his rendition of David Bowie's "Rebel Rebel" in Portugese at a totally different tempo.

Beautiful Bodies

Electrics

Ooh... The finished product - electrics.

"Buffy" at work

This amazing machine holds a guitar by suction and rubs it against a giant buffing wheel. They call this machine 'Buffy'.

Guitar Tops

Piles of guitar tops.

Guitar backs

Backs of guitars.

Future guitar necks

Here are the pieces of wood that they use for guitar necks.

On the Taylor Guitar Tour

Today we went on the tour at the Tsylor guitar factory. It rocked! Here's the guide showing us the wood.

Monkeying around

Orangatan at the zoo. They are SO cute. One of them did somersaults across his enclosure, just like a little kid might do - somersault after somersault after somersault.

Panda

A panda at the SD Zoo. A baby panda had been born in early August, but they're keeping it in a private area for now. The pandas are amazing, but my favorite animal at the zoo were the elephants. We also saw koala bears.

Headed back to San Diego

Emily on the plane (the window seat no less) on our way back to San Diego from Tucson.

Beth

Mark's sister, Beth. After dinner we visited her place. It was great, but the bats in the eaves of the patio roof freaked Ann out a bit.

Billie

Mark's mom, Billie, tackles her salad.

Beth and Kris

Out to dinner with Mark's sisters - Beth and Kris.

Rainbow over Tucson

An unusual sight - a rainbow over Tucson after a rare afternoon shower.

Chuys

We just had a late lunch at one of our fav places... Chuys! They have a chips and salsa bar with some of the best salsas around. (After this trip we're not going to want to look at Mexican food for a long time).

Pomegranate

This is a pomegranate growing on the grounds of the Westward Look.

More cool flora

Artichoke cactus

I could spend a week on the grounds of this hotel, just looking at the cacti. This one always makes me hungry.

Westward ho

The grounds of the hotel are gorgeous and it is surrounded by mountains.

Brilliantly colored flowers

There are about a thousand of these brightly colored flowers in the hummingbird garden at the Westward Look.

Typical AZ

This is on the way back to the hotel from The Good Egg. We had a huge breakfast and are feeling fat and sassy. :) We're going to spend the afternoon at the pool.

Ah, Arizona... Where the saguaros are as high as an elephant's eye.

Blake at the Good Egg

We're at the Good Egg having breakfast with Blake. If you ever go to Tucson be sure to have breakfast at the Good Egg. It's the best breakfast place here! Try the Castoville omlette, which is filled with artichoke hearts, spinach and tomatoes.

Nighttime Cactus

At the Westward Look they light up the cacti at night. Em and I tooka swim under the stars and then a dip in the hottub. We LOVE this hotel!

The scene of the crime

Just landed in Tucson. Taken from the air is this pic of the mountain where Mark & I got married in 2005.

Walking on the beach in SD

Em and I were up to our calves in the water when I saw what seemed to be a stingray or manta... a BIG one. I screamed and ran! It was actually a shark!!! A sandshark Mark tells us.

Who needs a stairmaster?

This is the walkway to the beach.

Wang Lung the farmer and his peon

Mark is the one who looks like Wang Lung the farmer from The Good Earth.

Look ma, I'm wearing a hat!

That's me... In case you can't tell. Good for me - I've been very diligent about wearing my hat this trip.

Off to the beach

After breakfast we decided to go to the beach before checkout. There are a ton of steps to get there. Down is easy...but up? Oye.

Squeaky

Em and I fell in love with this tiny duckling. It followed us around, squeaking non-stop at the top of its lungs. It actually got out of the water and would go wherever Emily went. We must have spent a half hour with this duck. We named him Squeaky. The video of Emily running from the big ducks was when she went to the food machine to get some duck food for this guy.

Another neat thing we saw were Lorakeets -- which are sort of like a cross of parrots and small fluffy parakeets. They are brightly colored with loud screeching voices. We got to go into an enclosure with them and they flew around us. The signs said that they might land on you and you should allow them to, but don't "pet" them because they may bite. Em and I were actually terrorized in the Lorakeet enclosure. They would whiz by our heads and seemed unpredictable. I had all these visions of Alfred Hitchcock movies. Mark, however, loved the Lorakeets and stayed in there with them for quite a while.

That's it for today!

Ducks

This is sort of embarrassing We go to the San Diego Wild Animal park, and when I check my pictures later, two thirds of them are of ducks!

The Elephant Egg

There's a great story behind this not so great picture. We were looking at an enclosure where they kept mother elephants and their babies. (By the way, the baby elephants are adorable. They can be 3 feet tall and 250 pounds at birth.) In the enclosure was this tree pictured above, with a round thing in it, and Emily asked "is that an elephant egg?"

My, what big ears you have!

Emily's got her pig ears on.

Firt attempt at a video

I can't see this on my mac, but maybe it will work for you PC people. It's a video of Emily running away from some aggressive geese.

Sensitive animals?

Em's been called many things in her life....

Em riding the giant rhino

Who knew there were hobbits in the SD Wild Animal Park?

The hobbit emerges from a tree. Oh wait... That's not a hobbit, it's Emily.

The Lorax would be proud

Emily discovers a Truffula Tree.

A Pig of Beauty is a Joy Forever

I couldn't have said it better myself.

Pigs and piglets

Although you can't really see it from this picture, there was a mother pig with about 4 or 5 babies trotting along behind her. They were SO cute that Em wanted to take one home. (But they were a bit... smelly.)

What a life

Lemurs really have it good. I wish I could be a Lemur. Hey, wait, maybe I already am!

Elephant backsides

Sorry viewers -- I would have liked to get the fronts of the elephants, but it didn't work out.

Ring Tailed Lemur

I think this was Mark's favorite animal - the Ring Tailed Lemur. They are really cute and acrobatic.

A picture's worth a thousand words

Pelican

This is a pelican. It really should do something about that double chin.
Actually, he was frantically waving his saggy chin trying to get attention from the female pelicans.

From the train

We took a train that drove us through the wild animal enclosures that are designed to mimic Africa. In this picture is the tallest giraffe in the park - almost 19 feet tall - and one of the rarest rhinos around. I think they said that there are only 4 male rhinos of this sort left in the world. They are actually trying to do artificial insemination with the remaining females to try to prevent that species from dying out.

Giraffe

We got some great views of animals when we took the train through the animal enclosures.

Reminds me of Queens... or the South Shore

Flamingo island

Animals of some sort

On the tram. They drive you through the animals. It's a great way to see them, PLUS, it was really hot and we were exhausted... so it was also a good way to sit down.