Festival of Speed, Sept 25-26

There is nothing better then watching a large group of muscle cars race around an airfield on an island. Us and two of our friends made yet another trek down to the San Diego area for the Coronado Speed Festival during Fleet Week.

For $15 we were able to watch 2 days of vintage car racing, see a huge car show, and drive several different cars. I drove 3, the least valuable of which was a 2011 Corvette Grand Sport ~$55,000, the next would be a 2011 E63 AMG ~$88,000, and last was a SL63 AMG at a cool $140,000.

The Corvettes were in an open area, thus you had to have a GM employee passenger to keep tabs on you :(

The Mercedes people had basically an auto-cross course set up. They put you in the car and told you the objective was to keep the cars moving...YEAH!!! Here are MORE PICTURES.

9-4 to 9-7: Back to San Diego and other stuff

This was a busy weekend, Angela's best friend and her husband cam in to visit from NM. We started the weekend by all taking a day to rest on Friday, we just made a quick run to the base museum since its about the only thing in town. On Saturday we headed for the Sequoias again, for some reason there was a jump and click your heals contest:

Me on a log:

Sunday through Tuesday we were in San Diego.
Us at the Gas Lamp Tavern:

Zebras:

Floppy panda is floppy:

Not exactly what I expected at the Feline Frenzy show at the SD Zoo:

Us on the Harbor cruise:

We also went to the Midway:

More Pictures

8-26: Went to the lake.

As the title says we went to the lake that weekend. Finally got out with the new toys, sadly I think it may be the only time we get to go this year.

Aspen:

The toys:

Me:

Jared and I taking off to go ride and Aspen following as we floated out:

The Sea...World

Last weekend Angela and I took a trip to San Diego. We got some vouchers for the Manchester Grand Hyatt San Diego Bay and stayed there half price. We hung out some in the Gas Lamp district (lots of food). We also walked around the Seaport Village that was next to the hotel. Here's a few of the view from our hotel room.We also went to Sea World:They have taught the dolphins and killer whales to go nose down into the water and use their tails to soak everyone...we stayed out of range.
And Angela bought a new road bike:

A few more pictures

HS Reunion

For the maybe 2 who read this and didn't know I went home for a week and went to my 10 year HS reunion. It was actually just a coincidence that it was at the end of the week that I went to visit my family. And yes, it was a month and a half ago...oops. And here is the picture I took at the reunion:Yes, I did drive the Trans Am on a 1500 mile trip through the hottest part of the US in the middle of Summer.

Others were just Sunsets and Fireworks.

Big Trees

Since I never wrote about it last time we went I'll post some pictures of the Giant Sequoias from this last weekend. It was just us and some friends and their dog.

A few more pictures

And from Trip 1

The Beach

That is exactly where we went a few weekends ago.
And we bought a body board and had a great time with that too.
5 picture slideshow.

Oh yes

215 HP, 1000 lbs...that'll do.

Drag Racing in the USA

Well, more than that. It was the 3rd annual LA Invasion Cruise/Show/Drag Race. It was great 4 days of fun as usual, the car did great, we stayed at a nice hotel and had a lot of good food.
Slide show 1
Slide show 2
Some of my pics

White water and tunnels

Last Friday I went white water rafting with the work group. We did two runs on the Kern River classes I-III, I don't have pictures - the CD's they sold were $60, so we passed. It lasted half the day, we ate at the local brewery after and then headed back to Ridgecrest. On the way the group in my truck discussed and decided to go to the Burro Schmidt Tunnel. Its pretty much explained in the picture below.Its located a ways south of Ridgecrest 8-10 miles down a dirt road, this one was a little more high speed then the ones in Death Valley.The wildflowers were also out along the route to and from the tunnel.

Wheelin

During the weekend of the 1st we went off-roading in Death Valley. It started with a late night trip north through DV on Friday after the girls had a wire-wrapping party. It was us and another couple that went. We got to Beatty around 11 and went to bed.

The next morning we got breakfast at the hotel and then headed out to Titus Canyon. Its a 27 mile dirt road/trail that winds through a usually dry canyon between Beatty and Death Valley.
It starts as a long washboard run through the desert into some winding hills, and then drops into a wash that then slowly transitions into the canyon. For the most part the road isn't to bad and could be run in a car with high clearance.
We also drove to an area called Chloride Cliffs, it was another rough washboard road. While a little rougher and requiring a little more ground clearance, I still only used 4wd for the low range on long downhills.

Weather shock

We went from nearly 85 F last weekend and Monday (mid 90s in Death Valley) to about 55 F today. This is due mostly to the wind in the 20-35 mph range. The good part is it also brought some more rain :)

Darwin Falls Hike

This will pretty much have me caught up on here. Last weekend I went with a group of ESDPs to Death Valley to go to the sand dunes and to Darwin Falls. The Dunes were our first stop with the intent of sledding down them on boxes and other things. Some of us stopped a little ways into the dunes to try out the idea: And the others kept going, out to the largest dune to try their luck there:In the end, the plastic snow sled was to narrow to ride on top of the sand, but a large box was able to slide pretty well.



The girl in the videos is generally the planner/organizer of events like these, and is usually a clown like this.

After we were done at the dunes we ran back over to the store/campground that is a few miles away for some cold snacks and from there we headed to the falls. To get there we had to drive on a rough dirt road for ~1 mile and hike another 1.5 up a wash and into a canyon.Looking up

The lower falls
Looking down at the lower falls on the climb to the upper falls. Gives an idea of the height that you need to climb to.
The upper falls

The climb to the upper falls is not for those who have a fear of heights, since you are on a fairly narrow trail looking down into the canyon most the way. Not to mention, you have to make a climb up and down on either end of the trail.

Wildflower Hike

On April 9th we went on a wildflower hike with people from work. I've been waiting to see it like I see the pictures on-line, but no luck yet. Anyway, here are some of the pictures:

Paint Brushes - I remember the NM ones being more a bright orangeA slightly out of focus Poppy
Yellow Flowers
Purple Flowers
Taller Purple Flowers
Thistle