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  • Tag: California

    • hollywood forever

      Posted at 8:40 am by jasminedesirees, on July 6, 2015

      hollywood forever cemetery

      A few weeks ago we drove from Phoenix to San Francisco. I don’t know if you’ve ever done that drive before, but I have and it is one of the most boring drives ever. It is just unchanging desert for the first 5 hours, and then you get to L.A., and you’re like great we’re here. But you’re not there, and you still have about 6 hours left in the car.

      So this time to break it up, we left early Saturday morning, hung out in L.A. for the day, and then drove the rest of the way on Sunday to break it up. Once I knew we were going to be staying, I immediately, as is my habit, checked the Cinespia website. I’ve been wanting to go to a movie at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery for years, but they only do it during the summer, and only on certain weekends, so even though I’d been actively checking every time we went to L.A., we had never made it.

      I was so excited because they were showing a movie that night, and it was Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo, which is really everything you’d want in a movie you’d watch in a cemetery. I bought tickets right away, they were $12 each, so not bad, and I also bought the parking pass, which is $10. You park in the Paramount Pictures lot about half a mile away, but I definitely recommend getting the pass, because otherwise parking is kind of a nightmare.

      I definitely recommend getting there early as well, we got there at about 6:30 for an 8:30 movie, and there were already people lined up almost around the block. Definitely bring snacks, people had amazing picnic spreads, and I saw more than one person balancing a stack of pizzas in line. You can bring low lawn chairs, there is a lawn chair section, but we just brought blankets and pillows to make a little nest.

      We saw a few people with tarps, and we were like, those people are doing too much. But then the ground was kind of wet, and our blanket got kind of wet, and we realized that those people were geniuses, who had obviously been there before.

      The movie itself was great, we had a really good spot, and could see and hear perfectly fine. It was such a fun summer activity because everyone was there with a group of friends to hang out and drink wine and watch a great film, and the weather was perfect.

      We decided to sneak out a little early because there were a lot of people there and we didn’t want to get stuck behind everyone, but once we were away from the crowd we realized we were alone. In a graveyard. In the pitch black of night. And we were lost. They don’t light up the rest of the cemetery, and they don’t really have signs or anything, but I knew there was a back way to get out that lets you out closer to the Paramount parking lot, so we were scrambling around in the dark trying to find it. It was basically terrifying, but we made it out alive (obviously).

      All in all, it was everything I thought it was going to be, and if you are going to be in the L.A. area in the summer, definitely check it out, at least once. Also, if you haven’t seen it, watch Vertigo. Because Jimmy Stewart.

      Posted in California, Los Angeles, travel | 1 Comment | Tagged California, hollywood forever, Jimmy Stewart, LA, movie, vertigo
    • grand island mansion

      Posted at 7:57 am by jasminedesirees, on May 5, 2015

      This last weekend I made a very quick trip back to California for a wedding. It was held at the Grand Island Mansion near Elk Grove. The wedding was really fun, and the venue was completely gorgeous, so I made sure to take lots of pictures to share.

      The Mansion was built in the 1920’s, and apparently it was a place where rich San Franciscans would take the steamboat for the weekend. It was also a place for people to drink without getting caught during prohibition, but we couldn’t find any secret passages. They were probably in the library, behind a bookshelf. That’s just science.

      I ended up staying the night there, and I’m about 98% sure it’s haunted, but it was still a really great weekend.

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      Posted in California, USA | 0 Comments | Tagged California, grand island mansion, San Francisco, weddings
    • sunny and seventy five

      Posted at 8:00 am by jasminedesirees, on March 27, 2015

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      Spending this weekend in LA, rolling around in a big pile of girls. Excited for twisted tea by the pool, dancing all night, and no boys allowed.

      Not excited for the 5 hour solo drive to get there, but slightly cheered by the prospect of the epic 80’s and 90’s playlist I made to keep me company on the road.

      Posted in California, travel, USA | 0 Comments | Tagged California, Los Angeles, road trip
    • san diego

      Posted at 9:17 am by jasminedesirees, on March 25, 2015

      My birthday was a couple of weekends ago, and I didn’t really know what I wanted to do. I’ve never really been a huge fan of birthday celebrations, it feels like a lot of pressure to get a bunch of people together so they can tell you that they like you, and people buy you presents and stare at you while you open them, it’s uncomfortable.

      san diego

      san diego

      I usually would rather go do something fun instead, so we decided to take advantage of our proximity(ish) and head down to San Diego for the weekend. If you’ve been reading along for any length of time, you’ll know that we are quite the fans of spontaneous trips, and generally just jump in the car and figure things out along the way. It usually works out fine.

      san diego

      san diego

      san diego

      In this case however, I forgot that I was born during what is generally considered to be spring break (also, the Ides of March, the day Julius Caesar was stabbed. Fun fact.) and also there were about four conferences in San Diego that weekend, so it was super busy.

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      san diego

      We stayed in Yuma the first night, just to break up the drive, and had supper at this amazingly delicious restaurant called the River City Grill, it had an adorable little back patio, and I had spinach ricotta ravioli and it came with alfredo, pesto and roasted red pepper sauces all swirled together on the plate… sorry what were we talking about? It was realllllly good.

      san diego

      san diego

      The next day we were up early to get back on the road. As we were driving into our hotel parking lot the night before I remarked that it was lucky we were so close to a Chevron, so we could fill up in the morning.

      san diego

      san diego

      san diego

      But then we didn’t. And we were at least 30 minutes out of Yuma before we realized that we were basically out of gas, and the next gas station was at least 30 minutes away. It was a litttttle bit stressful, but we made it just in the nick of time, and didn’t have to spend any of our weekend stranded on the side of the road, which is generally a plus.

      san diego
      san diego

      san diego

      We spent the day wandering around Point Loma, Pacific Beach, Ocean Beach and La Jolla, visiting different beaches, and stopping in at different bars along the way. Bali Hai had an amazing view, and allegedly the strongest mai tai that exists in the world (I think Smuggler’s Cove would beg to differ) and The Wood had an awesome roof top bar.

      san diego

      san diego

      san diego

      Around 5 o’clock we started looking for a place to stay that night, only to realize that a lot of places were totally booked up, and the rest were around $300/night. We briefly considered driving up the coast to L.A., but we were too lazy.

      We bought two pillows and a blanket, and found a dark residential street to snuggle up on, and slept in the car until about 4 a.m. It was really nice actually, it felt like we were back in Australia for awhile.

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      After that The Boy woke up and drove us to Ocean Beach to sleep on the beach so I could wake up beside the ocean on my birthday. We had a scrumptious brunch at the Fig Tree, hung out at the beach for awhile, and then started the drive back to Scottsdale so I could get a red velvet cupcake from Sprinkles.

      It was a great few days, I love being near the ocean, and the general vibe of San Diego. We were already thinking SoCal might be the next place we move to once we’re done creeping around Arizona, but after this weekend, it’s basically been decided.

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      Posted in California, travel, USA | 6 Comments | Tagged beach, birthday celebrations, California, Ocean Beach, roadtrip, san diego, travel
    • castello di amarosa

      Posted at 10:29 am by jasminedesirees, on December 10, 2014

      We spent Saturday being chauffeured around Napa in a limo, drinking lots of wine and enjoying the gorgeous December sunshine. We visited the Castello di Amarosa, a vineyard and winery, and also the most amazing castle I’ve ever seen.

      I’ve really only seen the Iolani Palace, and Sleeping Beauty’s castle in Disneyland, so I don’t have a lot to compare it to, but still.

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      We did the guided tour, so in addition to the public areas of the castle that anyone can visit if they come to the vineyard which includes a ballroom and a chapel, we also got to see the underground portion, including jails and a torture chamber, and many feet of tunnels stacked with barrels of wine.

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      It took fifteen years to build the castle, and all of the materials are authentic, sourced from ruins of castle in Europe. All of the iron work in the castle was recovered from ruins, and if they couldn’t find it there, they had it made in the authentic style as it would have been in 12th-16th century Europe.

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      We learned a lot about the wine they produce during the tour, and also about the castle itself, and it was really interesting.

      All of the stonework was done by a master stone mason, and different sections of the castle were done in the styles from different centuries, so they point that out to you on the tour, and explain what the differences were, and why.

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      For the last stop on our tour we stopped in a private underground tasting room that felt a lot like a dungeon, but at least there were bread sticks, and tried a bunch of the different wines that are made by the vineyard. I really liked a lot of them, I used to hate red wine, but in the last few years I’ve really grown to like it more and more, especially Zinfandel.

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      My favourites were Dolcino, it was a sweet white wine; Simpatica, which is a blend of Muscato and Riesling, and one called Fantasia, which tastes like melted frozen fruit punch juice mix. Our guide said he often uses it as a mix with vodka, which sounds like a terrible/amazing idea.

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      They have activities at the castle all year round, and every year for New Year’s Eve they have a black tie masquerade ball. It’s expensive, but it sounds like so much fun, so we’re going to try to do that for NYE 2016.

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      If you are looking for me at any point over the next 12 months, I’ll probably be gluing feathers and glitter onto my mask.

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      castello di amarosa

      Posted in California, exploring, USA | 0 Comments | Tagged architecture, California, castello di amarosa, castle, napa, Sleeping Beauty's castle, wine, wine tasting
    • bay

      Posted at 5:59 pm by jasminedesirees, on August 29, 2014

      As much as I’m loving life in Australia, this video is making me a teeeensy bit homesick for the bay. I’ve been lucky enough to live in some pretty cool places.

      Posted in California, San Francisco, travel, USA | 0 Comments | Tagged bay area, California, San Francisco, travel, video
    • iron horse

      Posted at 9:58 am by jasminedesirees, on June 4, 2014

      My aunt was in Sonoma a few weeks ago for a class, so we met up with her for the afternoon. We went for lunch in Sebastapol, then headed out for some wine tasting.

      We just randomly picked a vineyard, and drove out through wine country, down a deserted, twisty gravel road. I figured it was either going to be completely gorgeous, or we’d be murdered by brigands.

      Luckily there wasn’t a brigand in sight, and I am still alive to post this.

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      They specialized in sparkling wines, which are my favourite, but they also had a chardonnay flight and a red wine flight, so we got all three so we could try all of them. Our taste pourer was lots of fun and she kept “losing count” so we actually got tons of samples and were quite drunk by the end.

      She also mentioned that she gets to bring home any unfinished bottles at the end of the day. We went wine tasting in Livermore last summer, and the pourer there was a retired man who loved wine so much that he volunteered his time, and was paid in cases of wine. I think he was really on to something, and that is definitely a life goal for my later years.

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      After our tasting we headed into Santa Rosa to check out the Russian River Brewing Company, a very popular spot that brews its own beer, to do some beer tasting (the boy is a good sport, but wine isn’t really his thing) but unfortunately the line was stretched around the block to get a table.

      We were just about to head home, when we spotted an adorable little mexican restaurant just down the street, so we stopped in for some tequila tasting and tapas instead.

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      It was a lovely day, I’m always so excited when anyone from home comes to visit, because it doesn’t happen very often, and there are so many neat places in the Bay to see, but it’s way more fun when you’re showing someone around for the first time.

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      Posted in California, exploring, San Francisco, travel, USA | 0 Comments | Tagged California, iron horse, sonoma, travel, wine country, wine tasting
    • capitola

      Posted at 11:39 am by jasminedesirees, on May 29, 2014

      Capitola is one of my favourite spots in California. I could just go sit on the deck at Zelda’s and drink margaritas and enjoy the beach for hours. And also maybe pop over to Pizza My Heart for a slice, because, yum.

      I was really glad we were able to visit one last time before we leave, because it might be awhile before we’re able to get back there again. Plus we found a store there that sells Twisted Tea, in cans. It was a pretty spectacular day.

      And I’m a total sucker for those bright, colourful houses on the beach, one day I will rent one, even if I have to go stay there by myself.

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      Posted in California, exploring, travel, USA | 3 Comments | Tagged beaches, California, capitola, travel
    • beachie keen

      Posted at 8:10 pm by jasminedesirees, on May 12, 2014

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      Yesterday, Sunday funday at Capitola.

      My favourite thing in the world is the feeling when you’re all warm and sandy and sun-kissed from a day spent laying on the beach, and you come home to a quiet house and crawl between clean, cool sheets.

      I don’t even mind the sand in my bed. To me, this is bliss.

      Posted in beach, California, travel, USA | 0 Comments | Tagged beach, bliss, California, capitola, Sunday fun day
    • we could run away

      Posted at 9:20 pm by jasminedesirees, on April 30, 2014

      Last Wednesday, my parents called me from L.A., they were in Phoenix and decided to take a spur of the moment trip out to SoCal to watch the Sharks play the Kings.

      We immediately decided we were going, but we were supposed to go to Phoenix for a wedding the next day, so it took a bit of finagling. We managed to switch our flights to leave from Long Beach, hopped in a rental car, and drove down.

      We were only in L.A. for 24 hours, but we had a great time creeping around Venice and watching the game from a suite at the Staples Center.

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      Venice is one of my favourite beaches in southern California, I love the vibe, the people, and the graffiti. People there are so unique and unapologetic, and I love seeing all of the colourful art for sale on the boardwalk. We were there last year and I found an artist doing these really simple, almost comic book-like drawings, but they were so beautiful.

      We stood and looked at all his paintings for almost an hour, because I wanted all of them and I literally could not pick a favourite, but eventually I got dragged away. I asked if he had a website where I could order some of his paintings, but he didn’t, and told me to come back because he was always there. He wasn’t there when we went back this time, so I shall spend the rest of my life fruitlessly searching.

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      I hadn’t noticed it the last few times we were there, but they have a really cool half pipe for skateboarding set up right on the beach. We stood and watched them for awhile, some of them were really good. I was pretty jealous of their skills, I tried to get the boy to teach me how to long board last year, but he pointed out that I would almost certainly be irreparably damaged due to my lack of coordination. He was not wrong.

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      Posted in art, beach, California, family, Los Angeles, travel, USA | 3 Comments | Tagged art, beach, California, graffiti, Phoenix, road trip, sharks, skateboarding, spur of the moment, travel, Venice
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