Padres street lamp banners have been hung around the ballpark. Bunting decorates the stands. The playing field is immaculate. Tomorrow the home team starts a new baseball season undefeated.
Many baseball experts say 2021 might be the beginning of a Golden Age for the San Diego Padres. All of the pieces are in place. Finally.
I walked around Petco Park this evening and felt the quiet anticipation.
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
The Rancho Guajome Adobe is an architecturally and historically important 19th century ranch house located in Vista, California. I visited it a little over a week ago and walked around the grounds, learning about the fascinating history of the place while taking a few photographs.
I approached the Guajome Ranch House from the Santa Fe Trail to its south, then circled counterclockwise around the complex, viewing the beautiful arcaded veranda, several cisterns fed by wells, the chapel, and other outbuildings. I spotted various signs and plaques relating the history of the ranch, which was once the home of prominent early San Diego resident Cave Johnson Couts and his wife Maria Ysidora Barbara Bandini.
As you can see, I also stepped into a small museum. That’s where you can purchase tickets to guided and self-guided house tours.
According to Wikipedia: “The adobe was built in 1852 and served as the headquarters of Rancho Guajome, a Mexican land grant. Abel Stearns had given the rancho to Ysidora Bandini (sister of his wife Arcadia Bandini), as a wedding gift when she married Lieutenant Cave Johnson Couts in 1851. It was built with the profits from the cattle boom of the 1850s, when many California ranchos supplied the Gold Rush miners and associated new American immigrants with meat and leather. Couts was appointed sub-agent for the native Luiseño people (San Luis Rey Mission Indians) in 1853. He used their labor to improve his properties in the area, including this one and nearby Rancho Buena Vista and Rancho Vallecitos de San Marcos…”
I didn’t venture inside the 22-room hacienda, but I most likely will at some future time. The old ranch house is located in Rancho Guajome Adobe County Park. Check out the parks website here to learn more.
The following photos provide a taste of what you’ll see should you visit this historic place.
Peering from the veranda through an open door…
The sign reads:
The Carriage Courtyard.
Imagine the activity here where Couts quartered his many servants. The ranch foreman lived next to the gate. Horse and equipment stalls, blacksmith shop, tack room, winery, olive vats and a jail made up the ranch service yard. 300 Indian laborers made the thousands of adobe brick to build the walls, and other materials came from the abandoned San Luis Rey Mission with permission of the Diocesan Bishop.
Guajome Ranch House has been designated a National Historic Landmark
This site possesses national significance commemorating the history of the United States of America
1970
National Park Service
United States Department of the Interior
Rancho Guajome
Formerly attached to Mission San Luis Rey, the 2,219 acre ranch passed through brief ownership by two mission Indians, then Don Abel Stearns, and into possession of Ysidora Bandini upon marriage to Col. Cave Johnson Couts. The adobe ranch house built in 1852-53, is one of the finest extant examples of the traditional Spanish-Mexican one-story hacienda with an inner-outer courtyard plan. It was acquired by San Diego County in 1973 for the Guajome Regional Park.
California registered Historical Landmark No. 940
Plaque placed by the State Department of Parks and Recreation in cooperation with the San Diego County Department of Parks and Recreation and Squibob Chapter, E Clampus Vitus, April 26, 1981.
This El Camino Real Bell commemorates the trail of California missions established by the padres and honors the bell’s designer: Harrie Rebbecca Piper Smith Forbes
Dedicated by the Woman’s Club of Vista
9/21/96
At its beginning, Rancho Guajome was a working cattle ranch. Because the West was dry, cattle owners like Cave Couts would turn their cattle out on unfenced pastures. However, during this “open range” period, sometimes cattle from different ranchos intermixed, making it difficult to determine which cattleman owned which cattle. The branding iron was invented as a solution…
Cave Johnson Couts was born in 1821 in Springfield, Tennessee, and died in 1874 in San Diego at the Horton House. His wife Maria Ysidora Barbara Bandini was born in 1828 in San Diego, was married in 1851 at the Casa de Bandini in Old Town (now the Cosmopolitan Hotel), and died in 1897 in Los Angeles.
Included in the museum display are Native work baskets, Southern California style, circa 19th century.
Rancho Guajome Adobe farm equipment included a farm wagon, breaking carts for training horses, a broadcast seeder, a sulky used for racing horses, and a four-bottom Stockton plow used to turn soil to prepare fields for planting.
In the past I blogged about the Colorado House, a two-story hotel that was built in Old Town San Diego in 1851 by the very same Cave Couts. Today it serves as the Wells Fargo History Museum. Read that here.
I’ve also blogged about the El Campo Santo cemetery grave of Juan Mendoza, who was shot in the back by Cave Couts. See that here. (During one walk I spotted another mysterious wooden tombstone with the name Juan Mendoza by a parking lot, across the San Diego River from Old Town. Read that here!)
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!
If you’ve driven down Garnet Avenue in Pacific Beach, you might have noticed a couple of enormous old trees at the corner of Pico Street, just east of Soledad Mountain Road.
By the sidewalk stands an easily overlooked historical marker. It reads:
KATE OLIVIA SESSIONS’ NURSERY SITE
1857-1940
THIS PLAQUE COMMEMORATES THE LIFE AND INFLUENCE OF A WOMAN WHO ENVISIONED SAN DIEGO BEAUTIFUL. ON THIS SITE SHE OPERATED A NURSERY AND GAINED WORLD RENOWN AS A HORTICULTURIST. SHE WAS THE FIRST WOMAN TO RECEIVE THE INTERNATIONAL MEYER MEDAL IN GENETICS.
CALIFORNIA REGISTERED HISTORICAL LANDMARK NO. 764
PLAQUE PLACED BY THE CALIFORNIA STATE PARK COMMISSION IN COOPERATION WITH THE PACIFIC BEACH WOMAN’S CLUB.
JULY 7, 1961
Kate Sessions is probably best known as the Mother of Balboa Park. In addition to owning other nurseries and growing fields in San Diego, she maintained a small nursery in a corner of Balboa Park (originally called City Park) under an 1892 agreement with the City of San Diego. She was required under the lease to plant 100 trees in the park each year. Most of the older trees in Balboa Park that you see today were planted by her hand.
The colorful jacaranda trees seen around San Diego were also introduced to the city by Kate Sessions.
I recently blogged about the very first camphor tree planted in North America. She’s the one who planted it. The historic camphor tree stands just west of Balboa Park in Bankers Hill near a beautiful historic house. To revisit that old blog post, click here.
Here are a couple more photos that I took this weekend by the historical marker…
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!
A sea lion likes to hang out in front of Chase Bank in Pacific Beach. Perhaps you’ve seen it near the corner of Garnet Avenue and Mission Bay Drive!
I don’t know how I missed this bronze sculpture the day I walked around the bank building to photograph its mosaics back in late January. To see the extraordinary mosaics, which depict figures from San Diego history, click here.
Does anyone out there know the story of this sea lion sculpture? Do you have any memories?
It’s standing on soil covered with wood bark in what might have once been a fountain or pool of water, but I can’t tell. When I walked past the fun sculpture on Saturday, I could find no indication of when it was created or by whom.
Please leave a comment if you happen to know anything!
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
Spring has arrived in the window of Mission Hills Automotive.
Yesterday I went for a long, very pleasant springtime walk. These photographs represent my journey through the west part of Hillcrest, then through an interesting slice of Mission Hills.
I started inside Hillcrest, headed west down Washington Street, took a momentary detour to Fort Stockton Drive, then headed back down Washington Place to historic (and some say haunted) Pioneer Park, which I will blog about in a day or two. I then hiked down sloping Mission Hills Canyon along the green, seemingly little known Robyn’s Egg Trail, which I also plan to blog about. Eventually I came out near San Diego Avenue, southeast of Old Town.
Come along and read the captions to get a taste…
A flying unicorn on a fence by Copper Top Coffee and Donuts in Hillcrest.Lovers in a window at Urban Fusion Decor.Springtime in a window at VCA Hillcrest Animal Hospital.A cool mural on the side of Dame and Dapper Barber Shop. One of the bird sculptures along Washington Avenue’s median. I believe the sculptures were a project of the Mission Hills Garden Club.Mysterious tile artwork on the corner of a building.Banner thanks cool teachers at St. Vincent de Paul School.Interesting old building is home of the Ibis Market.Mission Hills homeowners are hoping to have acorn-style street lamps installed, to create a more charming and historic look.One of many beautiful old houses I passed in Mission Hills. I believe this one is a Craftsman.Gravestones line a corner of Pioneer Park, which was built over a cemetery where many early residents of San Diego remain buried.Heading down green Mission Hills Canyon on a sunny spring day. The Robyn’s Egg Trail is rough and requires careful navigation in spots. Along its approximately half mile length I encountered one walker with a dog and one homeless person.Bright flowers along the path.A happy kitty face greets me as I arrive at San Diego Avenue!
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
I was walking through Mission Hills yesterday when I suddenly thought I’d taken a wrong turn and ended up in Balboa Park!
There, rising in front of me, was a miniature version of the old Ford Building, home of the San Diego Air and Space Museum!
The unique, cylindrical, Streamline Moderne-style Ford Building in Balboa Park, which resembles a V8 engine, was erected by the Ford Motor Company for the 1935 California Pacific International Exposition.
This smaller version in Mission Hills can be found at the corner of Ft. Stockton Drive and Hawk Street. It’s the home of the Fort Oak restaurant.
Ford Building from 1935 California Pacific International Exposition in Balboa Park. No known copyright image from Flickr.
My walk yesterday went from Hillcrest through Mission Hills. I also visited Pacific Beach. Many photos and fascinating blog posts are coming! I also will be blogging about an amazing historic site in Vista, which I visited last weekend.
Now I’m about to head out walking again! Happy Sunday!
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The San Diego Museum of Art’s new exhibition Young Art 2021: My World, Our Planet has opened!
At the title suggests, the museum’s biennial Youth Art exhibition has an environmental theme this year. Students from schools all around San Diego County have contributed.
There’s a new twist this time, however!
Professional artists, coordinated by Mindful Murals, are reimagining 25 works of this outstanding youth art by painting SDG&E utility boxes from Balboa Park down Park Boulevard into downtown San Diego. Every utility box “recreates” a canvas painted by a young person!
I’ve already photographed many of the utility boxes. So I was excited to see all the great original youth art hanging on the San Diego Museum of Art’s walls!
Wouldn’t it be fun, I thought, to compare some of the original art with the painted utility boxes? Of course it would!
The professional artists painting the boxes were encouraged to interpret the student canvases in their own unique way. You can see significant differences. (And painting an outdoor utility box that will be seen momentarily by passing motorists and pedestrians is very different than painting a canvas with a fine brush.)
To view photos of many more utility boxes, click here.
So, without further ado, here come the comparisons!
Plastic, Not Dinner, by Anjolie Ly, Westview High School. Large numbers of turtles are killed each year when they mistake plastic waste for jellyfish.Artist Brise Birdsong. A more perfect ocean environment.Strong Together, by Chloe Katz, Art Studio Light.Artist Amanda Saint Claire, mentoring Katie Flores.Turn Off the Light, by Anqi “Cici” Mei, Solana Pacific Elementary.Artist Nhuy Reid.2050, by Sheridan Liew, Sherry Art Studio/Canyon Crest Academy. A future of severe environmental pollution might look like this.Artist Lucy Helle.Wind Farm at Sundown on 8 East, by Arianna Larios, Homeschool.I don’t know the artist at this moment! When I learn, I’ll provide an update. UPDATE! The artist is Sean Hnedak.Oceana, by Alice Zhu, Westview High School. A girl’s serenity contrasted with her hair as an oil spill.Artist Alyssa Stewart.
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
While walking up Park Boulevard in East Village today I discovered more utility boxes that are being painted for the San Diego Museum of Art’s cool outdoor exhibition Young Art: Outside the Frame!
Most of the boxes you see here are located around Park Boulevard and F Street. Last weekend I discovered other newly painted utility boxes in this same general area and posted those photos here. Click the link and you’ll learn more about this unique, very cool project!
(I noticed some of those earlier boxes are now finished, and I’ll be updating that blog post with additional images shortly.)
To see even more colorful utility boxes painted for the Young Art: Outside the Frame project, you can check out additional blog posts here and here and here!
As you can see in the next photo, the fun goldfish box was painted by Ground Floor Murals. They also created a super cool mural in City Heights celebrating Tony Gwynn. See that here!
For the other boxes that follow, many of which are just getting started, I don’t know the artists yet…
The next three boxes are on the sidewalk adjacent to some very cool East Village murals I blogged about here!
UPDATE!
Here are a couple photos I took several days later…
ANOTHER UPDATE!
And a week or so later I took more photos! I now see the box with the words YOU ARE MAGIC is by artist Amanda Lopez (@amanda.makes.art). The box with the whale in the clouds is by Tory Brooke Marshall (@afrothynothing). And the face with flowing red scarf is by Mindful Murals!
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!
Walk along Highway 101 in Solana Beach and you might notice a series of plaques describing historical buildings.
During my most recent adventure in Solana Beach, I took photos of several buildings and plaques immediately south and north of Plaza Street/Lomas Santa Fe Drive. This stretch of highway was the coastal town’s main street a century ago.
To learn more about these and other historical buildings, and to view a variety of interesting old photographs, visit this page of the Solana Beach Civic And Historical Society. They’re the ones who created the plaques.
This first batch of photos is from the 100 south block of Highway 101. All of these small, modest buildings are now home to local businesses, including an eatery and salon.
Stanley Estes’ Radio Service Shop, 1931.Howard and Irene Witmer’s Sandwiches, Fountain and Sundries, 1927.Ira E. Conner’s Meats, Groceries, Hardware and Dry Goods, 1925.Claude E. Miles’ Solana Beach Meat Market, 1926.William and Angie Kurtz’s Solana Beach Drug Store, 1928.
The next three photographs were taken on the 200 north block of Highway 101…
Ray Hobberlin’s Barber Shop and Residence, 1948.
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!
Today was an historic day! Four long-anticipated murals have debuted above the entrance of the San Diego Automotive Museum!
Yesterday’s scaffolding has been removed, revealing beautiful tile artwork that will be enjoyed by visitors to Balboa Park for many decades–perhaps even centuries–into the future!
I first blogged about the project back in late 2017. You can read what I wrote here.
As I explained, these permanent tile murals “…are based on murals that decorated the (California State Building) during the 1935 California Pacific International Exposition….Much of the California State Building’s original ornamentation no longer exists, including the four original murals. They were created for the exposition by Hollywood set designer Juan Larrinaga. Painted on fiberboard to appear like tilework, they depicted California’s commerce, scenic beauty, agriculture and industry.”
The exquisite tiles were created by RTK Studios in Ojai, California.
Those who enjoy at visit to the San Diego Automotive Museum, or the newly opened Pan American Plaza in front of the museum, will now be able feast their eyes on these four truly remarkable works of public art!
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!
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