A construction fence now surrounds much of the San Diego Natural History Museum in Balboa Park. I noticed a banner on the fence today. It states: NATURE GARDEN BLOOMING TO LIFE IN SUMMER 2024.
Pocket gardens and interpretive trails will be created around the museum, and include displays of native plants that should attract wildlife like butterflies and hummingbirds.
Anyone visiting Balboa Park will be able to freely enjoy these new outdoor garden areas. The completed project will be a cornerstone of the Natural History Museum’s 150th anniversary celebration.
I’m eager to see this new landscape take shape. I’ll probably take photos of the project’s progress in the months ahead, so stay tuned!
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Cottonwood Creek Park in Encinitas is a place to play, picnic, relax and enjoy nature. A beautiful walkway crosses over Cottonwood Creek and leads to leafy overlooks.
At one overlook, a sign lures inquisitive eyes. It describes how the nearby wetland was re-created, where for many years the water had been piped underground directly to the portion of the creek that lies west of the Pacific Coast Highway. The park and its restored wetland lie immediately east of Vulcan Avenue (a short distance east of Coast Highway 101).
The benefit of water filtration by plants (such as bulrushes and sedges) and plant litter (decomposing vegetation) is explained. Water that eventually flows into the ocean at Moonlight Beach is naturally cleaned of contaminants like heavy metals, nitrates and phosphorus.
The reclaimed riparian habitat also supports many native species. Trees, frogs and butterflies that benefit are depicted on a second sign.
To read more, enlarge the two sign images.
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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!
The San Diego River Artists’ Alliance is a group of artists who love our beautiful San Diego River. They have a free exhibition open to the public in Balboa Park. The River: Sea to Source is now on display in Gallery 21 at the Spanish Village Art Center.
Fourteen member of the San Diego River Artists’ Alliance have pieces in this exhibit. The fine artwork depicts the life-giving river and its ecosystems.
These very fine works are for sale! A portion of the proceeds will be donated to the San Diego River Park Foundation.
My photos provide a sampling of what you’ll see.
The SDRAA artists work alongside the San Diego River Park Foundation, an organization that advocates for the river. The San Diego River Foundation organizes river and estuary clean-ups, engages in environmental restoration and education, enhances the river’s extensive park system, has helped to create numerous murals along the river trail (you’ve seen many on my blog!), and is presently building a new nature center in Mission Valley (the River Center at Grant Park).
If you’re in Balboa Park the next couple of days, make sure to swing by Gallery 21 in Spanish Village. The exhibition will be open through November 6, 2023, so that gives you only a couple more days to pay a visit.
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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!
Native wildlife found in Tecolote Canyon Natural Open Space Park is illustrated by dozens of beautiful art tiles at the Nature Center.
The handmade ceramic tiles decorate outdoor walls at the Nature Center. They were created by students from University City High School. (Years ago, students from the same school painted wildlife murals that decorate a fence at the south end of Tecolote Canyon’s main hiking trail.)
Take a look at this wonderful sculptural artwork. I photographed some of the tiles–there are birds, mammals, reptiles, insects, butterflies, flowers…
Many tiles are mounted individually to the walls. Others are combined to produce murals demonstrating the different habitats of Tecolote Canyon.
I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!
A special Autumn hike was enjoyed this Sunday in San Diego’s beautiful Tecolote Canyon Natural Open Space Park.
The hikers, equipped with plenty of water and sturdy shoes, started at the Tecolote Canyon Nature Center and proceeded north up the main trail.
The dirt trail passed under sycamores whose leaves were beginning to turn; it proceeded under ancient coast live oaks, past bright yellow bush sunflowers, and roller coastered up and down sun-drenched hills and through shady tunnels of wrinkled gray willows.
Much of this special hike skirted the narrow Tecolote Canyon Golf Course, whose green fairways could be viewed from above.
A southern alligator lizard with a very long tail sunned at the edge of the path. Birds flitted nearby. As the hikers approached the Genesee Avenue trailhead, an impassable stream forced the half dozen adventurers to turn back. And then we saw three amazing, perfect spider webs suspended up there above our heads.
Those webs made this hike special. As did the San Diego sunshine and a cool October breeze. And the fluttering leaves. And footbridges and wooden fences. And aromatic sage, and monkey flowers, and the call of a red-tailed hawk, and hikers and mountain bikers who passed by smiling. And, of course, the fact that the hikers with me were friends.
Trailside sign explains: This area is being filled with plants native to this canyon. Plants such as toyon, California wild rose, blue elderberry, black sage and others will increase not just plant biodiversity but also animal diversity…
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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!
If you’ve driven down Encinitas Boulevard under Interstate 5 you’ve seen this wonderful, very colorful public art. Four long mosaic strips depicting local plants and animals have added life to the freeway undercrossing for about a year now.
In 2021 the City of Encinitas chose this design by Minneapolis-based artists Amy Baur and Brian Boldon.
The three foot tall strips feature glazed ceramic surfaces that shine in the sunlight and resemble stained glass. Here’s an article concerning the installation. The artist has stated: “Imagery from Encinitas’ environment — birds, plants, water, coastal and mountain flora and fauna — are layered with geometric shapes reflecting concrete patterns above and below the artwork.”
During my last walk in Encinitas, I took photographs of the beautiful artwork. What birds and plants do you recognize?
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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!
Look what I spotted while walking home from Balboa Park this afternoon! A red-tailed hawk was perched in a palm tree next to the Sixth Avenue sidewalk, at the west edge of the park.
The bird, perhaps ten feet above my camera, was unfazed by my presence.
A young person staring at a phone walked directly under the hawk without noticing it. What other wonders in this world go unseen?
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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!
A beautiful new park has opened in Mission Valley. The linear Creekside Park, located inside Civita, is centered around an elevated walkway that stretches between Civita Park and Friars Road.
I walked the length of the park this afternoon, my camera at the ready. It’s a green, tranquil place that is inviting to those who love the sunny outdoors.
The north end of Creekside Park at Civita Boulevard.Sign shows the San Diego River watershed. Runoff from the large Civita community passes from Civita Creek through Creekside Park, part of an extensive natural filtration system.Heading south with a kids play structure ahead.Colorful mosaics with a river theme can be enjoyed around and near this large planter. Created by La Jolla artist Jane Wheeler.IMAGINEPAUSEContinuing south, approaching Westside Drive.About to pass shady picnic benches and a fenced dog run.Friars Road in the distance.Looking to the west as I descend toward Friars Road.Another park map at the south end of Creekside Park. The park’s walkway connects with a sidewalk on the north side of Friars Road.Looking north at Creekside Park from Friars Road.
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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!
There’s an installation of public art in Mission Hills that’s easily overlooked. The art is titled Guard Posts. Redwood posts wrapped with copper stand at the side of the road where Goldfinch Street turns west and becomes Lewis Street. Engraved in copper are words that describe the canyon beyond the guard posts.
Why do I call this public art hidden? Not only are the posts inconspicuous from a distance, but some of the art is actually hidden in the branches of nearby vegetation.
Local artists Richard Keely and Maidie Morris finished the Guard Posts in 1994. You can see how time and weather have altered the artwork–made the copper appear more natural.
Most of the words atop these posts were contributed by members of the Mission Hills community. I did my best to transcribe…
HAWKS AND FALCONS FLYING OVER AT VARIOUS TIMES OF THE DAY, THE CANYONS ARE AN UNBELIEVABLE ECOLOGICAL SYSTEM ON THEIR OWN… MISSION HILLS RESIDENTWE HEARD OF PEOPLE LIVING DOWN IN THIS CANYON… MISSION HILLS RESIDENTIN THE SPRING EVERY SIDE OF THE CANYON IS SO DIFERENT. JUST LIKE A PALETTE. MISSION HILLS RESIDENTCANYONS, WHERE THEY SLIP APART LIKE FINGERS, ACT JUST LIKE A CHIMNEY. WE DON’T WANT TO… CANYON FIRE EVER (I can’t make out some of the words. If you know the full text, please leave a comment!)CANYONS…WELL. AS A PET SHOP OWNER I CAN SAY THERE’S A LOT OF WILD LIFE DOWN IN THE CANYONS… FOX. SKUNKS. LITTLE CREATURES
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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!
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Georgia O’Keeffe. Henry Moore. What do these two famous modernist artists, who lived on two separate continents, have in common? Love of nature. And a singular exhibition now open at the San Diego Museum of Art!
I enjoyed a very special tour of O’Keeffe and Moore a few days ago and I’m still deeply moved while thinking about it.
I, like many people, have always loved the paintings of Georgia O’Keeffe. However I knew precious little about Henry Moore, apart from a curvaceous sculpture he created, Reclining Figure: Arch Leg, that stands in the sculpture garden at the San Diego Museum of Art.
When compared side by side, the abstract work of both artists is strikingly similar. Organic, sensuous, familiar, elemental, inspired by forms found in nature. It’s no surprise that their art seems to be distilled from flowers, landscapes, bones and clouds. Because both artists loved nature and closely studied these things.
Both Georgia O’Keeffe and Henry Moore collected bones, driftwood and smooth river stones. Their studios resembled work areas at a natural history museum. In one gallery at the San Diego Museum of Art, recreations of the two artist studios are displayed for visitors to enjoy.
I was surprised to learn that O’Keeffe created sculptures, and that Henry Moore, the sculptor, also painted. The exhibition contains over a hundred pieces between the two artists.
Here is some of O’Keefe’s beautiful work:
The White Flower (White Trumpet Flower), Georgia O’Keeffe, 1932. Oil on canvas. “I have painted what each flower is to me and I have painted it big enough so that others would see what I see.”Red Hill and White Shell, Georgia O’Keeffe, 1938. Oil on canvas. A moon snail shell from the Atlantic shore in the New Mexico desert.Ram’s Head, Blue Morning Glory, Georgia O’Keeffe, 1938. Oil on canvas. Juxtaposition of skull with a flower.
Museum visitors admire Georgia O’Keeffe’s recreated studio which was located at Ghost Ranch in New Mexico:
Abstraction, Georgia O’Keefe, 1946. White lacquered bronze. Inspired by spiral of ram horns.
And here’s Moore at work, and a recreation of a studio in rural Hertfordshire:
Moore Working on the Elmwood Reclining Figure 1959-64. Photographer unknown.Recreation of Henry Moore’s Bourne Maquette Studio, which was named for a stream near the old farmhouse where he lived and worked.
A few of Moore’s sculptures, some of which are models for even larger pieces:
Working Model for Seated Woman, Henry Moore, 1980. Plaster with surface color. Enlarged from a small maquette created in 1956.Mother and Child, Henry Moore, 1978. Stalactite. Inspired by two seashells. (You don’t often see a sculpted piece of stalactite!)Working Model for Oval with Points, Henry Moore, 1968-69. Bronze. Inspired by the interior of an elephant skull.
This truly extraordinary exhibit is made possible by the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum and Henry Moore Foundation. It will be on view at the San Diego Museum of Art in Balboa Park until August 27, 2023.
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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!
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!
Cool San Diego Sights! 