January 2022

Up to 10 ft long, the Caribbean reef shark is one of the largest apex predators in the reef ecosystem, feeding on a variety of fishes and cephalopods; they were plentiful around Half Moon Caye although we may have seen the same ones over and over again

Half Moon Caye is Belize's oldest site of wildlife protection since it was first designated as a bird sanctuary in 1924 to protect the habitat of the red-footed booby birds; the orange-flowered siricote trees are preferred nesting sites

Juvenile nurse sharks were easily seen just walking along the shore of Half Moon Caye; this threatened species stays in shallow waters to avoid predators and is an important species for shark research as they are more amenable to handling and capture

This Caribbean reef shark in front of Nicole gives an idea of their size; this was the first trip I remember where I had no issues scuba diving and felt in control all the time (our guide asked why I hadn't become a divemaster which tells me I must be getting better)

Magnificent frigatebirds, with a wingspan of 8 ft, nest alongside the red-footed boobies; males are all-black with a scarlet throat pouch that is inflated like a balloon in the breeding season; they can spend days in flight without touching land or sea

Half Moon Caye was Belize's first national reserve, created in 1982 to protect the endangered red-footed booby; the small island had the best diving of the trip as well as awesome wildlife and great panoramas

The endangered spotted eagle ray is always a thrill to see; they are caught for food and medicine in SE Asia and Africa and preyed on by several shark species which has caused their population to plummet

Queen triggerfish; Belize has the only Jaguar reserve in the world which is known as Cockscomb Basin Wildlife sanctuary; the country also has the lowest population density in Central America with just 35 people per square mile

The next day we dove the famous Blue Hole, one of the world's most famous dive sites and one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World, first popularized by Jacques Cousteau in 1972; the 400 ft deep sinkhole was created by the collapse of an underwater cavern 12,000 yrs ago

The SE part of the island serves annually as a sea turtle nesting ground from May to November for the loggerhead, hawksbill, and green turtles, all endangered species; we saw a few turtles each day but they weren't abundant

I often found the Caribbean reef sharks headed straight for me and we would lock eyes with the shark swimming around me at what seemed like the last moment; these sharks are twice the size of black-tip and white-tip reef sharks

After 3 days of diving, I spent the last 4 days on Ambergris Caye reading and relaxing; San Pedro is quite crowded and chaotic with lots of scooters, golf carts and cars sharing the narrow streets; I prefer its neighbor Caye Caulker

Great barracuda; Belize, like the Mexican Caribbean coast, is overwhelmed at times by Sargussum, a type of brown seaweed; the shores throughout Belize were covered with it when I visited with tons removed from the shore every day but it keeps coming

Half Moon Caye is the easternmost landmass of Belize and, with the Blue Hole, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site; Half Moon Caye Wall, also known as the '6,000 foot vertical abyss,' is one of Belize’s most popular dive sites

The seas were amazing colors throughout Belize; diving the walls offered the best experience while snorkeling was very limited since close to shore most underwater terrain was just sea grass

Blue parrotfish; Belize is in the Central Standard Time zone and does not observe daylight saving time; Ambergris Caye (pronounced key), which is 25 miles long, is Belize’s largest and most developed island

Colorful indigo hamlets are prized in the aquarium trade; members of this species are synchronous hermaphrodites and they have the ability to move between male and female roles when spawning

This black-spotted porcupinefish was one of the few we saw; Belize City is by far the largest city in the country but after Hurricane Hattie largely destroyed the city in 1961, the nation's capital was moved inland to Balmopan

Bird Jar, David Levi, 1998; Mobile's population peaked in 1960 with 202,779 residents; the per capita income for the city was a low $22,401 and, despite some nice areas, most of the city seems poor with relatively few prospects for improved opportunties

Bottle Still Life #3, Bernard D'Onofrio, 2002; unlike most museums, the Mobile Museum of Art only listed the name of the work, artist and date created with no further information on the work and/or the artist

Mint and Red Pot, Rene Culler, 2019; this work of blown glass was on sale for $950 to illustrate how expensive even glass art can be; admission was $12 with seniors paying $10

Wreath, James Minson, 1995; easily the most interesting and accomplished area for the museum was its glass art collection which I really enjoyed; they showed technical expertise as well as creativity

Tall Vase with Poppies and Bees, Ludwig Moser, ca. 1890; Mobile has a population of roughly 200,000 and is Alabama's only saltwater port; Mobile was founded in 1702 by the French as the first capital of Louisiana

Telephone Wire Social Club, Christopher J. Szaton, 2003; a 2007 study by WeatherBill, Inc. determined that Mobile was the wettest city in the contiguous 48 states, with 66.3 inches of average annual rainfall over a 30-year period

Scene 2002, Kazumi Ikemoto, 2002; Mobile is known for having the oldest organized Carnival or Mardi Gras celebration in the US; the city's French Catholic colonial settlers celebrated this festival from the first decade of the 18th century

Botanical Vase, Tommie Rush, 1993; when Alabama was granted statehood (in 1819, two years after Mississippi), Mobile had a population of only 809 people

Mongo Compote; Fritz Dreisbach, 1991; Mobile's population grew quickly in the 1800s as it became a center for cotton production and the slave trade; by 1860, Mobile's population was 29,258 making it the 4th largest city in what would be the Confederacy

May Bouquet, Flo Perkins, 1992; fire ants were first introduced into the US via the Port of Mobile sometime in the late 1930s; they came ashore off cargo ships arriving from South America with the ants carried in soil used as ballast on those ships

Footed and Shouldered Bottle Shaped Vase (Bristol Glass - Islamic Style), Thomas Webb + Sons, 1880; Mobile's Roman Catholic parish was, in 1703, the first French Catholic parish established on the Gulf Coast

Bowl with Flared Lip, Johann Loetz-Witwe, ca. 1936; during its first 100 years, Mobile was a colony of France, then Britain, and lastly Spain; Mobile became a part of the US in 1813, with the annexation by President Madison of West Florida from Spain

Arrow Root and Water Lily Vase, Emile Galle, 1880; Mobile has been hit by numerous hurricanes with the worst being Frederic (1979), Opal (1995), Ivan (2004) and Katrina (2005); Katrina brought an 11 1/2 ft storm surge that destroyed much of downtown

Flush II (Incalmo Orb), Jamie Harris, 2005; aerospace, steel, ship building, retail, services, construction, medicine, and manufacturing are Mobile's major industries; Mobile's Press-Register is Alabama's oldest active newspaper, first published in 1813

Bowl, Dante Marioni, 1996; according to the 2020 census, Mobile is 51% Black, 40% White and 3% Hispanic; Whites were 64% in 1970; Mobile Bay was the first body of water in the new world to be accurately charted (in 1519)

Bags, John Littleton and Katherine E. Vogel, 1991; Mobile has four different nicknames: The Port City, The Azalea City, The City of Six Flags, and The Gateway to the Gulf

Bolero, Richard LaLonde, 1994; Bob Dylan, Cher, Dolly Parton, Robert Palmer, Johnny Cash, Hank Williams Jr., Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry and Jerry Reed have all sung about Mobile in song

The Elice Box (Assorted Licorices), Joan Vogel, 1993; famous people from Mobile include: Laverne Cox, Tim Cook, Alva Erskine Smith Vanderbilt, Jimmy Buffett, the Band Perry and Alexis Herman

Peach Cowboy Hat with Oxblood Band, Brian Benno, 1994; Mobile is home to the Mobile-Tensaw River Delta which is the second largest in the US; Mobile is home to 'America’s Amazon' one of the largest wetland ecosystems in the world

Dancing Pear Orb, Kari Russell-Pool, 1994; in 1860 the Clotilda, the last known ship to illegally smuggle African captives into the US, sailed into Mobile; many descendants of the survivors still live in Africatown, just a few miles north of downtown

Water Tower, Anthony Schafermeyer and Claire Kelly, 2001; five members of the Baseball Hall of Fame called Mobile home, more than any city outside of NYC and Chicago: Satchel Paige, Billy Williams, Willie McCovey, Hank Aaron, and Ozzie Smith

Ginko (sic) Vase, Emile Galle, c. 1900; famous people from Mobile include: Jeff Sessions, DeMarcus Cousins, AJ McCarron, Antonio Lang and 1951 Miss America Yolande Margaret Betbeze Fox

Cake, Sarah Chase, 1998; Battleship Memorial Park is on the shore of Mobile Bay and features the WWII era battleship USS Alabama, the WWII era submarine USS Drum, Korean War and Vietnam War Memorials, and a variety of historical military equipment

Famous UCLA students include Carol Burnett, Jimmy Connors, Rob Reiner, Kirsten Gillibrand, Francis Ford Coppola, Arthur Ashe, Mayim Bialek, Jackie Robinson, Troy Aikman, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Jim Morrison

Royce Hall, completed in 1929, is one of the four original buildings on UCLA's Westwood campus and has come to be the school's defining image; luminaries who have appeared here: George Gershwin, Leonard Bernstein, Ella Fitzgerald, Albert Einstein and JFK

This was the business school when I attended but is now the Luskin School of Public Affairs; UCLA is only 419 acres surrounded by wealthy enclaves like Beverly Hills, Brentwood and Holmby Hills

1932 Student Activities Center building; Ray Bradbury wrote his classic novel Fahrenheit 451 at Powell Library in 1951; UCLA today is 31,600 undergrads and 14,300 grad and professional students

The Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center is the primary teaching hospital for the David Geffen School of Medicine; it is currently ranked the 3rd best hospital in the country by U.S. News + World Report, and 1st on the West Coast

As a student I'd go to the Wooden Center mainly to play racquetball while the Arthur Ashe Student Health and Wellness Center came after my days; Pauley Pavilion, where home basketball games are played, is off to the left of Wooden Center

The business school has new buildings and a more central location these days; supposedly, the Internet started at UCLA in 1969; the first Internet transmission was sent from UCLA to Stanford (right after it was sent, the computer sending it crashed)

Westwood Village is an on-street shopping, dining and entertainment district that was planned in the 1920s - the second such district ever to be built in the nation (preceded only by Country Club Plaza in Kansas City)

The 87 Janss Steps lead to the 4 original buildings on campus; UCLA was not founded until 1919 and is the only leading research institution in the world that was started in the 20th century

My best friends at UCLA; Tim and Sandy (standing) accompanied me on my first trip to Europe after graduation; the 18 months I spent at UCLA were enriched by the intelligence and lack of pretense shown by my classmates

The Daily Bruin began the same year as UCLA, 1919; Ralph Bunche was valedictorian of the 1927 class and was integral in the formation of the UN; he was the first African American and first person of African descent to be awarded a Nobel Prize

With 13,000+ students living on campus plus adjacent fraternities, sororities and apartments, Westwood is still popular for theaters and restaurants; there is also a new Target and nice Ralph's grocery store

I lived here my first year before moving to an apartment in mid-Wilshire for my second year; UCLA receives more admission applications than any other US college or university (100,000+ last year)

On 5+ acres next to my old business school lies the Franklin Murphy Sculpture Garden; 70+ works by artists like Rodin, Calder, Moore and Hepworth make for a tranquil place to study

The 55 acre Westwood Village has a Mediterranean theme, with clay tile roofs, decorative Spanish tile, paseos, patios and courtyards; shuttle buses connect to UCLA but parking here is limited and expensive

The gorgeous UCLA campus is adorned with jacaranda and eucalyptus trees; undergrads are now 58% female with graduate students being 48% female; UCLA will host the Olympic Village for the 2028 Games

The original McNay house was completed in 1929 at a cost of $140,000 ($2.3 million today); Marion Koogler McNay married at least 6 times and lived an eclectic life which was detailed in an interesting video

Women Crossing the Fields, Vincent van Gogh, 1890; van Gogh enjoyed wandering the countryside and frequently painted these pastoral scenes; produced in the last year of his life, this vibrant painting illustrates the techniques that made van Gogh famous

Charing Cross Bridge, Fog, Claude Monet, 1902; Monet worked on this series from 1899 to 1905, creating 37 paintings; he was both captivated and challenged by the ways in which the ever-changing London fog affected the appearance of the bridge

Haymakers Resting, Camille Pissarro, 1891; a high horizon and monumental figures in the foreground distinguish Pissarro's outdoor scenes from other Impressionist paintings; Pissarro's known for his utopian view of rural life in France

Tennis Courts, Ben Shahn, 1949-50; known for creating art centered on political activism, the artist's work over time became increasingly focused on American loneliness and private moments of contemplation

Yellow and Blue Iris, Lowell Nesbitt, 1973; clearly inspired by Georgia O'Keeffe, I was impressed with the museum's ability to mix paintings from well-known artists with quality works from artists with whom I was unfamiliar (like Nesbitt)

Perils of the Sea, Winslow Homer, 1888; although best known for his depictions of stormy seas, Homer's early pastoral scenes and rural landscapes are very impressive and I prefer them to his seascapes

In Broad Daylight, Jane Freilicher, 1979; I had never heard of this artist, inspired by Bonnard, who paints colorful scenes often looking out windows with many scenes from rural New York

White Mice Vase, Daum Freres, ca. 1905; this one of a kind piece is among the most prized examples of Daum Freres glass works as it transcends design and decoration to become a sculpture in its own right

Guernsey, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, 1882; during his month-long stay in Guernsey, an island in the English Channel, Renoir completed a painting every two days, coming back with 15 finished works

Writing Desk - Bookcase, Hector Guimard, c. 1900-05; the leading French architect-designer in Art Nouveau style, Guimard viewed architecture as an all-encompassing art, devoting as much attention to interior furnishings as to the exteriors of his buildings

Temptation, Edgar Brandt for Daum Freres, c 1920; the Daum family worked at the beginning of the Art Nouveau era and created one of France's most prominent glassworks; along with Émile Gallé, the Daum brothers were leaders in the field of decorative glass

The Red Blouse, Henri Matisse, 1936; suffering an appendicitis at the age of twenty, Matisse was confined to bed; during his recovery, Matisse’s mother brought him an assortment of art supplies to help him pass the time, and he fell in love with painting

Reclining Woman, Pablo Picasso, 1932; in his career Picasso produced about 147,800 pieces, consisting of: 13,500 paintings, 100,000 prints and engravings, 300 sculptures and ceramics and 34,000 illustrations - an impressive 78-year span

The museum has 61 solifleur vases by Emile Galle (ca. 1905-10); solifleur vases are designed to hold a single flower; the detailed plant life etched on these vases is delicately rendered and accurate botanically

Coast redwoods are the tallest living things on Earth; the tallest is 379 ft high in Redwoods Natl Park while the tallest at Muir Woods is 258+ ft tall or about the height of a 23 story building

On May 19, 1945, delegates from the conference which founded the United Nations held a commemorative ceremony in tribute to FDR (he had died the month before) in Muir Woods' Cathedral Grove

I remember first visiting Muir Woods with my mom in the summer of 1985; though only 12 miles north of San Francisco, it takes 40 minutes to reach with no traffic (and that seldom occurs)

Two species of redwood remain in the US-both with very limited ranges; the coast redwood (Pacific coast from southern OR into CA) and the giant sequoia (west slopes of Sierra Nevada mtns) which grows larger in bulk but shorter than its relative

Redwood Creek is one of the few free-flowing streams on the Pacific Coast that still provides suitable habitat for endangered coho salmon (the southern extent of their range) and steelhead trout

In 1907, Sausalito wanted to dam Redwood Creek and flood the valley but the irate landowner donated the land to the federal government instead with Roosevelt protecting it the next year making Muir Woods a national monument

Coast redwoods can live 2000+ yrs (giant sequoias can live 3200+ yrs); this tree fell in 1930 and was 1021 years old with historical dates marked reinforcing the significance of protecting this old growth forest

Muir Woods is regularly shrouded in a coastal marine layer fog, contributing to a wet environment that encourages vigorous plant growth; the fog is vital for the growth of the redwoods as they use moisture from the fog during dry seasons

Redwoods, unlike most other trees, can reproduce not only from seed but also directly from their own burl growth; burl wood is so treasured for its intricate patterns that it is sometimes poached from redwood parks

Redwoods typically survive forest fires because their bark is up to one foot thick and is rich in tannic acid which acts as a fire retardant (it also protects the trees from insect damage and gives them a reddish color)

Muir Woods National Monument protects 554 acres of which 240 acres are old growth coast redwood; it is named after John Muir who is considered 'Father of the National Parks' and an early advocate of wilderness preservation

Advanced reservations are now required for parking ($8.50) to limit crowds with weekend shuttle service offered from several Bay Area locations; there is no cell service around Muir Woods so don't expect to reserve a spot on-site

Stinson Beach is known as one of the cleanest in CA but surfers here also suffer from periodic great white shark attacks; it was Billie Jean King's favorite beach when she lived in the Bay Area and Janis Joplin's ashes were spread here

The Marin Headlands offer the best views of the Golden Gate Bridge and downtown SF; from August to December, tens of thousands of hawks, falcons, eagles, osprey, and harriers are funneled by the peninsular shape of Marin County into the headlands

The black sand beach in Marin Headlands is caused by natural minerals, which are rich in iron and heavier than regular grains of sand; since the dark sand weighs more, it stays on the beach even when lighter grains are washed out to sea

I enjoyed watching the pelicans at the black sand beach in Marin Headlands; while here I read Billie Jean King's interesting autobiography entitled All In (I never realized she lived in the Bay Area for a time)

You can barely make out the Point Bonita Lighthouse which was the last manned lighthouse on the CA coast; this is the only lighthouse in the US which can only be reached by a suspension bridge (temporarily closed to the public due to Covid)

Muir Woods is only 3 miles from Muir Beach and scenic CA Highway 1; the Pacific Coast Highway is one of the most beautiful drives anywhere in the world and runs from Dana Point in Orange County north to near Mendocino