Snow Bunny Meets Big Bear

Looking every bit the disheveled snow bunny, I hit Snow Summit in Big Bear this past weekend. Theoretically, it’s about a 2.5 hour drive from LA. But it took us over 4 hours because the weather and traffic gods were working against us with all their might.



The crowds at the bottom of the hill overwhelmed me. Upon arrival, it seemed like every man, woman, and child from miles around was there. Skiers and boarders burst forth from cattle truck-like transports bringing people in from far-flung parking lots. Meanwhile, harried-looking staff ran around telling anyone who’d listen that tix were sold out. Thankfully, we’d pre-purchased.

And thankfully they have ticket limitations. Amazingly adept at capacity control, Snow Summit seems to know when enough is enough. The cap on tix prevents a ride down the slopes from turning into a jam-packed, elbow-bumping experience. So try to buy your tix ahead of time.



My snowboarder friends, decked out with their own gear, hit the slopes immediately, while I battled a frustratingly long line to get my equipment. Thankfully, it was all downhill from there!

Once I made it to the slopes, all was forgotten as I took in the view of white-powdered mountains and the glistening lake below. After a short 5 min. wait for the lift, my spirits lifted as I zig-zagged down Summit Run – a wonderfully long beginner run that was miraculously uncrowded. In fact, none of the slopes were really crowded.



Warm sun, fresh mountain air, piles of white stuff (fluffy, not icy). I didn’t want to go home, but then it started getting cold (I know, I've turned into a total SoCal wimp!)

As for leaving, beware of Hwy 18 - the so-called Rim of the World highway - if you leave after dark. Our friend’s car spun out briefly due to black ice. And for over 10 harrowing miles, our visibility was reduced to about 10 feet, if that, due to ultra-thick fog cover. Not so fun.

Here are some tips if you're a Snow Summit virgin:

Tip 1: The beginner’s lift ticket deal that includes two lessons is a total jip. For one, most people don’t need two lessons. Two, the ticket only lets you access the bunny slope, which gets boring faster than alphabetizing a library catalog (yes, I had that enviable job once upon a time). So for all those beginners out there, go for the all-day lift ticket. If I can handle the non-bunnies, anyone can.

Tip 2: Newbies should stick to Chairs 1, 2, and 9 that all lead to green beginner slopes. My experienced friends said the blue and black-rated slopes around Chairs 5, 6, 7, and 10 were the least crowded and most fun.

Tip 3: Your lift ticket at Snow Summit also gives you access to Bear Mountain. A shuttle runs btwn the two. So if you somehow get bored w/ Snow Summit, you have options.

Adamson House: Malibu’s Tile Masterpiece

Isn’t Malibu all about shiny new things? Flashy cars, big mansions, new breasts. The 'Bu has a well-deserved rep as the playground of celebs and the uber-rich. But less well-known are its historical landmarks, like the Adamson House - built in 1930.



A fabulous example of Spanish colonial revival architecture, the Adamson House boasts fountain-filled courtyards, arched windows, and last but certainly not least - exquisite ceramic tiles.

Once Mr. and Mrs. Adamson both passed away, the state of California had a cringe-inducing idea. In 1968, it purchased the house and planned to knock it down to make way for a parking lot. Thankfully, locals intervened.



The house’s colorfully detailed tiles come from the now defunct Malibu Potteries, which was a Rindge (Adamson) family business that only lasted six years from 1926-1932. The bathrooms feature the best examples – bright orange, blue, green, or red designs cover them from floor to ceiling.

There’s also a Persian-looking, rug-like decoration in a hallway built into the floor using tiles. It even has a fringe – now that’s attention to detail!



The house’s second-floor balcony provides stunning, Beach Boy music-invoking views of Surfrider Beach, the Malibu Pier, and the decorative fountains on the grounds (one’s star-shaped). If you have time, check out the fountain in the patio behind the house. See if you can spot the one upside-down tile.



Guided tours are the best and only way to see the inside of the house. These are not quickie in-and-out deals. Our guide Frank had encyclopedic knowledge of the house and used up the whole hour allocated.

Tours start in the garage adjoining the house, which is a sort of museum that includes pieces on Malibu’s history dating back to the Chumash Indians, who first inhabited the area. Available Wednesday thru Saturday from 11a to 3p, tours cost $5 per person. Click here for more info.



Post-tour, consider sauntering over to the nearby Malibu Lagoon, where Malibu Creek meets the Pacific Ocean. A true birders’ paradise, over 200 species of birds pass through here. For non-birders like me, the sparkling water, gentle sea breeze, and graceful flutter of birds overhead are enough to make it a great place to sit and zone out.

Outdoor Ice Skating At Pershing Square

For most of the year, Pershing Square is a largely concrete, downtown plaza that plays host to a fountain, a bizarre purple sculpture tower, along with some homeless nappers. Calling it visually appealing would be a stretch. Yet, experiencing an LA winter would be incomplete without a visit here.



Get into the winter spirit by hitting (hopefully not too hard) Pershing Square's small, outdoor ice skating rink, open from November 15 to January 21.



Imagine skating outdoors, surrounded by people who have never touched a skate to ice before, with the sun beating down and palm trees in plain sight. Rockefeller Center it ain’t, but why skate in freezing weather when you don’t have to?



Here’s what I enjoyed this past Sunday:
Gleaming skyscrapers loomed over the rink. Friends and families, some chatting in Spanish and others in English, along with pockets of Korean and Italian, tried to stay upright with varying success. Kids laughingly fell into heaps as shutterbug parents snapped their wobbles from the sidelines. Meanwhile, a centipede-like line of skaters clung to the outside railing, pulling themselves around the ice. And once the sun went down, sparkly lights gave the rink a holiday glow.



Bonus for Sunday skaters: live music! This past weekend I heard fun redneck classics like “Wooly Bully” and “Margaritaville” from a stage right in front of the ice. The novelty of live music at an outdoor rink was cool – for the first hour.

If you’re hoping to show off your mad skating skills or want to uninterruptedly zoom around pristine ice, Pershing Square is not the place for you. For one, the ice on the small rink is kind of uneven and two, it can get as clogged as LA rush-hour traffic, at least on weekends. So if you fall into this category, try one of LA’s year-round skating rinks.

Skating sessions last an hour with 30 minutes in-between sessions to smooth the ice for the next crowd. Admission per session costs $6, plus $2 for skate rental. Parking is available at the garage under Pershing Square. Remember to get your ticket validated to reduce your parking payout. Click here for more information.

To get a feel for the square in its normal state, check out this post from a downtown LA resident.

A Day Without Plastic Bags

Plastic bags pop up in all sorts of places - beaches, hiking trails, wind-blown on the side of the highway, and ultimately landfills - and it's not a pretty sight.

Yes, it can be a hassle to remember to bring your own bags to the supermarket, but it's worth making the effort, especially on LA's first 'Day Without A Bag' - today, December 20.

According to Heal the Bay, LA County residents use six billion plastic bags each year and recycle only 5% of that amount. Cleaning up all those bags costs us, as taxpayers, millions annually.

So either bring your own stylin' bag or skip a bag altogether if it's a small purchase. The environment, your conscience, and your fellow Angelenos will all thank you!

LA Kings: Good ‘Ol Hockey Game at The Staples Center

Get into the winter spirit with a Kings game at The Staple Center – one of the few places with ice (ice cubes don’t count!) in sunny LA. So what if it lacks the cachet of the Lakers? Sticks clack, skates swoosh, ref whistles trill, bodies slam against the boards.



Last Monday, I was treated to a LA Kings v. Edmonton Oilers game. We were in the nosebleed seats in section 303, not necessarily a bad spot at The Staples Center. The air may be thinner in the section 300 sideline seats, but we had a full view of the ice and the tix were only $25/pp through Goldstar, a site specializing in discount event tix.



Better still, we were in the midst of true blue (ok, it's actually purple if you want to get all technical about the jersey color) Kings fans. They yelled out to their star players using affectionate monikers like “Cammy” for Michael Cammalleri and lovingly dissed their team: “That shot was as wide as my ex-girlfriend.”

Even if hockey is not your all-time favorite sport, everyone should experience the bizarro intermission entertainment at least once. Imagine three fans in clear giant beach balls scrambling back and forth across the ice in a race for an autographed jersey. Add in a Guitar Hero contest, fan rides on the Zamboni (the ice resurfacing machine), and the Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grade Hockey Fan? faceoff, and you start to get the idea. The brilliant thing about hockey is that there are three 20 minute periods, which means there are two intermissions – 2x the fun.



After the Kings came back in the 3rd period to tie it, the game went into a 5 minute OT. Still tied, the Edmonton Oilers emerged victorious after an exhilarating shootout. Add in a couple of good tussles and overall, it was an awesome night.

On the way out, I just couldn’t stop myself from humming that annoyingly catchy Stompin’ Tom Connors ode to the sport:

The good old hockey game,
Is the best game you can name;
And the best game you can name,
Is the good old Hockey game!



The area around the Staples Center has undergone a major facelift in the past few years. Check out the brightly-lit Nokia Theater across the street. Parking can be pricey in the lots around the Staples Center, around $15 to $20. So try looking for street parking or use the Metro Blue line, which stops nearby.

For another take on excitement that awaits you at a Kings game, check out this recent blog post from the Militant Angeleno.

Cruising LA Beaches By Bike

A post-Turkey Day bike ride seemed like the perfect way to shake off our tryptophan overdose. Instead of taking a car and burning ever-pricier gas, my husband and I got the satisfaction of burning calories and burning thighs.



We started the roughly 30-mile roundtrip ride from the Santa Monica Pier, but you can cut your biking time down by starting from Venice. No bike? No worries. There are rental shacks near both the Santa Monica and Venice piers, with a decent cruiser running about $15/day. Check out Spokes n’ Stuff at 1700 Ocean Front Walk (310) 310-395-4748 or click here for other options.

The beauty of this ride is that you’re on a bike path, free of cars, almost the entire time, which may eliminate the adrenaline rush of swerving to avoid oncoming four-wheelers. But for inexperienced riders like myself, dealing with the speedy bike racers decked out in sleek, spandex gear, who whiz by in packs, is enough of a rush. Just remember that yells of ‘On your left’ are code for move your bootie to the right fast if you don’t want to get mowed down.



Following the bike path is pretty self-explanatory until Washington Blvd, where you turn left, battling cars and oblivious bikers. Ease into the bike lane and head east for several blocks until you hit Mildred Ave. where the route morphs back into a bike-only path.



Believe it or not, LA area beaches are not created equal. It’s not all Baywatch, and each strand of sand offers something different. In Santa Monica, watch people – adults and kids alike – bust out gymnastic moves on the rings, or just take in the fab view of the bay and carnivalesque pier.



Funky shops and characters await you in Venice. Stop by to listen to the street musicians, see break dancers, have your fortune told, or pump iron at the infamous Muscle Beach. On the weekends, you may be lucky enough to catch a drum circle in progress. If you have time, make a side stop at the Venice Canals.



With its modern high-rises and yacht-filled harbor, the Marina breaks up any illusion of coastal monotony. As you go around the Marina’s harbor, you’ll pass by the Fisherman's Village – a Disneylandesque take on a New England seaport. Despite the contrived setting, this is a great place to grab a bite at one of the waterfront restaurants or at the very least, enjoy views of the Marina.



After skirting the Marina, you’ll pass Playa Del Rey followed by Dockweiler, a long sandy beach known for the planes roaring overhead. (LAX is directly inland.) Dockweiler may not have the restaurants or charm of nearby beaches, but it’s one of the only area beaches to allow bonfires and is LA’s only on-the-beach campground.



Besides numerous restroom facilities, the El Segundo beach boasts hang gliding, along with a couple power plant eyesores.

Keep pedaling because my favorite stretch of sand, Manhattan Beach – the quintessential Socal beach with great waves, sea-green water, and a picturesque pier - is just around the bend.



Take heart, 30 miles might seem like a lot (and it is), but the terrain is almost entirely flat and there’s tons of places to break along the way. If my husband and I can do it, almost anyone can.

Undersea Delights Under The Santa Monica Pier

“I saw an octopus,” said one little boy. “Look Daddy, there he goes to the bottom.”

At the small aquarium hidden under the Santa Monica pier, watching the kids’ reaction to the sea creatures is almost as enjoyable as the sea creatures themselves.



Sponsored by Heal the Bay, a non-profit environmental organization dedicated to protecting Santa Monica Bay, both kids and grown-up kids alike can get acquainted with sea life through tanks and exhibits.



Long snake-like eels greet you in a tank along the entryway. Swell sharks and horn sharks spurt water, if agitated, out of the open-top shark tank. And like any aquarium worth its (sea)salt, they have touch tanks - three! – where you can gently handle sea stars, crabs, sea urchins, snails, and other tidepool creatures.

The docents here aren’t afraid to get their hands wet in the name of learning. Tara, on-duty during our visit, happily dipped her hand in one ice-cold tank to point out some egg cases, housing unhatched swell sharks. As she shined a flashlight on the cases, we saw the shadow of the giddily-moving crab fetus inside.




Be sure to check out the ‘Sarcastic Fringehead’ in the Kelp Forest exhibit. Yes, that’s the fish’s actual name! Described as a ‘grumpy old man’ by Tara, the Fringehead is highly territorial and has creepy-looking bug eyes. Plus, I could’ve sworn he grinned sardonically a few times.



While it’s not out yet, they’re preparing a Jellyfish exhibit that should be on display in a couple of months. Described as “Living Art,” I reached a meditative state just watching the jellyfish float around and around.

Don’t forget your sticker on the way out. With sayings like ‘Waste ruins my taste’ or ‘Toxins tick off turtles,’ the stickers remind people how pollution is life-threatening to these ocean residents.



The aquarium is small and should take most people no more than an hour or so to peruse so it’s probably not worth making a special trip just to see it. But if you’re at the pier, the aquarium is a must-see, especially if you’re with little ones. Kids enter free, while adults pay $2.

Click here for specific information on hours and directions.