Beautiful California and family secrets from long ago...

Now I realised yesterday that because I sent a link via email to some friends and relatives, that there may be some readers who aren’t that familiar with ‘blog-land’. For example, some may be puzzled by the use of the initials, ‘D.H.’. No I haven’t started holidaying with Derryn Hinch or Dustin Hoffmann and no it doesn’t stand for the Aussie derisory term, ‘D*ckhead’!!!! It stands for Darling/Dear Husband!

Bloggers also love to get comments (nice ones preferably) and readers can do this by clicking in the comment box. If readers don’t want to go to the trouble of getting a Google account, you can still leave comments anonymously but blog etiquette requires you to put your name at the end of your comment. Now we have those details out of the way, here is some more of my blog which, at the moment, is mainly all about our travels.

On Tuesday, Bruce’s cousin Adrienne drove up from Huntington Beach to meet us and take us out to see some sights. Adrienne’s mother Thelma, was DH’s mother’s cousin as they shared the same grandparents. Thelma has only recently passed away at nearly 98 years old, and it is since then that a number of family secrets have been revealed to Adrienne. Added to those shocks, Adrienne has discovered a whole lot of Australian relatives she formerly had little or no knowledge of. DH and I met Adrienne for the first time and she took us on a lovely day out.



Our lovely guide, Adrienne



First of all, we went to a secluded and quite exclusive cemetery where many celebrities have been buried. People such as Eddie Albert, Marilyn Monroe, Donna Reed and Eve Arden are just a few celebs buried/resting there. While we were walking around looking at the plaques I saw a little squirrel. He was so cute and the first American squirrel I’ve seen.

The flowers in the holder were fresh flowers albeit slightly dead! The story goes that Joe DiMaggio arranged for fresh flowers to be placed there every day...but we think he's dead now...

A long view of the wall where Marilyn is

A favourite actor of mine...Eve Arden and her husband

A famous family; I remember their brand of baking soda!

Another view of this little 'oasis'; it is surrounded by many highrise condos and apartments now

The little chapel where services were held

The little squirrel

He let me get quite close

Then Adrienne drove us along the Pacific Coast Highway and we admired the beautiful coastline which is similar to many parts of the Australian coastline. We passed a number of exclusive communities, especially some houses on the cliffs fronting the sea. The road view of the houses wasn’t impressive being mainly garages etc but Adrienne assured us that the parts of the houses facing the sea would indeed be impressive.

Malibu

We drove to Malibu which, thanks to the ‘surfie’ movie era, and ‘surfer music’, we were familiar with. Then we had lunch at a seafood restaurant called ‘Gladstones’, overlooking the beach...it was a beautiful venue and the food was wonderful. My Californian salmon salad was so delicious and beautifully presented.

View through the window at Gladstones

The lime tarts DH and I shared for dessert

We had a wonderful day getting to know our American cousin!

A 'Maria Goodwin Original Throw' which we brought over as a gift for Adrienne. (I actually have little labels which say that and which I sew on the back!)