Travel & Babble

Last week, I went to Wilmington, North Carolina, to visit my great-aunt and great-uncle. We didn’t really do a lot of sightseeing as it was around 90 degrees the whole trip, but the humidity felt like it was closer to 100. However, there was one place we did go to–the Bellamy Mansion. This was a house built in the Civil War era that has become a museum showcasing it from the Civil War to today. The museum is really only a house and slave’s quarters, with very little furniture. They keep the small amount of furniture because it is used for various events throughout the year like art galleries. It does take away from some of the appeal to it, because a lot of the time, furniture is some of the most interesting things about a house. The way they built things back then and the materials they used are so different from now that it’s really interesting to look back on it. The lack of furniture is also more noticeable due to the house being huge, with over 5,000 square feet. Keep in mind that this is in the downtown of Wilmington.

The architecture of the place is also quite interesting, as most old homes in Wilmington are. The home has these massive pillars surrounding it, all made out of marble. Most of the materials that were used to build the house came from the North, as that was where most manufacturing was. This was strange, as this house was built around the time where the tension between the North and South was rising.

When we visited the mansion, we took a guided tour along with around 15 other people. We toured throughout the whole house, as well as the slave quarters close to the house. The guide was very good at talking about the architecture and the family that lived there and had stories about the house, of which there are many. After we were done touring, I thought about how hard it would be to tour this house, and not only because of the heat. This is a house that was essentially built on the backs of slaves, and they did most, if not all, of the work on the house. It’s a sensitive talk about slavery these days, and every single time you have to not step on any toes. You can’t not acknowledge it, because it is so important to the house. Yes, the house is beautiful, but that beauty masks the evils of slavery. Some would say that it shouldn’t be a museum at all. In my opinion, the house is too beautiful for it to be ignored. Yes, it was build on the backs of slaves and that is a horrible thing and should be acknowledged, but it shouldn’t be shut down because of that. History is about learning, and one of the things you can learn from it is the exploitation of slaves and how it shouldn’t be done again, but you don’t have to interpret it that way. You can just appreciate the architecture and stories behind the house. Not everything has to spark a debate. Some things can be enjoyed. I learned that while in Wilmington this year, and this was only a tour for an hour and a half.

I was in Yuma for two days, and, as such, I decided to delay my writing. Going into Yuma I did not expect much. It’s a border town, around 15-45 minutes from the border. It’s quite hot, around 85 degrees when we were there. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, there was this reputation surrounding it that was just negative. It’s like the same reputation as Stockton or Bakersfield–that it’s just gross. Did Yuma completely shatter my expectations? No. Was it alright? Yeah. We went to the border before going to our hotel. It’s a fence. Not much more to say.

After that, we had a decent brownie and mousse from a local bakery. It did not deserve the measly three stars it got, it was a good four. Even in Yuma, people are still snobs on Yelp. We went out to dinner at a barbeque place. We had pulled pork, brisket, tri-tip, mashed potatoes, texas toast, fries, chips, and carrot cake, all house-made. I feel like things that are house-made always taste better than store-bought. Maybe it’s the idea that homemade is better or maybe it just is better, the world may never know. After that, we were basically in for the night.

We had the worst breakfast of the trip the next morning. Hampton’s, of course, aren’t known for their stellar cuisine, but it’s usually passable or above passable. This time it was some weird egg thing and ham, which, I’m sorry English people, is not a breakfast thing. The only real saving grace was the Frosted Flakes, which no other place had. We went to a Tunes and Tacos festival. Basically, a bunch of cheap tacos and music. Pretty cool. I think that should be in every good city. There needs to be some sort of local festival where you can see what the town offers. For Montreal, that happens all summer with the music festivals and local food. Same thing with Bozeman. Yuma may not be the greatest town ever, but it is elevated by that festival. There must be some life, some gathering of people to make a town feel alive, or else people won’t want to be there, especially tourists.

Anyway, after that, we went to the prison. It has been decommisioned for the past years, and now open to be visited. There are some great people there. Here’s some pics.

I always like history, so it was interesting for the around a half-hour we were there. The real main event that happened was welding. It was my mom’s birthday, so we went to Yuma to weld. It’s kind of a long story, but basically I took welding at Astrocamp over the summer and the teacher does her own classes in Yuma, which my mom wanted to take. She was super helpful and it was a lot of fun. We got to use a plasma cutter, which is essentially a short range lightsaber.

Essentially what it is is a lantern for our porch that we put solar lights in and the holes that we plasma cutted act as holes for the light to shine through and show the designs. I’m sorry if that sounds confusing, but I don’t know how else to put it. Anyway, we celebrated my mom’s birthday, ate some good burgers and a terrible caesar salad. Nothing much happened after that, and we drove home the following day.

Thus marks the end of this trip. What have I learned? Well, Cal Poly SLO is better than UC Santa Cruz, Prescott isn’t that great, Yuma is better than I thought, and Bakersfield is just as bad, if not worse, than I thought. I went to a fair amount of cities this trip, and I learned that pretty much all cities have hope. Like I said above, there is some good in Bakersfield. Prescott, if a few things were fixed and some life was brought into the town, could be a great second home destination. Flagstaff could be better if they controlled the snow a little more, a bit better than Gatsby controls time. If Santa Cruz fixed their homeless problem and layout, they could be a great beach destination. It’s easily to look at a city and be like, “Well, that’s gross. There’s like homeless people here and it smells. There is no hope and I’m never coming here again.” What I encourage is to give cities a chance. Sure, they might not look the greatest on the surface, but if you look closer, under the surface, some might say you can see the glimmer of hope lurking inside all of them.

This is a compilation of two days as I forgot to write yesterday. We went from Bakersfield to Flagstaff on Wednesday, which took about 6-7 hours. We stopped by a German bakery on the way in Tehachapi, which was good. I hate that, though. We live in an area of 50,000 people in Redondo, plus more than a 100,000 more in Torrance, but we don’t really have a good bakery. There’s no real German bakery, it’s just a bunch of generic, okay food. That’s one of the other beauties of travel, you get a bunch of bakeries in the most unlikely of places. Flagstaff was not that special, we weren’t there for very long, so we didn’t really do that much. We had some good Mexican food, though.

Despite the stellar picture quality that should easily determine what the item is, it’s about half of a 14-inch burrito. It had 3 meats, some cheese, some sour cream, and basically all good things.

In Sedona, all that we really did was a pink Jeep tour. We went on a rugged tour, which wasn’t actually that bad, since I was in the front seat. We had a good guide too. He did a good job, keeping three kids, a teenager, and three adults entertained. We passed by Jerome on the way out, which is such a weird town. It’s like they just pointed at basically a mountain and were like, “yeah, there seems good.”

The town is like tiered, with these weird roads and just a strange layout that sort of works? I don’t know, it’s a weird and kind of eerie town. Prescott is sort of interesting. It’s not nowhere, with a Trader Joe’s and a Costco. Also, apparently, it’s pronounced like Prescuit, like biscuit. I had some decent meatloaf in a sort of dark bar, but they did have some good wings and chocolate malt mousse. Prescott’s pretty high up–around 5200 feet. I love the terrain of Arizona. There’s areas like Phoenix which are quite low in elevation and are basically just a desert. There’s the higher desert in the northern area, which is like a desert, but 5,000 feet up. Finally, there’s the areas like Flagstaff that are up in the mountains, and get 100 inches of snow annually, which is more than Buffalo, NY! The elevation of Arizona makes it a much more interesting place, and I like it a lot.

Today, we went first to Cal Poly SLO for a tour. It’s a really nice school, nice and big. The people there seem nice, and the campus is insanely clean. As in, no trash at all, which is really weird. They’re a bit hard to get in, with an average GPA of 4.12 and an average SAT in the 1400s, but it still seems like a quite enjoyable school and one many should consider going into, especially if they’re interested in science. It’s kind of hard to talk about without the person actually being there, so I’ll stop now.

After that, we took a road east to Bakersfield. We stopped by Soda Lake and the Carrizo National Monument. The “monument” is literally just a field. However, despite how lame that sounds, it actually was kind of cool. With all the rain that recently happened, there’s been a big bloom out in the country, with flowers popping up all over the place.

These pictures don’t really do it enough justice. It was yellow and purple everywhere. At times, I couldn’t even see the hill, it was just that covered in flowers. At points, it didn’t even feel like it was California anymore. It’s really interesting how different California is depending on where one goes. Many people who live in California will never see this part of it, as it is hidden away in the middle of California, where many won’t go. This is the real joy of traveling–seeing and doing things many around you won’t experience ever. Sure, it’s great to go to Hawaii for the 457th time, but have you been to Montana? Or North Dakota? Many haven’t, so you will have those experiences that many others will never have. That is the true glory of road trips, and why my family loves to go on them.

As much as there is beauty, there is also ugliness. Legend says that if you look up ugliness in the dictionary, you get a picture of Bakersfield. Over half a million people live here, and I don’t know how. It has this haze of dust and smoke, like something straight out of Mad Max. It clogs your throat and gives you a terrible cough and blots out the sun.

This is mainly due to the drilling of oil, I presume, but usually oil towns aren’t that populated. Why half a million people choose to settle down in such an ugly place fathoms me. Is it part of the economy? Are so many people in poverty that they have to work for the oil industry, while they laugh at the joke that is the American Dream? Am I too young to be talking about this? Maybe. Should I move on? Yes. Hotel? Trivago. The sad thing about Bakersfield is that in the mess of it, there is hope. We had dinner at a really nice place, that was clean and big and just as good as ever. There are plenty of bakeries and different cuisines all around. The area may not be the best, but the people are making the best of it, and trying to make living here less terrible. In the end, isn’t that the true American Dream? Making the best out of the situation given, even if it isn’t the best? One does not to be the richest man nor the Renaissance man, they just need to improve their life and others and be happy. Anyway, that’s enough for today. I’m off to bed, where I’m probably going to get lung cancer from the air here.

After going to UC Santa Cruz to look around, I went around 150 miles south to San Luis Obispo. Once there, my mom and I went on a hike up one of the nearby mountains (?) for about two hours. It was a nice view, since everything is so green after all the rains.

Hiking is an interesting thing. It’s stupid when one thinks about it–you walk a lot and sweat and hurt your feet, just to get the top and look at a view and then go down. It’s not appealing at all, but it’s still enjoyable somehow. It is really satisfying once I reached the top, though, and I got a feeling of accomplishment by doing it. After that, we sinned with our dinner.

Pictured is a tri-tip sandwich, a fish taco, fries, and onion rings. The amount of calories is a number I would not like to see. The tri-tip really made me think about restaurants these days. They’re constantly striving to make these complicated burgers or sandwiches, like it’s a contest to see who has the longest ingredient list. I swear they’re actually doing that, or else they wouldn’t have those unnecessary additions to the words like “grass-fed beef” or “chicken touched by virgins on the island of Cyprus.” Anyway, they try all these complicated things, when the sandwich is still amazing even though it’s just bread, meat, and sauce. Perhaps that says something about our society, how we always strive for the complicated and amazing,when sometimes it’s best to go back to basics. I don’t know, I’m not Plato, but I swear you can write a paper about it.

I sometimes forget how nice SLO is. The city is clear about what is downtown and what is suburban. It’s clean and doesn’t have a lot of homeless people, which, coming from LA, is nice. It’s a very good place to live for a little while, especially a good college town. Speaking of which, I’ll be at Cal Poly SLO tomorrow, but until then, I’ll be thinking of the paper to write with that philosophy.

On the first day of our Spring Break trip, we woke up at six a.m and went to Santa Cruz. We arrived at about one. The drive was really nothing special; the route was mainly just through fields. We passed by some fields with hundreds of cows, which smelled just wonderful. Santa Cruz itself is alright. The layout of the city is a bit weird, with no real clear distinction between the suburban and rural areas. There also was a lot more homeless people than I thought there would be. We went to UC Santa Cruz, which is quite a fascinating school. It doesn’t look like a place for a school, it looks more like a national park.

The school itself was rather quiet when we went the next day because most of the buildings were closed on Sunday. A person working in the bookstore said the school is a lot louder on other days, but it still felt like the culture for people to keep to themselves there. The school is kind of isolated, which can be interpreted as a good thing or bad thing. On one hand, you’re away from other people, but on the other hand, you’re away from shops and grocery stores. The school feels science oriented, which makes sense with all the nature around them. It was definitely an interesting school and an interesting prospect for those who like an isolated, beautiful school. For lunch that day, we had a french dip, but for dinner, we had some good stuff. We went to an Italian restaurant and had Sunday gravy and black truffle gnocchi.

When on road trips, when there is some food that my family doesn’t usually have or doesn’t really exist where we live, we usually get it. The mindset is “Well, when else are we going to have this?” The food was very good and really hit the spot. The Sunday gravy essentially boiled down to penne with meat sauce and meatballs. The meat sauce was the real star there, and was some of the best I’d ever had.

Santa Cruz is a conflicting city. It’s really nice and has a lot of interesting food and people. But, it also is kind of gross, with a lot of homeless people. The layout of the city is also kind of weird, as I mentioned above. It’s a fascinating city though, and I recommend all to at least stop there for lunch.