Balboa Park Stroll - And Out of the Fire and Into the Rain

Sitting is the enemy when you're sampling the donuts in a new town, so one of the days I was in San Diego I took a stroll through Balboa Park.  Balboa Park recently celebrated its 100th birthday, and this area originally was the location for the 1915 Panama-California Exposition which San Diego hosted to celebrate the opening of the Panama Canal.

House of Hospitality reconstructed in the 1990's

San Francisco eventually was selected as the official “International” Exposition, but San Diego decided to hold its exposition anyway. The Panama-California Exposition would be smaller, year-round, and with an emphasis on gardens and an architectural style of its own.

Bronze statue of El Cid, 1930

Spanish Colonial Revival Architecture was chosen as the design theme for the first time in the history of U.S. expositions. Like at most expositions the buildings the majority of the buidings were made of staff plaster, without foundations, and were meant to be demolished after the Exposition. But during the two years of the Exposition, San Diegans had fallen in love and the buildings have been saved or reconstructed over the years.

I didn't go into many of the buildings after I was disappointed by the lackluster display at the Museum of Photographic Arts. I decided that taking a look around was a worthwhile use of my time instead.  This young fella and I both were interested in the lizard scuttling around one of the many flower beds.

After awhile strolling in the shade was a nice change.  Girls from Wisconsin are not used to unrelenting sunshine - but more on that at the end of this blog post!

It was the varitey of plants that proved the most interesting, though I will do a separate post tomorrow about an architectural display I found.  They don't make trees like the one below in the Midwest.

During the 1915 Exposition, the Botanical Building displayed bamboo, banana trees, palms and more. The designers even hid bird cages in the flora, adding their chirping calls to the authentic outdoor atmosphere.

Botanical Building

More than twelve miles of wood lath cover the building, making it one of the largest lath structures in the world.  It was strange to be in a structure that wasn't technically enclosed.

Outside the Botanical Building is a long lily pond where water fowl and turtles sunned themselves.

Another great place to see flowers was the Alcazar Garden which got its name because its design is patterned after the gardens of Alcazar Castle in Seville, Spain.  The garden has been reconstructed to replicate the 1935 design by San Diego architect Richard Requa with over 7,000 annuals planted.

Alcazar Garden

While there were many architectural sights I really enjoyed the end of my stroll through Palm Canyon which contains more than 450 palms (58 species) within its 2 acres.

California Tower seen from shade of Palm Canyon

The original group of Mexican fan palms date back to 1912. Once past the bridge and the giant trees at the start of the trail all the people and the activity might as well be a world away.

Not that I didn't enjoy watching all the kids enjoying the park, especially this group chasing bubbles!

Here's today's promised news tidbit.  More than one million acres have burned in 53 large fires in 13 states.  We've already seen almost as much acreage burn as we usually see in a year and it doesn't look like California will be getting any relief as July gets underway. I don't know what the cost of fire damage adds up to for those states, but I'm sure it's not cheap and there is only so much that can be done in the way of prevention. Here in Wisconsin our climate change effect is increased rainfall. Here is a link to a series on WisContext about last year's extreme rainfall.  Next time I head to Ashland I'll have to see how they've recovered from the heavy rains in June that caused sewage to overflow into Lake Superior.

Heavy rain in Lake Geneva the day after I returned from San Diego

Studies show that wetlands can mitigate the effect of flooding, so hopefully it will be in our budget to do what we can to save and repair wetlands and do other things to prepare for future floods.  The northern part of the state in recent years has had much trouble with roads and bridges damaged due to excessive rain, but Scott Walker instituted a $100-per-child tax rebate with our budget surplus instead.  It will cost the state treasury $137 million and his Democratic opponents are calling it an election-year gimmick.  I know a lot of people could use some extra money, but where will the money come from to fix the roads and bridges those same people use to get to work and take their children to school?  That's all I'll say, form your own opinions was the goal. Perhaps if you are a Wisconsin resident you can even chime in with something you think we could spend that money on instead of tax rebates or flood prevention, I'd love to know because I'm sure the list isn't a short one!

Dashed from car to post office door -  free shower!