Took a trip to Rosie The Riveter museum and Red Oak Victory ship on Saturday with the El Sobrante Rotary Club. It was excellent!

Some photos of the event:

Some "squatters" made themselves at home on the dockside crane at the SS Red Oak Victory ship. . .   Momma and Poppa Osprey.  Poppa was on one of the cables, keeping a watchful eye out.

Being whistled aboard:

Something most people - including myself - would not know. I have a new-found appreciation for an old friend who served aboard a supply ship during Vietnam War.

She's a bit rusty. She really should be preserved, being one of only three remaining.

Jeff, our guide I learned, lives nearly next-door to me in Alameda in Ballena Bay.

 The view of The Pretty City across the Bay from the stern:

Took them about a week to load up using the cargo cranes. Unlike the few hours it takes nowadays using containerized ships.

 The drydocks where the Victory Ships and Liberty Ships and others - a total of 747 ships during the years 1942 to 1945 - were built are still THERE, but re-purposed for other uses.

It applies to Dads as well.  :-)

The Engine Room.  6,000 horsepower all going into a single-propeller.

Next stop on the tour was the assembly plant, around the bend. . . .  Owned by Ford Motors, where many Jeeps, tanks, and other wartime vehicles were manufactured for the war.

We had lunch at the aptly named "Assemble" restaurant.  And then went into the museum. . . .

THIS made an impression on ME.  The PIN caught my eye FIRST.  Republic Aircraft Company is long gone from Farmingdale, New York, near where I grew up. . . .  but the airfield and the American Airpower Museum are there now. The Republic P-47 Thunderbolt airplane had the largest number of planes built during the war - 15,660, per Wikipedia. There must have been a lot of Rosie The Riveters THERE besides at this western end of the country.

Just to prove it, I found the American Airpower Museum's website:

Replica of a JEEP, all packaged up and ready to be parachuted. . . .

Must have been a huge operation. . . .

Kids saved scrap metal during WWII:

Just an interesting photo of some folks. . . .

Fast Times At San Simeon High

Went to a nice place on a hilltop a bit south of home recently.  The owner of these digs was a weeeee taddddd bit of a "conspicuous consuption-ite" I'd say.  I'm imagining what it'd have been like if the owner of this spread had won in his bid for political power, and parlayed it all the way to the White House as the historians who guided my friend and I thru this, his Castle, told us he'd planned to do.  Donald Trump eat your heart out!

We're here to party!

The outdoor pool is undergoing renovation. . . .    I didn't bring my trunks anyway.

Step lively!

EVERYONE needs a RA-The-Sun-God on their patio. . . .

The tapestries in the Main Hall were impressive:

As were the tapestries in the Main Dining Room:

Ceiling in the Dining Room:

The tapestry titled "The Hunt for the Stag" reminded me of several I saw that looked very very similar to it, only titled "The Hunt for the Unicorn" at The Cloisters in upper Manhattan.  I want to do some research and see if they are somehow related or at least by the same artist.  The tour guide was familiar with The Hunt for the Unicorn tapestries and said "Yes, they are similar, but I don't know if they are part of the same series of tapestries or even if they are by the same artist."

The indoor pool looked like it was in much better shape than the outdoor one. . . .

After seeing this all, I had only one parting word to say: