Island Patrol

When you are on an island, everything you consume has to be barged over from the mainland. In the case of groceries and gasoline, the entire delivery truck is loaded onto the barge and brought to the island and barged back empty. This causes the prices for such commodities to go way up.

While you can’t cut down on groceries and such, you can do something about fuel consumption. In order to cope with 5-dollar-per-gallon-plus gas prices, most Catalina Island residents drive small golf-cart sized vehicles since the town is rather small. You also see motor scooters and we saw a Segway while we were there.

One interesting vehicle we saw was this motorized stand-up three-wheeled solution which the Los Angeles County Sheriff Department uses to patrol the streets of Avalon. Click on the picture below for a large close-up.

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Shallow Water

This is a pleasant view of the shallow water by the beach in Avalon. I love the textures of the sand, rocks, light and bubbles. Click on the image for a larger view.

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Avalon at Dawn

On our last day on the Island, we got up early and I captured this picturesque sunrise over Avalon Harbor. You can click on the image to see the 800 by 600 pixel image.

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Clear and Pleasant Weather

During our entire visit to Catalina Island this week, we enjoyed some of the most perfect weather we’ve ever seen while visiting one of our favorite places. This photo of the famous Casino in Avalon was taken at sunset; the mainland California San Gabriel mountain range can clearly be seen in the distance. That mountain range is about a hundred miles beyond Avalon.

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On Catalina Island

Today is our anniversary. We were married in the city of Avalon on Catalina Island. We would be blogging more about our excursion, but unfortunately, the laptop is malfunctioning and we’re unable to download our photos. That will happen later this week when we are home again.

Meanwhile, we will be going out to seal rocks today to visit our piniped pals. Enjoy this picture Damsel took last year from the boat.

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Remembering Zep Again

marczeplin.jpgDamsel and I are again very proud to be able to honor Marc Scott Zeplin on the sixth anniversary of 9/11/2001. Last year, as a part of the 2996 Project, we honored Mark Scott Zeplin, who was killed at the World Trade center in New York on September 11, 2001.

“Zep” is what his friends called him. Zep was age 33 when he died. He hailed from Harrison, N.Y. (USA). Marc worked in the World Trade Center offices of Cantor Fitzgerald, a financial services company. Reading what Marc’s friends and family have written about him, Marc was well-liked and respected by peers, friends and others who wrote words about him following his death.

Please see our post from last year where we included a tribute to Zep written by his wife and mother.

We wanted to post more about Zep, but this week we are on travel. So, as a result we have to use a borrowed computer and have limited time and resources. But our best wishes go out to Marc’s family and friends on this day.