Across the Pond

Showing off in pinks: magnolia tree at the Huntington Gardens Roses, camellias, cacti; sages, jacarandas, and palm trees: last week a friend invited me to spend an afternoon at the  Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens  in San Marino, an affluent suburb of L.A. The Huntington boasts more than 14,000 varieties of plants in 14 principal garden areas and one section or another is always at its best. Right now the magnolias and parts of the cactus garden are showing off in oranges, reds and pinks. Natural habitat, home base: cactus garden As my companion and I were wandering down through the desert garden, into the Australian garden, and, later, through the Chinese garden it struck me how the Huntington is a mirror for life in Los Angeles. Botanical sections adjoin and sometimes blend into each other the way neighborhoods in L.A. do. To the immigrant from Europe some parts of the Huntington such as the Asian areas and the jungle see...

Finally. California's new governor, Jerry Brown, was expected to proclaim today that the drought which has officially plagued the Golden State since 2009 is over. This winter brought precipitation by the tub full: record breaking rain fall in December, plenty more rain in March, 50 feet of snow in parts of the High Sierra. Bottom line we got about 50 percent more precipitation than in an average year. Looking out a restaurant window in Mammoth on March 18 This is great news of course - though we in L.A. should never see ourselves as off the hook. Southern California is a desert. The water that we use here always comes from somewhere else, be it the Colorado River or the High Sierra, and if the drought had an up-side it was that many of us became aware of this. Angelenos aren't - and probably never will be - saints when it comes to environmentalism but as I have said before, we try and there is one L.A. characteristic that works in our favor whenever change is needed: we...

Sunday, while Hollywood was getting ready for its big night, with Oscars, red carpet, and gowns, we travelled to the mountains to enjoy the snow. We loaded the skis onto the Jeep and headed for our favorite local ski resort, Mount Baldy. Here's what we found: I am sometimes reluctant to make the journey to Mount Baldy. Not that it's a long one by L.A. standards (45 minutes from our home to the parking lot) but - when it comes to skiing I am spoiled because I grew up on a mountain. Anyway, the view from the top is reward enough: the Mojave desert to the north, the Pacific to the south, and a checkerboard called Los Angeles county in between. Mount Baldy is one of those L.A. excursions that make me wonder how one place can have it all: the desert, the beaches, the mountains; surfing, skiing, hiking... Is it a surprise that the movie industry should have settled here? Images from top to bottom: palm trees against the San Gabriel Mountains ;  Lord's Candle, ...

The other day we stumbled upon a patch of California right in the middle of Vienna: California poppies grow in the botanical gardens of Belvedere Palace. Spotting the deep yellow flowers on their thin, bent stalks, I was reminded of how these plants cover vast expanses of desert in California in the spring. The California poppy, scientifically known as Eschscholzia californica, is the official flower of the state of California. It blooms from February to May in the wild. The best place to see it in L.A. is the Antelope Valley Poppy Reserve in the Mojave Desert. Images: California Poppies in Vienna in August and in the California Poppy Reserve in April 2005