This is the Ahwahnee: one of those magnificent old hotels built inside National Parks. This one is on the valley floor of Yosemite. I would never have expected to stay at one of these famous lodges, but thanks to my friend Gloria in Santa Monica, I had the opportunity in January 1986.
That month during my semester break I flew out to LA for the first time in winter--my six previous visits had all been in summer. I don't remember any precise reason for visiting that month, but I do remember that I stayed for the first few days at my friend Foster's mother's condo in Woodland Hills. The first slide photos I took on that trip, however, are of the 20th Century Fox studio, where Jeff Charbonneau, Gloria's husband, was working as a music editor.
I had been there the preceding summer, when Jeff showed me and my film-school friend Dave his workspace and let us look around at some of the sound stages. (I remember seeing an episode of Moonlighting being shot and, either then or on this second visit, the recording stage where a full symphony orchestra was recording the soundtrack for The Boy Who Could Fly.) I loved the glamor and history of the studio, and on this second visit I got to walk through a couple of unoccupied sound stages, one of them having sets from Big Trouble in Little China still standing:
I also got to explore the 'permanently' standing New York street set:
When I scanned the next slide below I thought it might have been a "Small-Town America" set, but no, these are real houses from the 1880s, relocated just off the Pasadena Freeway (and now part of a Heritage Square Museum).
At some point I took these photos of Estie and Foster while we were having lunch:
Maybe we were in the middle of an excursion to look at Victorian homes in L.A., because my next shots are of more houses from the 1880s. These are on Carroll Avenue in Angelino Heights, near Echo Park:
At some point Foster and I revisited the Mayan Theatre (cf. BOXES 138-140 for the previous visit), which was still, as in 1981, showing 'adult' fare:
This time the manager allowed us inside to take pictures of the lobby and hallways, though I was only able to get shadowy glimpses of the interior designs:
Meanwhile, Gloria, whose first child, Nigel, was now 3 or 4, had recently had a second boy, and here are a couple of photos of young Lucas:
That January Gloria and a friend of hers who had a child of her own about Nigel's age, were planning to take a vacation in Yosemite National Park. It worked out that I was able to ride up with them in the friend's van and stay at the Ahwahnee, sharing a bedroom with the two older boys while the mothers had their own rooms, and helping out with a bit of child-watching. It was a great weekend, and free of the crowds that are said to overtake Yosemite in the summer. Here is my first slide of the visit, likely taken from a hotel window the next morning, since we would have arrived after dark:
And here is another shot of the Ahwahnee:
The weather on the valley floor was in the low 40s and, as you see, misty, but cooler in the mountains above, where the women went cross-country skiing amid the spectacular evergreens:
Driving back from this upper level we stopped for the panoramic views of the valley:
On walks along the valley floor we had great views of cliffs and waterfalls, and even just mossy rocks:
My only shot of the interior of the Ahwahnee that turned out halfway decently is this one of a lounge, with a glimpse of the outdoors on the left:
The mist along the valley floor lightened up over the weekend, as you can see in the next photos:
Nigel shows up in a couple of shots, one with me, one with Gloria:
More trees and waterfalls:
That afternoon we saw a coyote on the path ahead of us--it ran off into the woods:
When we left Yosemite the view from the entrance was the famous perspective, in full sunshine though with afternoon shadows moving in:
The only other photos I took on that L.A. trip were of the mural being painted on a wall of Ocean Park Blvd., right near the Garvin house. It became a classic: a fantasy of the merry-go-round horses on the Santa Monica Pier running away free:
In the summer that followed I took a couple of trips to organized events: a conference in Maine and a tour of historic movie theatres in Illinois and Iowa. I'll report on them in the next post.
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