‘Twas a good easter weekend. The weather was phenomenal; it felt just like summer. It was probably in the mid-80′s both yesterday and today. We kept the windows and curtains closed in the house part of the day because it was so hot… We haven’t done that since September.

Yesterday was our monthly top-to-bottom house cleaning day. (We try to schedule a certain day, otherwise we’ll find a good reason to keep putting it off.) Today we started things off with a tasty breakfast. Last night I put the ingredients in the bread machine for the super easy and tasty Amish Bread, and this morning I awoke to tasty bread aromas. We sliced the bread and made french toast and scrambled eggs, then ate out on our patio. Delightful! The scent of flowers was in the air and it was a really warm and pleasant easter morning.

After breakfast we headed out to the Santa Margarita River park in Fallbrook. In all my years of living down here I’d never explored this place, which is a shame; it was great. A nice flowing river (more like a creek by non-Southern California standards) with a great trail beside it shaded by lots of bit oak trees. Overall a very peaceful and relaxing place that reminded us both of places farther north. The grass was nice and green by the river, but it seems that the flowers are past their prime and the grass is starting to turn brown everywhere else. Spring happens quick down here… It’s a good thing easter came early this year.

Hope everybody else’s easter was nice, and you all were lucky and got those tasty round little brown chocolate balls that the easter bunny scattered around my yard. Mmm mmm!

One of the best parts of living in Southern California is the multitude of climate choices it presents; this time of year there are snow-capped mountains and warm desert valleys within 30 miles of one another. Being quite fond of warmth and sunshine, we took a quick overnight trip to the Palm Springs area last weekend.

The weather was awesome (mid-70′s and clear blue skies) and the drive out was beautiful. The areas ravaged by fire in the fall have risen from the ashes in the spring, with beautiful California Poppies and other varies of flowers carpeting the formerly blackened hillsides. I also got to stretch my car’s legs a little on the back roads; a welcome change after slogging through commuter traffic every day.

While we did enjoy the typical lazy escapes of lounging by the pool and eating tasty food, we also decided to try The Living Desert Wildlife and Botanical Park, which was a pretty awesome experience. Living in the zoo capital of the world, you’d think we’d be tired of them, but this place had enough of a different spin on things that it was really refreshing. There were lots of great garden exhibits with cacti galore, plus some pretty interesting animals. I made a short video of the park, which you can watch below.

(Music is the rather inaptly named “Rain in Vancouver” by Teru.)

Today I decided to try out time lapse photography for myself. Here’s what I came up with. Made using the “Smooth Interval Recording” feature of my Sony DCR-HC48, iMovie, and Garageband for composing the music.

Click to watch the video!

Drive an hour and half east from the sprawling metropolis of San Diego and you’ll undoubtedly find Anza Borrego Desert State Park; it’s the largest state park in California and the second largest in the country. Covering over 935 square miles of rugged yet beautiful desert, this area has lots of hidden surprises. One of them is the rather uninvitingly named Hellhole Canyon.

The trailhead is located on Highway S-22 about a mile before it turns into Palm Canyon drive in Borrego Springs. Things start off fairly flat, open, and easy. Here it’s all desert; cactus and sage covered mountains lie to the west and a broad valley terminates at the Salton Sea to the east. Even on a cool 65-degree winter day, the sun here feels quite warm and the cacti look quite ominous. Eventually the canyon constricts and the trail fragments, requiring some good rock-scrambling skills. Push on and you’ll be rewarded with a beautiful shady grove of California Fan Palms. About a half mile farther is the real treat: Maidenhair Falls. This is a true desert oasis; an 18-foot waterfall spills into a small pool, boxed in by a mossy canyon wall and sheltered overhead by palm and sycamore trees. While it’s not the most glorious waterfall in the world, it is impressive considering the location.

Watch a little movie of the hike after the jump.

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Looking for a great conversation starter? Try “Prius”. It’s not easy to make a box with four wheels, four doors, and four seats so polarizing. It seems that everybody has an opinion about the Prius, but few people talk about what it’s like to actually drive the thing. I mean, isn’t it still a car? It seems to be made of metal, plastic, and glass like every other car on the road. But what if the truth is much more insidious? What if driving one of these things makes you into a smug jerk? What if it makes you part of the Hollywood elite? What if it subliminally brainwashes you into voting Democratic? What if the radio only tunes in to NPR? Curiosity got the best of me; I had to find out.

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Complaining about the winter weather in San Diego is like complaining about driving a Lexus while the Ferrari is in the shop; it shows a pattern of spoiled behavior and may cause your Hyundai-driving friends to give you the cold shoulder. So I’ll just say just say that it has been unusually cold in San Diego lately.

Fortunately, the weather report had some encouraging news a couple weeks ago; a warm weekend was on the way. Being the sun-loving people we are, we decided to maximize our exposure to those life-giving rays and head out to the desert resort community of Palm Springs.

Never having been to Palm Springs, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. Elvis used to hang out there, so did Howard Hughes. Heck, Sonny Bono used to be the mayor. What kind of place was this? Turns out that it used to be the “playground of the stars”, and although this title has worn away over the years, one can still see the attraction. The city is not quite as glitzy as its former nickname may sound, but compared to many desert communities it is very pleasant and clean. Imagine a retirement community smattered with resorts, then add a gooey cultural center.

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