Friday the 20th was our anniversary so we had a yummy lunch at Laguna Beach. The fish eaters (Sue, Brian) had some tasty seafood at the restaurant on the beach, while the beef eater (Scott) had, what else? A burger. It was a little cool and foggy at the beach, but so nice to be at the coast!
We visited this mission to see some more LDS history. While the Mormon Battalion was stationed in Southern California during the Mexican War, they helped build many structures throughout the area. One construction project was barracks at this mission. The foundations and some of the walls can still be seen below.
The church at the mission is a beautiful building.
The Battalion later camped along Aliso Creek, which happens to run behind the apartments Brian lived in while he was on his mission and there’s a marker there behind the apartments. So we visited it and got our picture taken by Scott.
After a fun day at Sea World, we had a quiet, relaxing morning at the beautiful San Diego Temple.
It is peaceful and quiet-looking, but just behind the building here is the freeway. As you come around a curve, the temple is RIGHT there on the freeway and it’s quite impressive.
The grounds were landscaped with tons of blooming geraniums and other tropical plants and it was quite lovely.
The two central towers are quite impressive, inside and out, and here’s a view up at Angel Moroni.
And the other spire, showing off the stained glass.
Read TWELVE (12) mystery & suspense novels in 2012
I had fun with this one because I had some mysteries on my shelves that I wanted to read this year. Even though I’m done with the challenge, I want to keep reading the Navajo Mysteries and Charlotte & Thomas Pitt novels because they’re just so fun. And I’m a series reader. Can you tell? So without further ado, here’s what I read for this challenge and links to my reviews can be found at Book Chick City’s challenge page.
A Red Herring Without Mustard (Flavia de Luce #3), by Alan Bradley
I Am Half Sick Of Shadows (Flavia de Luce #4), by Alan Bradley
The Fallen Man (Navajo Mysteries, #12), by Tony Hillerman
Listening Woman (Navajo Mysteries, #3), by Tony Hillerman
The Cater Street Hangman (Charlotte & Thomas Pitt, #1), by Anne Perry
Callander Square (Charlotte & Thomas Pitt, #2), by Anne Perry
People of Darkness (Navajo Mysteries, #4), by Tony Hillerman
The Dark Wind (Navajo Mysteries, #5), by Tony Hillerman
The Ghostway (Navajo Mysteries, #6), by Tony Hillerman
Paragon Walk (Charlotte & Thomas Pitt, #3), by Anne Perry
Skinwalkers (Navajo Mysteries, #7), by Tony Hillerman
A Thief of Time (Navajo Mysteries, #8), by Tony Hillerman
I am doing awesome with reading challenges this year. I have completely finished three, done the first two levels of the Mount TBR challenge and am just planning to keep going until the end of year and see how high I climb, and I’m about halfway through the 50 States Challenge. So far with that I’ve just been marking the states I’ve happened to read, but to finish it this year I’m going to have to do some more targeted reading.
After getting completely soaked at the closing of Sea World, we headed over to the San Diego Mormon Battalion Historic Site. We looked a little worse for the wear, but the sister missionary from Idaho Falls who gave us the tour was very understanding. Scott and I had never been there and a couple of years ago when I was attending National PTA Convention in San Diego, a group of us went to Old Town San Diego for dinner and a tour. To our disappointment, it was closed for remodeling and we could only see the outside. Brian got to visit on the last day in his mission because the Carlsbad Mission has a tradition of taking missionaries there just before they go home. He told us it was all high-tech and cool, so we were interested to see it. It is very well-done and interesting and we even saw our neighbor, Marvin Payne, portraying one of the characters in a moving photo, Harry Potter-style. During the presentation, one of the tour members is called up to get dressed in typical Mormon Battalion gear, so Brian volunteered. Or maybe we volunteered him. Anyway, here he is as a Mexican War-era soldier.
The story of the Mormon Battalion is quite interesting, and if you’d like to read more about one of the longest infantry marches in US military history, click here.