California, Here We Come - Day 15 - Pioneertown

[Guest]

The Story So Far...

The Pre-Trip Report

Day 1 - Travelling to London

Day 2 - Two Musicals

Day 3 - The London Bridge Experience and touring London

Day 4 - LHR to LAX, yay!

Day 5 - Vegas, baby!

Day 6 - The Strip and Cirque du Soleil

Day 7 - Grand Canyon

Day 8 - Leaving Las Vegas

Day 9 - San Diego Zoo

Day 10 - Seaworld

Day 11 - A well deserved rest and DownTown Disney

Day 12 - Disneyland

Day 13 - Disney's California Adventure

Day 14 - Pool and stuff!

The Cast

Myself, Rachel, 36, loves planning and theme parks. Can get a bit obsessive about holidays.

OH, Andrew, 43, usually goes along with my plans, loves driving and big trucks, doesn’t care for rides but is happy to mind bags, pushchair and energetic toddler.

DS1, Dan, 16, loves rollercoasters and music. Surgically attached to his Ipod.

DD, Hannah, 11, loves Tinkerbell, swimming pools and getting her own way. Wants to do anything and everything.

DS2, Tom, 2, Mr Independent, thinks he can do everything the big ones do, loves Toy Story and Mickey Mouse.

Friday 6th August 2010

In our original plan today was to be Knott's Berry Farm. However, we decided we were a bit theme parked out so we switched today's plan with Sunday's plan and headed off on the road again.

We decided that rather than wasting time with breakfast we would just stop somewhere on the way. Decisions made, we jumped in the car (well, once dressed we did!) and were on the road again!

Andrew was very happy to be driving again, after a few days of letting someone else drive us around. Once again, the litter strewn concrete highways of LA were less than impressive but after quite a few miles we were soon driving on the kinds of road I had imagined driving along.



There weren't any blown out tyres and litter along these roads (although we didn have to swerve to avoid a huge dead dog at one point!)

We hadn't anywhere in particular planned for breakfast, so we waited until we were fairly hungry and pulled over at a roadside eaterie - Denny's for the second day running! Not that we really minded; the food is fine...and cheap and service is always good. This time Andrew had the French toast slam and I had the value slam at a bargain $4. However, when they came I wished I'd ordered the French toast again so Andrew very kindly (after some massive hints) swapped a piece of French toast for one of my pancakes. Hannah had a build-your-own slam consisting of pancakes, bacon, eggs and toast and Tom had pancakes. Dan opted for All You Can Eat pancakes - basically, you get three pancakes and once you've eaten them, the waitress keeps bringing more until you are finished. We told Dan he wouldn't even finish the first three but somehow he managed five! Tom had a kid's pancake and bacon, although he won't eat the bacon.



The diner was fairly quiet and the waitress was fantastic at bringing more juice and coffee. All in all, no complaints from us

Once back on the road again, we chatted, listened to the radio, played on DSs and enjoyed the scenery.





Shortly before we reached our destination (I think I'm being brainwashed by the Tomtom) we reached an area that had hundreds upon hundreds of wind turbines. I live in an area where we have half a dozen of these at the edge of the village and people are always complaining about them. I wonder what they'd make of this?







Soon after this point we turned off the main road onto a smaller windy road that went through some steep hills



and soon we were there.

The 'there' in question was Pioneertown, a western style town built to look like an 1880's town and used for filming many westerns in the 1950's.



We parked the car and got out into a pretty much deserted main street.



We weren't one hundred percent sure we were actually meant to be there but began wandering nevertheless. It wasn't long before we came across a saddlery with a cat on the porch.



We stopped to show Tom the cat and a man came out and greeted us with a "Howdy". He told us a little bit about the town and said we were free to wander around, take photos and suchlike. He told us that the population of the town was around 200 but that they had a fair amount of visitors throughout the year. He said he'd started the day by opening his door at 6am to find a group of German tourists photographing the cat! We chatted for a little while about where we'd already been and what our plans were and we moved on. The main street was a mixture of character-type buildings such as these





and private dwellings, which had signs outside so that you didn't inadvertently take a photo or peer through their windows!

Outside one house was another man, sitting on his porch, typing on a laptop which looked completely incongruous in the setting. He also called out a greeting and we had another chat about the town, our travels and England. He recommended the food at the local bar and said we should visit Joshua Tree National Park as we were so close. He had a dog and some newborn puppies in a run beside him and Tom had a happy few minutes watching them.

At the top of the street was the OK Corral



and what is apparently the most photographed Post Office in the United States. Well, once we found that out, it was almost rude not to take a photo, wasn't it?



We also found the Sheriff's Office but there was only a dummy inside!



It did give Hannah a shock when she looked inside though!

Continued in next post...

[Guest]

Once we reached the end of the town, which wasn't that far, we walked back down and again a couple of people in their garden said hello. We wondered what it would be like to live in a town like that, where people often came just to have a look and wondered if they ever got fed up with having to be pleasant to strangers. Whether they do or not, it was a very interesting place to visit and the locals were very friendly. If you're ever anywhere near, go and take a look!









Before we got back into the car we called into the bar with the best food around. We were still too full from breakfast but the food looked good and we liked the way the drinks were served in jam jars. 'Girlfriend in a Coma' by The Smiths was playing in the background which didn't seem quite right for a western town though! We bought five bottles of water and Hannah took advantage of the restroom facilities before we left and walked around to the car. We were quite amused by the sign by the handicapped car parking spaces.



As we weren't too far away we decided to have a drive to Joshua Tree National Park. It wasn't too long a drive but by the time we got there Hannah and Tom were both asleep. We decided against waking them and just had a short drive then turned around.



As we headed back to the main road, a little play with the satnav revealed that we weren't too far from Palm Springs. With Hannah and Tom out for the count and Dan happily plugged into his ipod we decided to take a look.

Again, it didn't take long to get there and the views were pretty good.





As we got close to Palm Springs it was strange to see everything suddenly turn green and luscious after so many miles of dried up terrain.



Hannah and Tom were still sleeping so we limited ourselves to a drive around town. It looked a lovely place and I'd like to go back sometime, maybe to stay a night or two. We were glad we checked it out anyway!

We began the drive back to hotel but we thought we'd stop at a Cold Stone Creamery on the way back to egt one of the ice creams we'd heard so much about. As it turned back we were nearly back at the hotel before Tom woke up so we decided to go to the one three miles from the hotel. The road we were on wasn't too bad but the road heading in the opposite direction was backed up for miles - presumably people heading out of the city for the weekend.

We pulled up at the shopping centre where the satnav told us the Cold Stone Creamery was, only to discover that this particular branch had closed down. Plan number two was to visit the one outside Disney. However, on the way there traffic was terrible and when we finally reached it there was nowhere to park. Time was ticking on and we thought that if we had ice cream now the children wouldn't eat their evening meals so reluctantly we headed back to the hotel.

Once there, we showered to get rid of all of the sand we'd collected and headed out on foot for something to eat. On the way, we passed the hotel lobby and booked an LA tour for the following day. We mentioned that we were also planning to book the Pirate Dinner Adventure and the Bell Services man was quite insistent that we book with him as it would be cheaper. Little did he know that we'd done our research and had a half price coupon, making it cheaper to book directly. We declined his offer of tickets and also his offer of a lift up to the Pirate Show when we said we were headed in that direction to eat. He was quite amazed that we wanted to walk, even when we explained that we enjoyed walking and kept offering to drive us the huge distance.

We headed out on foot, slightly worried as to how far we would have to go. Our hotel was 7000 Beach Boulevard and the Pirate show was 7600 Beach Boulevard. It turned out it was the very next building up the road. Fair enough, we had to walk under a flyover, but it couldn't have been more than 400m away! It did have a weird road to cross though; there was a 'green man' to get you into the centre of the road but nothing to get you to the other side. It was fine heading in one direction but difficult to see what was coming when we were on the way back.

We bought Pirate show tickets for Sunday and continued up the road towards Knott's Berry farm. We had been thinking we might eat at the chicken restaurant there but the queue was hug so we headed to an old favourite - TGI Fridays.

Usually TGI Fridays is one of the few places where we have an alcoholic drink so Andrew got his Budweiser and I ordered a daiquiri to be informed that the machine that made all mixed drinks was broken. More Sprite for me then! In all my visits to TGI Fridays (in USA and UK) I have always been unable to order anything other than the Jack Daniels Chicken and Shrimp but tonight I actually had a change and ordered scampi and salmon with sweet potato fries and onion rings. Not at all healthy but so delicious! Hannah had the same dish but with mashed potatoes instead of fries. Andrew ordered the sizzling chickan and Dan got his usual ribs. He was a bit disappointed in the portion size when it arrived and we discovered when we got the bill that they'd given him a kid's portion! Tom just ate from everyone's plate as we'd discovered that if we ordered him a meal, more often than not he left his and ate everyone elses. He always drinks his milk though!

Once again, I couldn't manage a dessert. What on earth was wring with me? I never refuse dessert but could hardly manage one on this trip. Dan made up for his small main meal with a brownie obsession and Hannah and Tom shared a sundae, although none of them finished their desserts. The total bill was a pretty reasonable $77 plus tip which we thought was good for five people, although when we got back to the hotel and looked we realised that Dan had only had a children's meal and they had only charged for one soft drink instead of three.

It was very dark when we got back outside and the road that we thought wasn't too far on the way there seemed a long way with our ful stomachs to drag along with us but eventually we got back to the hotel. We were being collected at 7.30 the next morning for our tour so pretty soon we were all in bed.

Tomorrow: LA Tour

[hross42877]

What a great day with fab pics!

[orlandosgr8]

What an interesting place to visit

[Guest]

Enjoying your reports, we visited Pioneertown around the end of July,Dw wanted to take one of the pups home, we ate in the bar and had a nice meal there, and there was a group playing when we visited it.
We stayed beside joshua Tree, and visited it, loved the desert and Yucca Valley area

[angelcake71]

excellent

[disney owl]

more brill photos thanks