Cruising at Newport Beach

Before I begin today's tale, a postscript on yesterday's fun and frolic is necessary. Betty did indeed take on the kitchen on her own and prepared a fabulous meal of mustard chicken.

After dinner, we got into a game of Bite Me and at around 9:00, the earth began to shake - no sex was involved. The light fixture above the table was doing a nice sway and it was quickly clear that LA was having yet another earthquake. The action lasted no more than 10 seconds and we tuned into the local news channel to get the goods on the seismic event. It turned out that the epicentre of the 5.1 quake was closer to Disneyland than us, where they closed all the rides. There was footage of spilled wine in a liquor store - quel domage! - and a street flooded by a broken water main. Otherwise the quake produced little damage. Of course by this morning the e-mails were rolling in wondering about the quake's effect on us. All is good. So today we opted for a drive down to Newport Beach, a trip of slightly less than an hour on the infamous highway #405. The traffic was good and we got to the Marina a little ahead of time, where Gary had rented a Duffy boat.

These Duffy boats are electric boats used for runabouts and unique to Newport Beach. It was a lovely sunny day for a trip around the harbour and Gary and I shared piloting responsibilities. It got a little chilly, but otherwise the day was perfect.

We brought on board all manner of delicious snacks and enjoyed some liquid refreshment as well as we cruised past the beautifully exclusive homes of Newport Beach.

The homes are not the only high point here as we cruised past many multi-million dollar yachts like the 110 foot Shogun and cleverly named Knot Too Shabby.

There are many other ways of getting around the harbour with kayaking and paddle boarding being very popular.

Most homes have very little property and usually very little beach with a big boat parked out front. They are very different from each other, which made our cruise even more enjoyable.

We sailed past John Wayne's former residence, a grand, well kept home aptly named Duke's Point. The history of his relocating from Beverly Hills to Newport Beach dates from when he was a budding football star who was injured in a bodysurfing outing at Newport Beach. The mishap directed him from football to acting.

As well as numerous sightings of Newport mansions and yachts, today we also discovered some very expensive electric cars of which Californians have grown fond. The first one pictured here is the Tesla, retailing for around $90 000. I guess it goes like a bat out of hell. So much for electric cars being sluggish.

The next equally priced electric car was the Fisker. This one had a roof loaded with solar panels which helps augment the cars batteries.

The last hot car sighting was an Aston Martin Vantage that is on Gary's wish list. Yeh, mine too.

Before returning to Brentwood, we stopped at Ralphs for some groceries for tonight's pasta dinner. Then it was slow time/blog time before dinner, with hopes for a seismically calmer evening and more cards.