the golden state

 

my first Loupaper card

wonders of travel

Is there a more dramatic arrival to anywhere? In this case Princess Juliana Airport in Sint Maarten with its one runway and planes flying low over Maho Beach

or a more space agey piece of LAX than this Theme Building

 or more elegant than this wonder of Victorian engineering

drinks

 One of the more interesting and delightfully fun advertising campaigns

or maybe you'd prefer something warming like hot chocolate with marshmallows (personally, I would skip the marshmallows)

10 minutes

This is a 'cable car', though not quite what I was thinking of, but it still fits the theme.

I was thinking more along the lines of this, the Singapore Cable Car Sky Network ride from Singapore to the island of Sentosa.  It was the first ropeway system to span a harbour.  It is $3 (sgd) for locals and $15 (sgd) for tourists for the almost 15 minute ride, though I gather the cars look a little more modern than these 1960s ones.

One cable car that doesn't look any different from the original - in fact it is the original - is this 110 year old aero car that takes you on a 10 minute ride over the Niagara Gorge and the Whirlpool Rapids. There's no disembarking.  You get the thrill of the views, riding on an antique cable car, and because of the flow of the Niagara River you cross the international boundary four times.  All for $19.00 (cad)

Or, how about this aerial tramway.  It is in fact, the world's largest rotating tram car according to their website.  During your 10 minutes of travel, the cars rotate slowly, "offering picturesque and spectacular vistas of the valley floor below".  All for $30.95 (usd)

Sometime though, these things are called a 'gondola', as is this one in Banff with views of the Rockies that takes you up to the summit of Sulphur Mountain.  This ride is slightly less than the others, at 8 minutes.  It is also the most expensive, at $60 (cad)

Cable Cars, Gondolas, Aero Cars, Aerial Tramways

plus this one, posted earlier

chinatown

  

a one way street in Chinatown, San Francisco, with the ubiquitous chop suey restaurant

 

sequoia

Sequoia National Park was established in 1890.
Sequoias can live for 3,000 years.

from California

1940's

Sequoia

streamliner

Santa Fe's "Super Chief" traveling thru the Orange Groves, California
One of the Santa Fe's great fleet of streamliners with gleaming steel coaches, drawn by 1800 H.P.  Diesel-electric locomotives, passing through the Orange Groves of California. 39 ¾ hours from Chicago.
unsent circa 1940