I'm not sure where to start so let's just go back to the end of December, right after Christmas. I know I've been mentioning it for a while, but for our Aquatennial group this year, we were ending on a high note....the Tournament of Roses in Pasadena (from here on, I'm abbreviating. Tournament of Roses is now going by TOR otherwise I'll be here all day). Parade, football game, the whole deal. But for a couple of us, we decided to take a round-about way getting there!
Captain Rob and his wife, Amy, go to Vegas every year for Christmas. Amy's mom and stepdad live there. I've never been to Vegas. So, they invited me out there before the TOR. I flew into Vegas the morning of December 28th and arrived to a very chilly desert town. By chilly, I mean 50 degrees. If you are Minnesotan, you'll understand what I mean when I say that would be nice and warm back here. But when you go to Vegas, you don't want to wear your jacket. OK, no more weather complaints. For good reason!
Amy, Rob and me in Vegas
We spent that evening in Vegas, watched the Vikings almost blow it against the Giants and went out for dinner. We then headed to a casino where we decided we needed to place a couple bets. We pooled some money and bet a three team parlay (you pick three games against the spread and have to get all three right to win) on some college football bowl games. I was very confident in our picks. Well, there's a reason they call it gambling. We lost the first game and that was that. Oh well.
Monday morning it was time to head to sunny southern California and the TOR in Pasadena. This meant a drive across the desert, specifically the Mojave Desert. It's a lot of nothing while at the same time being kind of cool. It's mountains, valleys and big skies. It's also brown, empty, sort of depressing and absolutely foreign to me. You literally don't see ANYTHING green. The mountains are sometimes snowcapped, sometimes full of scrub brush, occasionally just red rocks and always lonely looking. There are about three decent size towns between Las Vegas and the outskirts of Los Angeles (about a 4 to 4 1/2 hour drive).
Pretty much what everything looks like between Las Vegas and LA
Primm is first. Right on the Nevada/California border. It's like the first place in Nevada you hit where you can gamble so it has a couple of huge casinos. It's bizarre. There's nothing else there. Just giant hotels with lots of flashing lights, rising up in the desert, totally out of place. They also were advertising a couple of musical acts coming up. Brooks and Dunn and L.L. Cool J. In Primm? Who had EVER heard of Primm, Nevada and who goes there to see L.L Cool J? Bizarre. It's amazing what slot machines do to people. The chance at a quick dollar (or more likely to LOSE a quick dollar) send people scrambling through the desert and since we're there, might as well line-dance to Brooks and Dunn. I don't get it.
Next is a couple California desert towns. Baker, which is nothing but a desert oasis with gas stations and truck stops. I guess it's kind of a launching point for the folks who head into the Mojave to the south or into Death Valley to the north. By the way, I see why they call it Death Valley. Not a whole lot going on there.
Then comes Barstow, which actually starts to resemble civilization again. By that, I mean there's people. It still looks like a desert. Kind of odd to see a large populous city there. It also was my first chance to eat at what I've been told is the greatest fast-food burger place ever, "In And Out Burger". Otherwise known as the Church of Rob Mauzy. For the record, good if not great burger. Reminds me of the old A & W Drive In burgers. Yum.
Pasadena is probably 90 minutes past Barstow. And you can start to tell you're heading into southern California. The traffic picks up, the sun starts to shine a little brighter and the cars get a bit more expensive. You can feel the energy kind of pick up as you head into the sprawling metropolis. It's hard to imaging how large the whole area is. You can spend hours on the road and not get close to seeing the other side of town. It's huge.
We arrived in Pasadena, a very old suburb. It was incorporated as the second community in Los Angeles County (after Los Angeles of course) in 1886. It stands at the foot of the San Gabriel Mountains, probably 20 miles from the Pacific Ocean. Pasadena was originally named for a man who had become famous for working with Minnesota Chippewa Indians (how fitting) and the name means "of the valley". It became a city with many wealthy inhabitants over the years who lived on South Orange Grove Blvd., otherwise know as Millionaire's Row. It has since changed into a more moderate community, much more famous for a festival and tournament that began in 1890.
A very different looking Pasadena in 1876
The Rose Parade is held each year on January 1st (unless it's a Sunday in which case January 2nd becomes the lucky day). The first parade in 1890 was set up by the Valley Hunt Club, a Pasadena social club. Their intent was to celebrate the fact that while people were freezing out east, the fortunate residents of Pasadena were celebrating blooming flowers and moderate temps. Way to rub it in....what a bunch a jerks, right? OK, not really.
The first Rose Bowl football game took place in 1902. It was played by Michigan (BOOOOOO!!!!) and Stanford. It was a disaster and the Tournament took a huge financial hit. They scrapped the football game in favor of......wait for it.....wait for it.....yep, you guessed it! Roman Chariot Racing! And we missed out on that. Bummer. Anyway, they eventually brought back football in 1916 and it is easily the oldest of the Bowl games (hence the name "Grandaddy of them all").
The first Rose Bowl football game took place in 1902. It was played by Michigan (BOOOOOO!!!!) and Stanford. It was a disaster and the Tournament took a huge financial hit. They scrapped the football game in favor of......wait for it.....wait for it.....yep, you guessed it! Roman Chariot Racing! And we missed out on that. Bummer. Anyway, they eventually brought back football in 1916 and it is easily the oldest of the Bowl games (hence the name "Grandaddy of them all").
The first ever Rose Bowl in 1902. The football game
went on hiatus until 1916.
Chariot Races in Tournament Park, 1908. I know, wish you were here.
OK, there's your history lesson. My favorite part....I know, I'm a dork. I just like the history stuff. Sorry. Hope I didn't bore you. But seriously, where else do you dump a college football bowl game for chariot racing? You can't make this stuff up.
Back to our trip. We found our way to the Pasadena Sheraton and checked in. Commodore Mary and Queen Tara were already in Pasadena, arriving the day before. When we got there, they were touring Hollywood, Beverly Hills and Venice Beach. Tough work, I know. Princesses Jaclyn and Emily were on their way to the hotel from the airport. We also were waiting for the arrival of King Boreas and the Queen of the Snows from Winter Carnival. We had quite a large representation from our Minnesota festivals descending on SoCal.
We got everyone checked in and it was time to meet the rest of the visiting festivals and our hosts from the TOR. We were joined by people from Fiesta in San Antonio (I've told you a LOT about them), the Kentucky Derby, Rose Festival in Portland Oregon and a handful of other folks. We loaded a bus and were off to a mexican restaurant, El Portal.
We spent a little time mingling and enjoying Margaritas (NOT the girls....for the record. Their parents read this. They were on their best behaviour, I promise!) before heading inside for dinner. The surprise of the night was that they had arranged for a local stand-up comedian to do a little private show for us in the restaurant. Good times! And a good way to end Monday, our first day in Pasadena.
Tuesday, we had a chance to check out what the Tournament of Roses is all about and also to see how they create the elaborate floats that we watch on TV every January 1st. First stop, the Wrigley Mansion.
The front lawn of the Wrigley Mansion
I mentioned "Millionaire's Row" a little bit ago. One of the mansions on that famed boulevard belonged to William Wrigley Jr. Yes, the gum guy from Chicago. He bought the home in the early 20's and his wife spent most of her life there. It's a gorgeous home with a wonderful rose garden (how fitting). The home now belongs to the city and they have allowed the TOR to make it their working headquarters. The Rose Queen's Crown (a retired one). It's
made up of diamonds and Mikmoto Pearls. Nice.
The morning we arrived there, several Los Angeles television stations had camped out on the front lawn and were doing their morning news shows from there. After breakfast in the mansion and a quick tour (including an AWESOME trophy room with memoribilia galore), we headed out into the lawn to get a closer look.One of the former Rose Bowl Trophies
An upstairs room in the mansion with old TOR Programs on the wall
Not long after being out there, Amy and King Boreas stumble across the TOR Grand Marshall, the one and only Cloris Leachman (Young Frankenstein? Are you kidding? One of the funniest movies ever and I'm there with Frau Blucher....cue the horses). She was wonderful to take some time and talk to us while we acted like totally dork tourists seeing the baby Jesus for the first time. We took several photos before letting the poor woman escape. It was cool though.
Our group swarming Cloris Leachman
The Aquatennial in front of the TOR Headquarters
After the mansion, we were off to what they call the "float barn". That's where they assemble and decorate the massive Rose Parade floats. And after seeing this up close, you have a whole new respect for what goes into it. They had about 16,000 volunteers helping decorate. That's a lot of flowers. For example, one float that belonged to the USO was a giant American flag...if you watched the parade, you may remember it. The flag alone took 25,000 carnations flew in from South America to decorate. That is one flower at a time, in a vial of water and plant food, stuck carefully into a styrofoam board until it looks like a flag.
The flag made of carnations
The smell of the building was stifling with flowers. There were people on the floor trimming roses, sorting seeds, gluing grass....every single piece of material you see on a Rose Parade float must be organic material. If you see something that looks like a walking path on a float, it may be potatos. If you see a mural with Helen Keller on it, it could be made out of onion seeds. If you see a giant rabbit with fur, the fur is probably made out of grass. I think you're getting the idea. We saw a huge operation and there were 8 floats in it. Out of about 40. That's a lot of work.
Volunteers hard at work decorating floats
The thousands of flowers awaiting placement on a float
I'm running out of time now today but I have much, much more to tell you. This is just a teaser! I'll be back after the weekend with what should be the rest. Make sure you check back!
Lindsey Peterson
2008 Captain
Minneapolis Aquatennial
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