Friday, September 25, 2009

From Los Angeles Onwards up North (part 1)

Charlotte Lily here, writing from the sticky heat of New Orleans... sitting in our favorite internet spot here on Frenchman Street, place called 13... But first there's some catching up to do of the adventures of the wandering fairies & the lovely Lunette...

So, lets see... We arrived in L.A. sometime after dark to meet Cspot's dear friend Emily at the place we'll be camping our first few days... with the absolutely lovely and amazing Hazel. We park Lunette in the driveway and wander into the gorgeous sloped backyard to a bonfire and grillin' party, hugs, beer and tequila, and song requests! We sing and settle in to share stories, and are soon joined by the very beloved cousin Aaron (genius painter and participant in the "Fairytale Installations" Residency with Rose Robin & Cspot in France 2007).

Over the weekend we make an art party and show in Hazel's front yard and set up video projections, sounds system, and we do live screen-printing, singing & music-making, and perform a few fairytales...

We also explore and try some busking along the boardwalk of Venice Beach -- not much money but meet cool people and enjoy the seaside. We end our time in LA staying in Charlotte's uncle's apartment and get to perform a show for the Gaspard family in a beautiful park, very special for the new generation of little ones!

From LA we head into Topanga Canyon to stay with a family friend in the mountains with views to knock your socks off, and we steal cousin Aaron and his musician friend Mack and we have a lovely few days of cooking, jamming, painting and chilling...

We end our tour of the Los Angeles area with a trip to the beach all together (with Aaron & Mack) and then the four intrepid fairies pile into Lunette to continue up the coast northwards...

We get to our planned campsite destination and they are all full up!!! So we head to the County Campsite on the recommendation from the Parks Lady, and as we pull up in the dark the headlights catch a group of creepy old men with hungry eyes standing around a bonfire in a can... "Lets get outta here!" We quickly back out and head off into the night. Once we have a safe distance from that scene out of a Stephen King novel about cannibal campsites, we realize we have no other nearby options and all the fairies are fading... So we make a useful discovery -- it actually works quite fine and comfortable to sleep 4 in the bus! Cool...

We awaken to seals playing in the ocean, and have the most rad brunch ever at Shell beach, a place called Zorro's that I would very much recommend to anyone driving within any reasonable distance, the food was SOOO tasty! (and we've had some stellar food across America, from Tiger Diner in Louisana to the Cowboy Cafe in Roswell, NM, to the homemade gumbo from my great-aunt Mary and so on and so much more...

We get into Capitola that day thinking its Santa Cruz for some strange reason. We enjoy the beach and cook dinner and settle in to sleep in the bus again since we haven't any other real options. We are awoken at 2:30am by a Police Officer who sternly tells us that it is illegal to "camp" on the beach (we are in our own personal bus) and he threatens us with a $450 fine if we do not move along and vacate the Capitola area immediately. Exhausted and unhappy we drive out of the city to park in a less than discrete business parking lot, all expecting to be woken up again at any moment with more cops and threats... We're lucky though and make it through to morning without any more hassles.

We get into Santa Cruz a little bit worse for the wear, but rallying our energy to see what we can do -- including see about the power steering on the bus which has just stopped functioning. Erin and Avatar head off on a recon mission while Rose and Charlotte contend with getting the bus fixed...
Where is the diesel mechanic around here?
Oh, really? They are called "Good Guys"? Hmm...

Check out the videos:
http://www.youtube.com/user/RoseJayLloydRobin

See Rose's Video of Getting to LA and Hazels Place:


See Video of the Performance for Charlotte's Family:


And here is a clip from our visit to Mama Sue's Garden on our way to L.A...