Cazalea shares a delightful New Year's Eve walk through San Diego's Balboa Park, featuring his wife's newly restored Seiko Hi-Beat. This post beautifully intertwines the joy of a revived timepiece with the exploration of local landmarks and nature, offering a serene escape during lockdown.
We are walking this morning, and my wife is wearing her newly-revived Seiko 17-jewel, automatic, date-equipped Hi-Beat watch. We've had this for about 12 years and it's never run before. More details on its restoration will be covered in a Watch Tech article.
We went to the southeast end of Balboa Park today, near the Naval Medical Center, San Diego. This massive, sprawling complex is one of the largest medical centers in the world. We followed the scurrying folk on their way to work and ended up at the back corner where no civilians are allowed. OK with me, I don't want to go into a hospital anyway.
If you just spin around 180 degrees you find the old hospital (now administrative offices for Balboa Park) and its more appealing architecture and tile work.
By stretching my arms to their limit I was able to lift my camera high enough to get the whole bench in the picture.
This is an aloe vera.
And a beautiful Bird of Paradise flower.
I spotted a hummingbird watching me from the aloe. Unlike most of his brethren, he actually sat still for a few photos!
I believe this is the best portrait I've ever gotten of a hummingbird. He was politely posing for me.
My wife pointed out that this is New Year's Eve and the hibiscus are still blooming beautifully.
Low cloud cover dampened our hopes of a sunset, but made dramatic skies over us as we left the hospital grounds and headed west.
It's crazy that we have these huge-huge buses with 2-3 riders... We crossed Park Boulevard.
And came to one of the cultural center buildings (re-purposed water tanks). This one is dedicated to those cultures south of the border, aka Renerod and "my people"
The city allows, if not encourages, these murals decorating the tank and ancillary buildings. It doesn't stop grafitti, sadly, but does look much better than bare gray concrete (architect's choice).
Eagle and the Snake.
Suddenly we felt the sun on our backs!
Across a mile of canyons and mesas I saw the tower (from a few days ago), this time from the SE, glowing in the sunlight.
I spun around and got one usable photo of the sun coming through the clouds, right above the fence to the new hospital complex. In a few seconds both my camera and I were blinded by the light.
Turning back to the cultural complex, we walked around the perimeter
and set off to the next one
Home of all mechanical watches! The World BEAT Center? Could it possibly be a watch site?
Sadly no, this is occupied by artists with African roots and drumming in their souls. Strangely the entire circumference is dedicated only to Egyptian art. I know I was only educated in the USA, and haven't been south of the Equator, but isn't there more to Africa than Egypt?
Sorry I couldn't get everything in focus for this shot... (maybe later with Photoshop).
Backside of the Beat.
If you like drumming and dancing type stuff, you could check out some of their videos on YouTube. I noticed the average length was about 2.5 hours so I gave them a pass.
Circling as much as we could of this place, we ran into a fence, a steep drop-off into a canyon, and fatigue.
We marched back across Park Blvd, through the parking lot, and came to the Veteran's Memorial Museum and Chapel (closed).
So we eyed the great brass B-24 (coveting it for our home garden), then drove home.
Here's her watch, more than 50 years old now, displaying the proper date in Red even. To adjust the date, you pull the crown out past its first stop, which increments the date, one day per pull.
The pair of vintage Hi-Beats. We have been together 49 years, so not quite as long as the age of these watches. (I see we could use some moisturizing lotion on our skin)
So we are home for breakfast, hot tea, our tolerant Tiger, and a book for Mrs. C while I go to the dungeon and write up our report.
Thanks for reading. We are approaching the end (perhaps you thought it would never come) and I have to say we have really enjoyed these walks.
We have learned much more about our city AND the Seikos we own. Just so you know, we have never done this sort of exploratory walking before October!
Cazalea
