Mini-Vacation in San Luis Obispo and Paso Robles, CA March 25-28

Every once in a while I manage to tack on a little vacation time to a business assignment. A recent trip to Bakersfield (see prior posting) allowed me to take time for a short respite at a friend's house in San Luis Obispo, California. Although I had previously visited San Luis Obispo early last year (see posting from January, 2009), I was able to take some new sightseeing opportunities. One highlight, located near the town of Los Osos, was the state park called Montana del Oro.

Spectacular views abound at the beach in Montana del Oro park.

Another "find" - for me at least - was in Paso Robles, California, where I was surprised and pleased to visit several fine wineries. Who knew that Paso Robles is designated as an official American Vinticultural Area (AVA for short)??!! Like most folks, I am well aware of Sonoma and Napa and the many wineries in those two Northern California counties. Turns out, however, there are literally dozens of wineries in or near Paso Robles!! And I managed to visit five such places on Saturday, March 27!

Castoro Cellars: great scenery and excellent wines. I purchased a fine 'dessert wine'.

Eagle Castle winery. Just opened. Here I purchased a 375 mL-sized bottle of a "dessert wine" - basically a very sweet wine. Some folks turn up their noses at dessert wines but, hey, this sort of wine is just what I like! By the way, Eagle Castle charges a $5.00 'tasting fee' (sadly, most wineries do this now) but visitors are allowed to taste up to fourteen (14) different wines! A great value and a fine tasting experience.

Lost Hills, California: March 22 - 25

About two weeks ago, I travelled to Bakersfield, California (first time there since January of 2009) and had the pleasure to visit one of our company's smaller oil fields in the nearby area to conduct a review of the chemical treating program in that location. I often am called upon to act as sort of a "Mr. Fix-It" wherein I travel to a field area and help our men and women engineers tackle whatever problems currently are afflicting their operations. And to be "Mr. Fix-It", I have to further take on the role of a detective, asking questions, digging up data, reviewing past reports, touring the field and then helping - somehow - to solve the mystery of the problem(s) at hand. Not an easy task! Anyway, this week's "patient" was located in Lost Hills - a very small town located about an hour's drive north of Bakersfield.

Travel north of Bakersfield on 99 and take a left turn onto Route 46 and then head west a few miles .... and you will arrive in Lost Hills!

Our Lost Hills oilfield is a very old operation. You can't miss it! Hwy 46 goes right through the middle of the oil field. For the unfamiliar visitor, it presents an odd sight indeed - seemingly hundreds of oil well pumps bobbing up and down. Quite a lot of pumping and all for slightly less than 5,000 barrels of oil per day .... less than what one typical oil well in the Middle East produces in one day!!!

After my work was completed, I continued to travel west on 46 to Hwy 101 an then headed south to visit a good friend in San Luis Obispo. I spent a few days there on vacation, heading home on Sunday, March 28. That mini-vacation will be the subject of my next posting. Stay tuned ....

Houston's Azalea Trail - March 2010

Apologies for being late. I've been so very busy with work and a recent business trip and mini-vacation to San Luis Obispo as well as Tucson, Arizona that I've "fallen down" on my blogging efforts. I shall endeavor to catch up.

Herewith I present a few photos from the recent Azalea Trail - an annual event held in early March in the Bayou Bend area of Houston. Because of the unusually "cold" winter (I put "cold" in quotations since this is a relative term; a northerner would smile but the weather was cold for those of us who call Houston home!), the azaleas did not bloom on time. Many azaleas were still dormant at the time of this year's Azalea Trial. In fact, if one visits the site this weekend in April, I suspect there may still be many on display.

Enjoy the photos:

The Diana Garden - probably the best looking of the various gardens spread out within Bayou Bend.

The Clio Garden (ca. 1928).

Hundreds of magnolias (or so I was told) .....

I was not the only visitor taking pictures this fine day (March 8) ....

A description of Bayou Bend - where the annual Azalea Trail is centered. There are several other places along the 'trail' but this particular location is the main one!

Miss Ima Hogg - the lady who once lived at Bayou Bend and whose property is now the property of and maintained by the City of Houston and the Museum of Fine Arts. Reference: www.mfah.org/bayoubend

OK ... this is not part of the Azalea Trail .... it's the Japanese Tea Garden located in Hermann Park - an excellent place to spend a quiet afternoon while in Houston.

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PS: I shall try to post pictures of my recent vacation in Tucson, Arizona (March 11 - 15) and San Luis Obispo, California (March 25 - 28) and maybe even my business trip to Lost Hills, California but now, my dear followers, I simply MUST get to work on completing my US federal taxes!! (Render unto Ceasar what's Ceasar's ... and before April 15th!!)

Ft. Worth, Texas; Duncan, Oklahoma and Wichita, Kansas!

Photo: View of Wichita, KANSAS from my room at the Wichita Hyatt Hotel.

Ah, the joys of simple DOMESTIC (in country) travel! I was thankfully blessed with a trouble free trip last week as part of a three-stop lecture tour in the central USA that took me to Ft. Worth, Texas (my fist visit to Fort Worth!!), Duncan, Oklahoma (my previous visit to Duncan was about 25 years ago) and Wichita, KANSAS (my first ever visit to the state of Kansas!). I am pleased to report that all my flights and associated flight connections were ON TIME and the weather was most pleasant (generally fair weather - albeit cold - without any snow storms to disrupt the flight schedules as would have no doubt been the case had I travelled the week prior when Ft. Worth had over a foot of snow!).

A side benefit: A total of 94 people showed up for my lecture in Fort Worth, the second best attendance of all my presentations to date (about 120 people attended my lecture when I was in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia last month).

Some lasting impressions: (a) downtown Fort Worth was surprisingly pleasant; I walked around at night and did not feel threatened; (b) Duncan, Oklahoma was next door to Fort Sill - one of the largest military bases in the USA. As a result, there were many Army and Air Force personnel on my flight to/from Lawton, OK; (c) although I was in Kansas for only about 19 hours, the people in Wichita were most friendly and hospitable - always a welcome treat on any trip! (A pleasant contrast to the rude people I once ran across in Vienna, Austria during my visit there in the mid-1990's!) A sampling of the photos I managed to capture follow:

I never did find out what this building was but it sure figures prominently in downtown, Fort Worth, Texas.

The Bass Performance Hall (built by the Bass brothers who reportedly own most of the real estate in Fort Worth, Texas).

A nice contrast of old and new buildings in Forth Worth.

A restored area in downtown Fort Worth. Many shops, restaurants and cafes make for a most pleasant stroll.

OKLAHOMA ..... from the air. I was surprised by how makes lakes dot the land!!!

NAPOLI's Italian restaurant in Duncan, Oklahoma. I nice, simple, unpretentious place for dinner.

Main Street in Duncan, Oklahoma. Not much to brag about here .....

Apparently this boat, located across the street from the Wichita Hyatt Hotel where I was staying, once raced in the Americas Cup???

The Wichita Petroleum Club where I gave my lecture. A small turnout greeted me: only 19 people attended. :-(

Bye Bye Dubai and the Long Trip to Home

Well, it's that time again - time to return to HOME-SWEET-HOME! I thoroughly enjoyed my short overnight stay in Dubai. This time I booked a room at the Intercontinental Festival City Hotel (shown above). The hotel is right next door to the Festival City Mall (pictured below) - one of the newest malls in Dubai. There are plenty of choices from which to select when it comes to restaurants and coffee shops.

I believe I've said this before but I'll say it again, if you have never been to the Middle East, try to arrange at least one visit to Dubai. It's an adult playground, very relaxed, alcohol is allowed at the hotels, and a visitor can get an excellent introduction to life in the Middle East. Just bring your credit cards folks as it is expensive to stay here!! Try it, you'll like it!


Coffee break in the Festival City Mall.

Outside view of the Festival City Mall next to the Intercontinental Hotel.

I spotted this 'medicine' in the pharmacy section of the HyperPanda supermarket store in the Festival City mall. Anyone have any idea what this stuff is good for and does it really work??!!

A great place to purchase teas. (This particular store is located somewhere within the Festival City mall.)

My itinerary home was NOT one I would have chosen! The Society of Petroleum Engineers booked my ticket and selected my return via Delta 7 from Dubai to Atlanta. I departed Dubai at the delightful hour of 11:30 pm. Wheels up was @ midnight. We landed at Atlanta International Airport after 14 hours and 40 minutes of flying. I did NOT like the seating ergonomics aboard Delta's Business Class section. The seats are way too cramped for a tall person like myself. At any rate, at least we were not delayed and upon arrival I managed to zip thru immigration and customs in a relatively short time. I rode the train to Concourse 'D' and waited about 2 hours for my connecting flight home. We departed from Gate D13 on time (!) but had to wait a while before actually taking off. Our plane (Flight 5179) was way behind a long line of other jets waiting to take off at Atlanta's airport (picture above). Once I was at home in my apartment, I unpacked a little and then dove into bed for a blissful sleep! Home at last!

Return to Work in KUWAIT!

Photo: Sunrise over the Arabian Gulf at Mina Al-Zour, Kuwait

Well here I sit in my comfortable room in Dubai and I finally have time to pen this posting summarizing the prior ten (10) days in Kuwait. Time flies when you're having fun! And this short visit sure flew by! I flew in on Friday, January 22 and hit the ground running on Sunday, Jan 24. Too much work to do and not enough time to do everything! However, I managed to squeeze in a pleasant weekend (Jan. 29 & 30) following the conclusion of the work week. I ventured to the Avenues Mall (Kuwait's largest and newest mall) on Friday and, afterwards, enjoyed a sumptuous buffet lunch at the Moevenpick resort hotel in Salmiya. On Saturday, I simly went to the Starbucks nearest our camp (about 32 km north of our compound). The rest of my Saturday was work related and so I shall not bore you with that! FYI: The Al Zour Starbucks is STILL CLOSED! Something about a "license problem" .... On Sunday (Jan. 31st) I departed Kuwait aboard Emirates 856 at about 10:30am and arrived into Dubai at almost 1 pm. We arrived into the new Terminal 3. You gotta see this place to believe it!! The one negative first impression I came away with is that the walk from the gate to pasport control was way too loooooong (about 10 minutes, at least!). But once I was in the baggage claim area, WOW! It looked like the inside of a palace. It was huge. And being so brand new, everything shined and glistened in the bright lights overhead! I grabbed my suitcase and met my driver and I was off to the Intercontinental Hotel in Festival City. Then it was time to rest and relax!

Next (and final posting for this trip): DUBAI

A very nice home spotted alongside Highway 40 heading into Kuwait City.

My favorite - water towers!

It's alive!!! We've had some rain in Kuwait in the last few weeks and all it takes is a little water and the desert comes alive with flowers and grass.

A violinst played near my table wile I ate my Friday buffet lunch at the Moevenpick resort hotel in Salmiya.

Dubai, UAE

Dubai is my last stop on this Middle Eastern lecture tour. I arrived on time aboard my flight from Dammam, Saudi Arabia (the above picture shows the Dubai skyline at night). Thankfully, there was no waiting on the airport immigration line and I arrived at the Crowne Plaza Hotel (hte one along Sheikh Zayed Road) on Tuesday evening (January 19). The following day, I gave my lecture at 12:30 pm. Total speaking time was about 45 minutes followed by the usual 15 minutes of Q&A. (About 25 people in attendance.) And then my tour was officially completed and I could then begin to rest and relax.

Now the fun part - a friend offered to show me around the Emirates (fyi - there are seven emirates of which Dubai is only one) and I eagerly accepted his generous offer. (Note: to allow me the time to do this sightseeing, I paid the extra night at the hotel but the added cost is worth it to me!) My friend picked me up at 9:15 am and we drove to the eastern most part of the UAE near the Omani border. We soon encountered some fabulous mountains and stopped at the Hatta Fort Hotel for a pleasant lunch and some excellent scenery that most short-term visitors to the UAE never encounter! On the way back to Dubai, I snapped a few pictures of the mountains and at one location I had inadvertantly photographed a small portion of a UAE Army barracks nearby where I was standing. Oops!! A soldier came out of nowhere in a jeep and took my little camera and ordered us to follow him. At the base camp, he handed my camera to his commanding officer who scanned thru the pictures and then ordered me to delete two (2) of the pictures I had stored in the camera memory. Fortunately, that was all! We then shook hands, he handed me two pieces of fruit and I was outta there, car tires spinning in the desert sand as we drove off!

The next day (Friday, January 22) I departed from the ultra-modern Terminal 3 at Dubai International Airport. The Emirates Business Class is so huge they have a directory of the various sections of the lounge!! I boarded Emirates 857 to Kuwait for an on-time departure!!

NEXT POST: Kuwait

The Burj Khalifa - now the world's tallest building! I wanted to go to the 124th floor observation deck but the hotel concierge informed me there might be up to a 2 hour wait in line to get tickets and that the ticket price ranged from 200 to 400 Dirhams .... depending upon the length of the que!

Some scenic mountains along the road to the Omani border.

Where we had lunch ....

A view of the pool area at the Hatta Fort Hotel.

Who knows what this building is for but it sure looks nice ....

Reply to Comments:

Al: Thanks for taking the time to leave a comment. Using my rule-of-thumb which states a person needs one day for every hour of time shifting, I am already caught up from my jet lag (9 hours between Houston and Kuwait time)! Now it's time for "real" oilfield work!! And YOU know better than anyone what that entails!

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Thumbprint: Yes, Saudi may be sometime be viewed as "boring" but for those of us expats lucky enough to work with Saudi Aramco (or I suppose some of the other major companies within the Kingdom), there are enough unusual everday events that make for an interesting life and for many memories to reflect back upon in our later years. At least that is my opinion. Glad you like my postings. Many thanks for your recent comment! I just hope I can reach out to more followers like you who take the time to leave comments!

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Hindsfeet: Many thanks for your recent comments as well. I just haven't had the time to properly express my thanks to you and to all my other followers who make time for leaving a comment or two. That lets me know I am at least managing to reach out to a few dedicated followers out there in the blogosphere.

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Ron: In reply to the comment you left a few days ago (regarding my Doha posting), Doha is a lot smaller than Dubai, less frenetic - probably a lot like Dubai WAS many years ago. However, given all the construction cranes, I'd say it won't be long before Doha becomes like Dubai. I am frankly surprised that the pace of construction has not slowed despite the woldwide recession!!

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Ryan Schellenberg: Glad you liked my pictures from Doha. I only wish I can go there again soon! A truly unique place to visit!!