California Trip -Sacramento -Part Three

In all the years we have visited my sister in the Sacramento area, I did not realize that this city is famous for having an abundance of great trees.  So this trip, in between celebrating Dolores' 80th birthday, we did some tourist things and took some interesting pictures of buildings, bridges, blossoms and trees in the Capital City.  Finding this water tower was a experience all of it's own!

Phoenix Field is a subdivision in Fair Oaks developed on old airport land close to where my sister lives.  In the tradition of Sacramento, the streets are lined with flowering trees... a thing of lasting beauty and a joy to walk thru.  You can see my camera shooting friends catching up to me.

I was quite taken with this hedge type bush that comes out with blazing red new leaves in the spring which mature green.  We tried to find the name but will have to stop by a nursery to get it... we welcome any advice from anyone who is familiar with it and can confirm the name.

There were several tulip trees blooming... but were just past their prime already.

I really do love these huge tulip blossoms... and when the tree is loaded with them it is gorgeous!

Merritt drove us past this castle house... and I got caught taking this picture.

Turned out that he is one of Merritt's dentist friends.

We all had a good laugh when he tried to justify why he was wearing these old, worn out shoes!

We stopped in at the Governor's Mansion... but we missed the last tour of the day.  Apparently Ronald Regan was the last California governor to live in this mansion.  Arnold Schwarzenegger lived in LA and stayed in the Hyatt Regency for $65K a year when he was in town.

Downtown we parked next to this tall skyscraper.  When I saw the name on the building it twigged why California is in such deep financial trouble.  This is the Environmental Protection Agency Headquarters Building for California.  I Googled it up and 3,500 people work here under the guise of protecting the environment.  This energy efficient building has 25 stories... only five stories (51 feet) less than the tallest building in Sacramento, the Wells Fargo Building, which is 30 stories and 423 feet high.

I found a great website to help identify tall buildings... and that is how I can tell you that this is the US Bank Plaza.  It also tells a lot of information about about each building... like this one is 26 stories and 376 feet high.  And the cool thing is the Emporis.com website has 50 of the tallest buildings in Sacramento listed.  As you move your mouse over the name a photo of each building pops up... very nice!

This Renaissance Tower is another wannabe tallest building in Sacramento... 28 stories with 6 levels of above ground parking... 372 feet.  The Chase Bank occupies first floor... and likely more above.  This was the first skyscraper to be built on 170-ton pilings.  Shirley and I likely took more photos of this building from more angles than any other.

That white dot just above right is not lint on the lens... it is the moon!   So, if we have both the sun and the moon that means on the other side of the world it is double dark!

Just down the street from the Renaissance Tower is the infamous Crest Theatre... but there were no takers to go and see Joan Rivers who was advertised to be there Sunday evening.

My family's response reminded me of a small plaster of Paris sculpture at home on the farm growing up. It had three monkey's sitting side by side. One with it's hands over his eyes, one had his hands over his ears and the third one had his hands over his mouth.  The saying that it illustrated was...

"See no evil.  Hear no evil.  Speak no evil."

With a weakness to photograph beautiful churches, we stopped to capture this Cathedral of the Sacred Sacrament.

These lesser tall buildings may not show up on the Emporis website, but if you were hungry for seafood this place comes with good reviews... and they also have an happy hour!

Merritt took us down Capitol Mall to see the Capitol Building...and while we were standing there...

In short order these three couples rolled of the limo to have their picture taken in front of the Capitol.

After the formal shot... they wanted an informal one.  So we all got our money's worth from that group. I think each of us... Merritt, Shirley and I each got a dozen different poses of these crazy kids who were celebrating on their way to their prom.

As the sun was setting and we got this view down Capitol Mall toward the lift span bridge and on the right is another skyscraper... the US Bank Tower.  It is no coincidence that the big banks have the tallest buildings in most cities.

As the sun was setting I got this shot of the Tower Bridge... the middle section is a lift span.

An hour later we got this shot from a sister bridge up river.  Since we couldn't stop on that bridge to take a picture we had a pretty long walk to capture this photo.

It was a great day... and we finished off at Chipotle's Mexican Grille.