Behind the Orange Curtain

[Cynthia]

Having just returned after twenty years in the wild Southwest, I am eager to check out any surviving weirdness in Orange County (CA) any suggestions?

I was glad to see that Garden Grove still has it's Stanley Ranch Museum and that the Santa Ana Zoo yet lives . . . also have to check out the Nixon Library as I was there for the opening as a young woman (lost a bet) and was so overwhelmed with the desire to kill some of the other attendees I don't remember a thing about it.

If only the Japanese Deer park was still here . . . ;)

[Cadaverous Pallor]

Santa Ana's arts district has a decent amount of cool culture to offer. This is something we mean to do more often.

http://www.santaanaartwalk.com/
http://www.santiagoartdistrict.com/

There are some great restaurants in downtown SA too.

[€uroMeinke]

Bowers still exists - as does the Newport Harbor Art Museum - only now it's called OCMA (Orange County Museum of Art). There are always the beaches, the tide pools of Laguna, Balboa Ferry and such - I think there still might even be a short stretch of undeveloped beach around Crystal Cove. South Coast Plaza still exists, but it's transformed quite a bit - some good people watching there, but you got an AP already so you have that covered with Disneyland.

[Ghoulish Delight]

You can observer the "progress" of the Great Park in Irvine, where the El Torro Marine base was. So far it consists of....I'm not entirely sure. A big balloon ride. That's as much as I know. That and the fact that they've caved and will allow commercial development of some of the land.

[BarTopDancer]

You can observer the "progress" of the Great Park in Irvine, where the El Torro Marine base was. So far it consists of....I'm not entirely sure. A big balloon ride. That's as much as I know. That and the fact that they've caved and will allow commercial development of some of the land.

And a Cirque show that completely FBUARs traffic at Sand Canyon and the 5.

[Kevy Baby]

There is a really cool park at 1313 South Harbor Blvd. in Anaheim!

[BarTopDancer]

There are the Tall Ships at Dana Point Harbor. If you take the 133 south you'll hit 2 nature parks, some wine shops and some art areas.