Exploring the Los Angeles area – Griffith Park and Observatory

This was our first real weekend in this area after we moved. Got up late and looked up things to do. I had always read/heard about the Griffith Observatory. Decided to go there. And I was glad we went.

We first went to the Griffith Park which is about 30 minutes drive from where we are (we took the Los Feliz exit off I-5 to get there although I later found that going there via CA-134 may have been easier/faster).

There are a lot of things to see in the park itself. It has a zoo, couple of museums, equesterian center, pony rides and a rail-road. We did not get time to visit any of these places. But drove around the park. The road inside the park is a loop. We started from Crystal Springs Dr which connects to Griffith Park Dr. The travel town museum caught our eye. I like railroads in general and it looked as if they had lot of old steam locomotives. Their website also has information about steam locomotive rides which will be interesting.

We stopped at the merry-go-around hoping to get something to eat. But the snack shop there is not particularly well stocked. It looked like the snack shop at the railroad entrance was bigger and probably has more options.

After driving around we went to the Observatory which is in the park but about 4 miles away from the park entrance on Crystal Springs. The distance should not be surprising – Griffith park is spread over 3500 acres!

The main observatory parking lot was full so we had to park in the Greek theatre parking lot. The walk up from the Greek threatre to the Observatory is fun. You can walk along the road while taking some small short-cuts to get around the switchbacks. Even though it was cold we enjoyed the walk. The only problem was when coming back the walk could be dark. Fortunately, the city had put up portable flourescent lights to make sure the road was well lit.

The observatory itself deserves a separate post. It offers spectacular views of the city of Angels and the famous “Hollywood” sign. Apart from Hollywood Blvd, this was the only other place where I could see the sign although this was clearly a better view.

There are lot of exhibits – but I highly recommend spending time at the Foucault Pendulum which is right at the entrance. You should see the pendulum knock over a peg.

After roaming around the observatory we saw the show at the planetaurium. The show was a short chronology from the big bang and also a brief history of observation starting with Ptolemy, Copernicus, Gallieleo all the way to modern astronomers like Hubble. It was titled “Centered at the Universe”. I would highly recommend watching it.

Tip: If you visit the Observatory on a busy day like we did, there will be long lines for tickets to the planetaurium shows. But you can beat the line by purchasing your tickets at the automated kiosks which is near the solar system exhibits. The kiosk is not operational until the ticket booth opens. But not everyone knows about the kiosk and the observatory staff does not remind people about it.

Also make sure you get in the line to enter the observatory 20 to 25 minutes before the show begins.

Repairing digital camera

The lens cover for my Canon Powershot SD 800 IS stopped working. Apparently, it is a common problem since Canon has a KB article on their support web site. There is also a self help article on the web. I tried doing that but it is awfully difficult to do it yourself especially if you do not have instruments to handle the tiny parts. I think I ended up breaking one of the shutters and almost lost the tiny springs which hold them together. But fortunately I found it.

The camera is almost 20 months old. So it was out of warranty coverage. I asked Canon for an estimate and they gave me a quote of about $150. Plus, they wanted me to ship it to Chicago which would have cost at least $20 more. So I searched for a local repair shop.

Luckily, I found one in the Los Angeles area – Eric’s Camera Repair. It is in Glendale. It is a small shop but the technician knows how to repair these delicate devices. He repaired my camera for $65 and it looks like it is holding up very well.

Donating your old computer

If you are in the San Francisco bay area, the best way to dispose off your old cranky computer is to donate it to crc.org.

How to dispose off your satellite dish?

I recently moved from the Bay Area to Southern California. I had DirecTV and was fortunate that my new home allowed for installing satellite dishes. So I decided to transfer the service. DirecTV and DISH network both do not care about the actual satellite dish. So you can either carry it or dispose it off.

To dispose off your dish in the San Franscisco bay area – most recycle centers accept a full metal dish. In my case, I called the Sunnyvale SMART station. They asked me to dump the dish in the metal dump. And they do it for free.

Various other people have come up with other creative ways to use an old dish. Like this one. . I will add one to it. Use it as your dinner plate!

Hello world!

What a way to introduce yourself in the tech world! WordPress gave that title to their first post. I liked it so I will keep it.

What is this blog? It is a compilation of useful information, travel logs, informative articles/links and finally my opinions.

Why? Over the last few months I had come across many occassions when I wanted some information which was available on the web but was not filed in a helpful way. I am hoping that my posts show up in some search results and someone finds it helpful.