Balboa Park Part 2

Today I have pictures from the Air and Space Museum, some pictures of buildings, and the Botanical Building.  Also more pictures from the Automotive Museum. 

The cars were fabulous, as were the motor cycles.  Some of the vehicles had been restored to glossy new.  Others looked as if they had just found them after they were stuck in a mud pile for 75 years.  Interestingly, I tend to like the non restored better.  Maybe the history was talking to me.

Indian, gorgeous motorcycles.  

This is a military motorcycle from WWII.

This is a very early car.  You can see Marty and me in the mirror.  That will give you an idea of how large this car is.  Many of the early cars had 16 cylinders.

                                                     

                                           

The Apollo 9 space capsule.  It looks way shinier than it is.  Most of the paint is burned off, and the bottom where the heat shield is was black.

 

This is the killing machine, the Drone.

 

Notice that these are a Navy jet fighter and a Navy helicopter.  San Diego is a Navy town, no Air Force exhibit here.

This is a replica of a German WWI plane. Among the serious stuff, a little humor.  In 1978 the museum burned and they lost everything.  They have recreated the planes they lost.  Other planes obtained since then are original.

They didn’t tell us who Bunnie was.

Several of the museums.  The architecture is stunning.

                                                    

The Botanical Building.  I was expecting a glass building.  This is just slats and is open air.

This is the view with the Botanical Building at your back.  The Lily Pond.  The smell was awful yesterday.  They had seeded and sodded around the pond.  We think they used fairly fresh manure to help the grass along.

Inside a true jungle.  There were orchids, ferns, banana plants, Australian Tree Ferns that go to the ceiling.

This will give you a sense of scale.  Marty is close to 6 feet tall.  You can’t even see the ceiling here.

Few plants were identified.  So don’t know what this is other than lovely.

                                                                     

We loved the swirl of these plants.

Another beauty with no identification.

Next week we hope to go back and visit other museums.  There are so many gardens for us to visit also.  Part of these visits are just because we love gardens and museums.  But we are previewing for when Little Brother and wife Ann come Thanksgiving.  We need to know what is out there for them to see.  Of course I will send them links to Balboa Park and other sites in the area.  They may see something we hadn’t even thought of.

Hope you enjoyed this.  We certainly enjoyed our day out Tuesday.