A Day in California from Ryan Killackey on Vimeo.

I stumbled onto this “Day in California” video via the great design-inspired travel blog, Prêt à Voyager. The video is made up of 10,000 images taken over a year and a half by Ryan Killackey and his wife, who have made great use of a slide-tilt effect using Adobe’s After-Effects. This is for all of you who are inspired by the beauty that is California.

I have no definite plans yet, but I hope to pull together my own quick video ode to SoCal for the release of the book on the area. Until then, enjoy!

I’m a big fan of Sunset magazine, but when I got the most recent issue, I have to say that I was a bit disappointed. Truthfully, it’s just about two little things about which I know a lot about. Date shakes and burgers. I love them both. Profusely. So, I have to disagree with the editor’s top pick’s in the July 2011 Sunset issue’s piece, “The West’s Best Road Food.” Are the best shakes really at Shield’s Date Garden in Indio? Delicious? Yes. Creamy? Check. Can be paired with a free screening of The Romance and Sex Life of the Date? Absolutely. But they are NOT the best in the desert. That accolade goes to the Windmill Market & Produce in Desert Hot Springs/North Palm Springs on a deserted, almost dirt road, with a sign that reads, “Best Shakes in the Desert” or something like that. It’s true too. I’d drive far, far out of my way to get their date shake, made with REAL dates, I might add, not just date crystals.

Photo by Andrea Gómez Romero for Sunset

Secondly, Manny’s Buckhorn Tavern is listed over Owl Cafe for best burger of the West (ironically these two restaurants make the two best burgers I’ve ever had in my life and they are across the street from each other in San Antonio, NM, which has just that–one street.) OK, it’s not as bad as the date shake mistake, in which Windmill didn’t even get listed, but I’m a little miffed. No burger I’ve ever tasted in my 30 something years of existence has matched the burger perfection that is an Owl Cafe burger. Manny’s is pretty good but…I’m clearly partial to the Owl. Been going since I was about 12 years old after swim meets in Socorro. Damn! I miss that place.

When my father told our family we’d be moving to New Mexico in 1986 the only thing I knew about the city was the Santa Fe railroad. I imaged a dusty old mining town in the middle of a deserted and lonely wasteland with a few snakes and a fast train that sped by the poor people who happened to live there. I was devastated to have to leave my home in Seattle. And, of course, now I just miss it when I think about all the special things there that just can’t be found anywhere else…

This video, put out by the people at Albuquerque’s very own Hollywood East (the Sony Imageworks studio), documents these same sentiments by the first 40 employees that picked up and moved to Albuquerque from Los Angeles and the rest of the world. It’s kind of funny to hear all the first impressions of this place I newly called home some 25 years ago. Boy, all these people really need to get their hands on New Mexico: A Guide for the Eyes!

Good Afternoon Costco Shoppers. When shopping at Costco in the state of New Mexico, you can now pick up a copy of your favorite book on the state: New Mexico: A Guide for the Eyes.

I’m not sure about you, but I don’t see Costco as a tourist destination for visitors of Santa Fe or Albuquerque, so this is a real testament to the fact that the book is popular with tourists and locals alike. Oh, and Happy Shopping!

Oh boy. Days after I posted about EyeMuse Books’s very own Google Map to showcase the spots in SoCal I’ve hit for photos thus far, I visited Huell Hower’s website and found a map that makes mine look absolutely lame. Granted, my final map will have a meager 100 destinations around the region simply because I chose to highlight only 100 “icons” of the state, but seeing all the stops that Huell’s map has makes me feel…lazy. All right, all right, I know he’s been in production for 19, yes, NINETEEN years, and this is his full time job, but jeepers! Way to get around, Huell! If you haven’t seen the show on your local PBS station, it’s a gem. Check it out. Truth be told, I was visiting his website because I realized that I have seen only a handful of episodes, and I better get watching, because he is a serious resource regarding the culture and history of Southern California.

Dallas Clayton, who self-published the children’s book, “An Awesome Book” in 2008, seems truly awesome. The book, like all great kid’s books, has a deeper message that speaks to people of all ages, without losing its humor or fun. DREAM BIG! the book urges. And, after you are done reading it, that’s exactly what you’d like to do. What’s even better is learning about the mega-success the book has had. Kids clearly love the book, and the creator is loving his new found career of writing and illustrating children’s books. For every book that is sold, one is donated to a child, a school, a hospital. I love seeing a book that hasn’t come out of a big publishing house make such a spash! Great story, inspiring message, excellent visuals–An Awesome Book made my day. Yeah, Dallas Clayton, for living your dreams!

A few weeks ago, my husband, son, and I head out to Palm Springs for a spontaneous getaway. I had a list of photographs to take, of course, as well as a growing curiosity about the local date farms. The 15 minute excursion to Thermal, CA was the perfect mix of pleasure and business, because I’ll not lie, fresh dates rank high among my favorite snacks. 95% of the dates sold in the United States are grown in the Coachella Valley, and by all accounts it’s a tough business.

After the year’s harvest is over in December farmers must begin anew the long list of annual chores that go into cultivating these delicious fruits. And, it’s almost all done by hand, with some torturous looking tools. Each date branch must be manually de-thorned, then pollinated, then thinned, then covered (to keep moisture and pests from ruining or eating the crop), and finally it’s harvest time again. All the while, the palms must be continually irrigated in pools of water. Unlike most plants and trees, a graft or offshoot must be taken from an existing date palm to cultivate known date varieties–simply planting a seed will produce an entirely new type of date! Which is why visiting a farm is so satisfying–there are new flavors at each stop. Most commercial date palms grown today in Southern California are direct offshoots from the original date palms first brought into the region in 1890 from various countries of the Middle East.

Date harvesters, called palmeros, take ladders up the palms and cut off branches (which usually hold about 150 pounds of dates) using what look like over sized Captain Hook hands.

Driving a long and lonely road through Thermal, we attempted to visit Flying Disc Ranch, but instead found a team of harvesters finishing off the last of the Barhi dates from another commercial farm. The manager on site was very kind to allow me to photograph his team working, and offered a huge bunch to us to prepare at home (my instructions were simply to hydrate them and let them dry again).

Later we did find Flying Disc Ranch (a far smaller operation) and watched two workers there pick out “raw” dates from ripe ones. Technically all dates are raw, but the freshest dates retain a color and crispness that is unlike the dark and wrinkly fruit we all know. These taste a bit like coconut.

We finished our journey at Oasis Date Gardens where I discovered a love for the very dried, and sweet, Thoory and Kway varieties. Amazing! After 3 farms, we left Thermal with a date shake in hand, and a full belly of the tastiest batch of dates I’ve ever had.

We are honored to announce that New Mexico: A Guide for the Eyes has won a New Mexico Book Award for the Travel category. The title was up against two deserving books, which makes the prize even more special. Check out the entire list of winners here–we congratulate them all!