Ell Alley: February 2016

Monday, February 1, 2016

Las Vegas

Desert scrub, red rocks & La Madre Mountains at Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area

Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area Visitor Center

The White Hills & La Madre Mountains

Rusty in the White Hills with pinyon pine

Juniper-pinyon forest between the White Hills & La Madre Mountains

We were in Las Vegas NV from January 28 to 31, 2016. We had arrived on Thursday in time for lunch, which we had at Chili’s near the airport & also near the Delano on the Las Vegas Strip. The hotel was beautiful, very tasteful in comparison to the other hotels. It was the hotel farthest south from downtown Las Vegas along the strip, one of 2 hotels in the Mandalay Bay development. We walked directly into the Mandalay Bay casino from the Delano lobby. Everything was enclosed like a suburban shopping mall. There were shops & restaurants surrounding the casino. That evening we had dinner at the Bayside Buffet at Mandalay, then walked through the shopping arcade to Luxor, another hotel & casino. We took a tram from Luxor to Excalibur, the next casino on the corner of our block. The air quality in the casinos diminished as we moved from Mandalay to Excalibur. Mandalay was fine. Excalibur was horrible. Smoking is allowed inside. That was a shock, but it smelled worse than just smoke. After that, we avoided casinos.

On Friday, we went to Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area. The drive through suburban Las Vegas was interesting. The architecture & landscaping looked just like southern California. The Las Vegas Valley has mountains all around, like Los Angeles. It was a pretty view to the mountains from all over the valley. Jordan & Rusty hiked 8 miles around the White Rock Hills. In the canyon between the hills & the La Madre Mountains, there was a forest of pinyon pine & juniper. There was quite a variety of plants: manzanita & a dozen other shrubs, 6 species of cactus as well as 2 species of Yucca & an Agave. The climb up through the canyon gave spectacular views, but it wasn’t difficult. The descent into Red Rock Valley was less interesting & the last 2 miles along the lower edge of the White Rock Hills was exhausting after almost 4 hours of hiking. Steve was asleep in the back of the car when they returned to where they started.

That night, we saw the Cirque du Soleil production O at the swanky Bellagio near the center of the strip. O was flawless. It was beautiful, amusing & fascinating all the way through the 90 minute show. Much of the performance of O takes place in a large pool that covers most of the stage. Pieces of stage are raised & lowered so that the depth & size of the pool changed continually. For brief moments there was no pool at all. There were synchronized swimmers, divers, gymnasts, acrobats, dancers, contortionists, clowns, men who worked with fire, assorted characters, singers & a small orchestra. The music was excellent. When the show was over, we walked along the strip with thousands of people. We saw the water show outside Bellagio. We passed shops, restaurants, hotels & casinos like New York New York, Paris Las Vegas & Caesars Palace. We had never seen such a crowded street scene, except possibly in New York City.

On Saturday morning, Jordan & Rusty drove to the Sloan Canyon National Conservation Area in Henderson, a Las Vegas suburb. It was warmer than the day before & quite windy. The temperatures in Las Vegas those 3 days ranged from 41 to 72. The hills & valleys of Sloan Canyon were beautiful, but unchanging. The vegetation was sparse. They walked about a mile, then turned around. Henderson is an upscale suburb against the hills at the edge of the Las Vegas Valley. They had lunch at Panera in an outdoor shopping complex. That evening we drove to downtown Las Vegas, which was filled with people. It was seedy. Many of the shops & casinos there were run down, some even empty. We left to get dinner at Bonefish Grill in another upscale outdoor shopping center on Las Vegas Blvd, not far south from the Delano. It also had a Whole Foods supermarket.

Here are photos from Red Rock Canyon & Sloan Canyon:
https://picasaweb.google.com/100763275568283270725/RedRockCanyo n

About Ell Alley

Ell Alley is the home of Jetta, Jordan, Kitty, Rusty, Steve & Toby. It is named for the alley beside & behind the house that forms an ell: the shape of the letter L. It is located in the Rainier Vista development, in the Rainier Valley of Seattle, which extends 7 miles southeast from Downtown Seattle to Rainier Beach, between Beacon Hill & the lakeside ridges of Mt Baker, Lakewood & Seward Park. Ell Alley is 4 miles from Downtown Seattle, 0.4 miles from the Columbia City Station & 0.7 miles from the center of the Columbia City Landmark District.

Rainier Valley History

The first settlers arrived in the 1850s, but settlement was slow until the forest was cut down & milled, as it was throughout the city. Developers bought logged-off land toward the end of the 19th century. They laid out the communities of Genesee, Columbia City, Hillman City, Brighton & Dunlap.

Cheap land in the valley, just outside the City of Seattle, attracted Italians of rural origins & they planted large, productive gardens. The north end of the Rainier Valley became known as Garlic Gulch. Japanese immigrants also had farms in the valley. The produce filled local markets including Pike Place.

The Rainier Avenue Electric Railway opened the valley to greater development, reaching Columbia City in 1891 & Renton in 1896. In 1907, the City of Seattle annexed most of southeast Seattle, including the Rainier Valley.

At the start of World War II, Japanese residents were forced into internment camps east of the mountains. Tens of thousands of war workers came to Seattle to work at the Boeing Company, the shipyards & the port. The US government constructed thousands of temporary housing units at Rainier Vista, Stadium Homes (now Mt Baker Village) & Holly Park in the Rainier Valley.

After the war, the temporary housing became public, low-income housing. Suburban development took many white residents away from the valley. Blacks moved into the Rainier Valley from the over-crowded, nearby Central Area. Interracial couples found acceptance here. Filipinos arrived in large numbers.

After the fall of Saigon in 1975, refugees came from southeast Asia: Vietnamese, Cambodian, Hmong, Lao & Mien peoples. Many settled in the Rainier Valley. Chinese continued to arrive, although most settled on nearby Beacon Hill. There was a small influx of Mexicans. Somali immigration began after US involvement in Somalia in 1992.

Work on new housing at NewHolly (formerly Holly Park) began in 1997 & continued for a decade, with 1400 units sold to private owners. The rebuilding of Rainier Vista began in 2003 & still continues. Columbia City rapidly gentrified starting in the late 1990s. Many units of new housing were built in the form of townhouses, condos & apartments.

The current population of the Rainier Valley is about 41,000. The racial breakdown is 34.1% Asian, 26.9% Caucasian, 26% African American, 1.6% Pacific Islander, 6.5% Mixed Race, 1% Native American and 3.4% from other races. Hispanic or Latino of any race are 7.2% of the population.

Our Land & Climate

The city of Seattle rests between 2 bodies of water: Puget Sound & Lake Washington. Puget Sound is a substantial part of the Salish Sea & a very small part of the Pacific Ocean. The Salish Sea is set apart from the Pacific by the Olympic Peninsula in the state of Washington & Vancouver Island in the province of British Columbia. The dense, wet clouds of the Pacific Ocean travel as far as the Cascade Mountains, near the Salish Sea & not very far from the ocean. East of the Cascades lies the desert of the Columbia Basin. The moist, temperate climate of Seattle extends south to northern California & north to southeastern Alaska. The Pacific Northwest Coast from San Francisco Bay to Cook Inlet shares a flora dominated by evergreen coniferous forest. The central portion, west of the Cascade Mountains, is called Cascadia. The climate is cool & wet from fall to spring, warm & dry in summer. The Olympic Mountains block Seattle from much of the Pacific rainfall. Seattle is drier than the Atlantic coast of North America & northern Europe, cooler in summer & warmer in winter. It lies near the latitude of Paris & Quebec City.

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Monday, February 1, 2016

Las Vegas