Reverie, Speed and Traffic on the L.A. Freeways.

I'm in Southern California, visiting with my boys, and their families. I'm in the foreground, in a blue jacket. My husband and grandchild are at the end of the harbor. My daughter-in-law is taking this picture. On this day, we are all visiting the Huntington Gardens and Libraries, a delight of art, architecture and landscape. Here, we are in a part of the Chinese Gardens, on a sunny afternoon.

We could have spent a couple more hours here. But, in L.A. you have to ponder traffic in all your decisions.

To go anywhere, to see and do anything in Southern Cal. you have to drive on freeways.
Well, on good days, you get places on time and without a lot of stress.
On this particular day, the return trip took us two additional hours, not because of traffic problems-though there were a few-but because of our assumptions about things. We travelled on the commuter lane,  for two or more passengers. Most of these lanes take you straight from one freeway to the next.

On our trip, we were on the San Gabriel Freeway ready to go south on the Long Beach Frwy. We stayed on our commuter lane anticipating an option. No! We ended up on the Santa Monica West. So, we promptly looked for a way to go south, and the Harbor showed up in time. From the Harbor south, we had to go east to get back to the Long Beach Frwy.

You get my point. It was after 3:00p.m. and rush-hour traffic was beginning.
That  calm reverie at the Chinese Garden?
Trampled on the freeways.
And we knew these things ahead of time!