A Night to Celebrate Community, Creativity, and The Joy of Coming Together.
The Atlanta BeltLine Lantern Parade is a magical event that takes place annually in Atlanta, Georgia. The Lantern Parade is a night to celebrate community, creativity, and the joy of coming together. This year on May 11th, 2024 was the 14th year the Parade took place on the Atlanta Beltline, specifically on the Westside Trail.
Created and presented by Chantelle Rytter and the Krewe of the Grateful Gluttons, this parade brings together thousands of people, hundreds of lanterns, and some really big lantern puppets for a festive evening of creativity, community, and magic. Lantern enthusiasts of all ages gather to light up the Atlanta BeltLine, creating a magical atmosphere.
Everyone is invited to join in the fun! Whether you’re a spectator or a participant, the parade welcomes anyone with a lantern. Participants are encouraged to create their own homemade lanterns to showcase their creativity. Spectators can either watch from the sidelines or jump in and dance to the music.
Live bands accompany the procession, including groups like the Atlanta Drum Academy, Black Sheep Ensemble, Seed & Feed Marching Abominables, Atlanta Freedom Band, and Kebbi Williams & the Wolf Pack.
The Atlanta BeltLine Lantern Parade began in 2010 with just a few hundred participants. Over the years, it has grown to include tens of thousands of lantern enthusiasts, making it one of the most anticipated events in the city.
Keep an eye out for details about the 2025 Lantern Parade! If you’re in Atlanta during the parade, I highly recommend experiencing this enchanting celebration of light, creativity, and community! It’s wonderful to see how lantern festivals continue to captivate audiences in different ways!
How I Got to Audition, Be Cast and Work on the amazing film.
How I Got to Audition, Be Cast and Work on the Film
It was late in 2021, when my agent called to tell me that I had an audition for The Color Purple the Musical which would be filming in Atlanta, GA later that year. It was a non-singing part, and the audition would be by self-tape. The practice of the self-tape started in the late 2000’s but when the Pandemic arrived it became the only way to audition for a while and is now the preferred way of casting directors to audition for Film and TV.
Short video of the Premiere night of The Color Purple the Musical
A self-tape is when an actor in the privacy of your own home or in a professional studio prepares an audition with the material that the filmmakers have sent you whether that’s a monologue or a scene or a song. You film either with a digital camera or phone, edit it, making it look as professional as you can and then send it into the casting director. The part I was asked to audition for was the mayor. It is when the mayor’s wife asks the character Sofia, the strong-willed independent thinking black woman to be her maid, and Sofia turns her down. The mayor’s wife gets very upset, calling Sofia a derogatory name, and Sofia insults her back. In the time and place of The Color Purple, a black woman in the South was not allowed to speak to a white woman in that manner or with that tone of voice. The mayor overhears this conversation, and he comes over and slaps Sofia. Sofia turns around and decks him with a punch that knocks him out. She is then surrounded by white men, beaten, and hauled off to jail.
My self-tape was basically a monologue, so I pretended that I yelled at Sofie and slapped her. It was only me there when I did the audition. I did not slap anyone – it was all pretend. I filmed it with my phone, edited it and sent it off to the casting director. I then forgot about it because that is how you have to approach self-tapes. You get no feedback on how you did as opposed to before in the pre-Pandemic days where you often went in for an in-person audition. I did not hear anything for a long time and really had forgotten I had even done the audition when weeks later I got a call from my agent saying that I had been cast in The Color Purple in the part of the Deputy. A part that I had not even auditioned for, and I was extremely excited. To be cast in a big screen movie being produced by Oprah Winfrey and Steven Spielberg was very exciting.
From the time that I was cast to the time that I was going to actually appear on set and film my part was going to be several months, and the money they were offering for me to be in the movie was extremely low. I had just moved from Los Angeles, and I put the difference in union film pay down to the fact I was in Georgia, a right-to-work state. On a few occasions I actually told my agent that I would probably pass on the part. There had been a big miscommunication between my agent and myself on what they were going to pay me. I thought the film was going to pay me a very small fee since it was just a few lines, when in actuality they were paying me a couple of thousand dollars. When I told my agent that I was probably going to take a vacation and go overseas, she became very upset with me. That’s how we discovered the misunderstanding, and of course, I stayed.
On Thursday, July 30th, 2022, I show up at the set of The Color Purple which was filming at Blackhall Studios in the Atlanta area. Now my contract called for that I would have a trailer with a dressing room which is pretty normal for a major motion picture when you have a speaking part. Yet, according to the script, I only had a few lines so I was thinking it would not be very elaborate. I had not seen the script since that was being kept a secret. I knew what scene I was working in, but I didn’t know how they were going to shoot it.
When I got to set, I checked in with the production manager. I was then taken to my trailer by a production assistant. When I walked inside the trailer, I found I had a couch, a television, refrigerator, and a radiant heat fireplace plus my own private bathroom. So for a small part, it was the height of luxury. A few minutes after I had gotten into my trailer there was a knock on my door. I opened it to find a young woman of about 24 who said that she was my personal production assistant for the day. I’ve been working in films for 40 years, most of them pretty low budget. I’ve never had my own personal production assistant and I really wasn’t sure exactly what she was supposed to do. Turned out she was to get my food, walk me to and from the set and make sure that I had anything that I needed. In general, just take care of me.
Director Blitz Bawazula
After we’ve been introduced to each other and she explained that she would come get me when it was time for me to go to makeup and hair, she left and I’m sitting in my trailer trying to get used to the fact that I have my own trailer and a personal production assistant. All of a sudden, I heard someone playing some really good Blues guitar. I walked out of my trailer and went down a couple of trailers where I saw a very nice looking African American man wearing a really cool hat. He was sitting outside a trailer with an acoustic guitar with a pickup playing some wonderful blues through a really small little amp next to him. The woman who was my personal assistant was listening to him. I had no idea who he was. I thought perhaps he was the music coordinator for the film. I asked him that and he went “Yeah, I’m something like that” as he continued to play. My production assistant laughed and says, “Yeah he’s really important and he’s really good.” Then she left and I listened to him for another few minutes and then I returned to my trailer.
Author as The Deputy
Time passes slowly on a movie set. You either stay in your trailer and read or watch TV, or you walk around like I did and talk to the crew. Eventually my assistant brought me my costume and took me to Makeup and Hair. After that I got dressed in my costume and was taken onto the set where I was introduced to the director, who turned out to be the man playing the blues guitar. His name was Blitz Bawazula, a Ghanaian filmmaker, author, visual artist, rapper, singer-songwriter, and record producer who had worked with Beyonce’ among others. The scene we were shooting that day featured Fantasia Barrino who was playing Celia and Danielle Brooks who was playing Sofia and myself. The scene had a large jail cell set like a cellblock in a prison. It was enclosed on all sides and had a full roof. The cinematographer was Dan Laustsen, a Danish cinematographer best known for Crimson Peak (2015), John Wick: Chapter 2 (2017) and The Shape of Water (2017) for which he received an Academy Award nomination. By now I was feeling fairly intimidated by all this big-name talent and the general tone of the set. The set was very professional and friendly but there seemed to be a little tension in the air. So, I just stood back out of the way, and didn’t think I was going to have much interaction with the director.
Fantasia Barrino and the Author
Blitz walked us through the blocking mostly talking to Fantasia and Danielle, and he went back to the video village which is where the director and the producers watch through monitors what is being filmed on set. We did a quick run-through of the blocking and Blitz came over to give some direction to Fantasia and Danielle. Then he turned to me and said, “I need to give you more lines.” Which of course as an actor, I was very happy about. He said on the next run-through he would tell me where to add these extra lines.
So began this wonderful day where I soon realized that I was not going to ever have my face on the screen, but they were going to shoot me from every possible angle. The idea being that when Celia comes to visit Sofia and it’s time for her to go, I come in and order her to leave. She’s very slow to get up so I threatened to beat her with a night stick. I never say that, but you can see the night stick in my hand. I am always in shadow. I’m always backlit or shot from the side but my face is always in shadow. We would shoot it one way and then they would shoot it from another side. Because the set was an enclosed cell when they wanted to shoot from a different direction, they literally took a wall out so that they could get the cameras set and the lighting correct. Then they would put the wall back in and shoot us from another angle. They shot me from behind, they shot me from the side, they shot me from the far end of the cell near where Sofia is sitting and then they also shot me in close up as Celia leaves the cell and I closed the door behind her.
Fantasia Barrino and the Author
When I arrived on set, I didn’t know who the director was. That information had not been given to me so I found Blitz to be very friendly and very interested in anything that I had to say concerning the character or how I should deliver lines. He was very respectful even though I had a very small part. One of the things that particularly impressed me in that I had never seen on a movie set before was while he was directing our scene in between setups or getting ready for the scene to restart, he was also editing the movie at the same time. Not our particular scene but I watched him edit the musical number that Fantasia/Celia sings after she leaves the jail. It had already been shot and he was giving preliminary editing notes to an assistant editor who was on the set with him. Maybe all major motion pictures do this at this point, but this was the first time I had ever seen it on a movie set. Editing while simultaneously you are shooting another scene. To be able to keep those two jobs going simultaneously was incredibly impressive.
I didn’t really get to spend or get to know the woman who was playing Sofia that much because Danielle Brooks was at the other end of the cell behind bars and when we took a break she went back to her trailer or dealt with her personal entourage. Because Fantasia and I were on the other side of the prison bars and we had dialogue with each other, over the next six hours I got over my intimidation not of her personally but of the scope of the project. We actually had some laughs and at the end she took a bunch of photographs with me which I thought was very nice. As is the custom on a movie set when an actor who has a speaking part leaves the set, the assistant director called out, “And that’s a wrap for James Carey.”
Lobby of Preview in Atlanta at Tara Theatre
More than a year later in December of 2023, I found an e-mail on my computer inviting me to a cast and crew screening of The Color Purple at the Tara Theatre in Atlanta. The movie was finally ready and was to open nationwide on Christmas Day. I was very excited to see the film. I had no idea what it looked like. The film had been kept on wraps for almost an entire year and Oprah had the studio doing a series of targeted screenings to groups around the country in order to build word of mouth.
Lainie Smith and Author at Preview
My partner, Lainie Smith and I showed up at the theater that night, and there were two screenings going on simultaneously. In one theater was the screening for all the bigwigs and important guests, while in the other were all the crew and cast who did not have major parts like me with their friends and families to watch the film. Of course, I’ve seen Steven Spielberg’s version from 1985, which was a magnificent film that helped make the careers of Whoopi Goldberg and Oprah Winfrey as actresses, but this version was a revelation. The acting of all the main actors especially Fantasia and Danielle who played Celia and Sofia and Celia’s abusive husband Mister, played by Colman Domingo were amazing.
Lou Gossett played Mister’s father and even though he was almost confined to a wheelchair, it was wonderful to see the Academy Award-winning actor who is now in his 80’s on screen and hold his own with everybody else. He also gave a touching speech at the screening, welcoming us and saying he believed this was a wonderful and unforgettable movie. He was absolutely right.
Swag from The Color Purple
The dance numbers, the music which comes from the Broadway musical, The Color Purple, and the cinematography are all excellent. The message of the show and how it’s delivered is life affirming. It’s a positive message and while the subject matter at times is incredibly dark, Fantasia’s performance as we watch Celia go from an ignored abused little girl to a successful businesswoman who is finally in control of her own future is really marvelous. The editing is superb.
I cannot recommend The Color Purple the Musical enough. It is a moving, touching, warm hearted time in a movie theater. Just make sure you bring a box of tissues because you’ll definitely cry. It was really a privilege to be part of this excellent and moving film. I hope you enjoy it and wish all of you a happy 2024.
2023 was a watershed year for me. It was the best year that I’d had in a decade. The last really good year that I could remember was 2014 when I got married to my ex-wife. The day that we got married, I was full of love, happiness and incredibly enthusiastic about the future. I had a woman that I loved, my professional career seemed to be going extremely well and financially I had bailed myself out from the ruins of the worldwide fiscal crisis of 2008. What I didn’t realize was that would be the high point for a long time.
They say the first year of marriage is terrible and I can agree with that. After the euphoria of getting married had worn off, the day-to-day just dragged on my ex-wife, and while I didn’t know it, she was already planning her escape. Not every year was bad. In fact, each January as I looked at the coming year, it seemed like exciting things were going to happen both professionally and personally but by December our lives were filled with chaos, pain, question marks about our relationship and professional inertia. Then came a hard divorce, followed by the Pandemic, followed by a need to sell my house and leave my chosen home city of Los Angeles and a move to Atlanta, GA. The first couple of years in Atlanta were difficult. I found friends, and work but I never quite felt like I fit in here, and I missed parts of the life that I’d had in California.
And then in 2023, it all seemed to come together. I wrote, directed, produced and released an award-winning short film, Love Potion. The film did not win as many awards as some of my previous films had but we took a shot for the big time and film festivals like Sundance and Tribeca. We did not get into them, yet I am immensely proud of the film and feel it is my most complete movie. I acted in five movies, I appeared in five commercials, I was in two music videos including a game changing country western music video by Tyler Childers where I portrayed a gay coal miner who fell in love with another miner. The controversy that music video created was an amazing thing to watch and I’m proud I was part of that project. I bought a condo and put down new roots. While I did not travel internationally as I usually do during a year, I found myself working as an actor in Baltimore, Austin, Nashville, Charleston and Rock Hill, SC. I put the finishing touches on a book that I hope to release in 2024. Both personally and professionally, I felt more satisfied and complete than I had in a long time.
While 2023 was an amazing year, it was also a year of hard struggles, doubt, wondering where all this was leading, and a lot of personal reflection. One of my siblings faced a life-threatening blood disease and thanks to the stars above, they managed to survive. With all the professional success that I had during 2023, that was without a doubt the most important thing that happened in my life. My sibling survived, and because of that situation I took a look at my own personal life and my legacy. I realized I was closer to the end than I was to the beginning and needed to change my perspective on life and work. My life has often been about the end result. Producing the product, getting the job done, what is the end goal and how to find the next job. The older I get, the more I realize it is more about the journey than it is about what you accomplish. Completing the work and making sure that the project is excellent are extremely important, but paying attention to the day-to-day journey through life is equally as important. As John Lennon said, “Life is what happens while you’re making other plans.” In 2023, I found that to be absolutely true.
I hope 2024 will be as successful both personally and professionally. It’s already shaping up to be what looks like an interesting year, but rarely does it happen that you have two incredible years back-to-back. I’m talking to a producer about directing a feature for them, my film partner and I are in discussion with another producer about a project we’ve already done that they might want to take to the next level. I’ve been hired by a local theater group to direct 2 plays for them including the American classic, The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams about which I’m excited. Yet, I’m trying to keep everything in perspective and remember it’s about the journey and living in the moment.
To all of you, I wish a happy and successful 2024, and I hope your journey is exciting and fulfilling.
@ 2024, Carey On Creative, LLC., Atlanta, GA. Tripswithjames.com is a copyrighted entity of Carey On Creative, LLC.
“I really liked Love Potion. Not only does it deal with obsession, but the film also provides a supernatural element that has possible evil hiding just under the surface.”
A Short Film Premiere – A Film by James Carey
This event took place on Sunday, July 23rd of 2023.
There will be another screening of LOVE POTION on Sunday, November 12th, 2023, at the Tara Theater in Atlanta around 2 PM. Please look out for more information here on Tripswithjames.com or www.lovepotionthefilm.com or @lovepoitionthefilm or www.jamesrcarey.com .
There is a link to the film at the end of the blog. The viewing is free, so check it out and let us know what you think of LOVE POTION!
THE BEGINNING
For those of you who are not familiar with my blog, or the story of LOVE POTION, let me give you a little background. LOVE POTION is a 27 1/2-minute short film produced by my film partner Lainie Smith and myself from a script that I wrote several years ago. I had just finished co-directing the low budget feature Madly with its creator Allison Dane, and I was looking for my next project. I was going through a stack of ideas and treatments that I had written over the years, and I came across LOVE POTION. I showed it to Lainie, and she said that is our next project.
From there began a year and a half adventure of writing and rewriting, looking for producers and money to make the film, casting, finding locations, assembling a crew and finally filming the project. However, that is never the end of making a movie, it is just the beginning of the hardest work. After filming you go into postproduction and editing. In our case we went through three separate editors before we found somebody who could finish the project for us. Then there is the color correction and final adjustments to the film like music, credits, and including the various film sizes so that the movie can stream online and then a larger version for showings in a movie theater. Over the years I have made 16 short films and co-directed a couple of features but the process for LOVE POTION was the most arduous that I had ever worked on, and in the end, I think the results were worth it.
LOVE POTION features a cast that includes David Lee Garver who plays the lead character, David Caprita and Lainie Smith as the two mysterious villain characters, Alex Efaw, VJ Roberts, Aubrey Ebony, Shannon Thomas, Ana-Lisa Patterson, Elizabeth Gibbs, John Rust and Rebecca Lambrusco.
THE GALA
The gala opening of LOVE POTION took place at the historic and newly reopened TARA Theater in Atlanta. By the time you are ready to screen a short film at its opening, sometimes you have run out of money, and you just show it to friends or screen it online or if you are a student maybe you get to screen it at the school auditorium. Lainie decided to go all out, and we rented the Tara. Tara had been a historic theater in Atlanta for generations but had been closed for a long time and it had recently just reopened under new management. We booked their 150-seat theater, we had posters, we had gift bags, swag and we promoted the hell out of the gala. We screened at 2:00 PM on Sunday afternoon, July 23rd. It was the second weekend that Barbieheimer opened and as you can see from the opening photo, we were on the same billboard with them. Which was a thrill.
Even more exciting was the fact both films were playing in other theaters at the same time our film was playing. For one show only, LOVE POTION outdrew Oppenheimer at the 2:00 PM slot. They had about 50 people and we had over 80. We all thought that was very cool. The audience reaction was wonderful, and we had incredibly positive feedback at a Talkback that we had at the end of the screening. A lot of the audience wanted to know what happened because the movie as a proof of concept can go in many different directions. It is just up to which way we want to send it. We had a wonderful review from an online movie reviewer bvsreviews.com and I quote:
Love can be a very wonderful thing. But when it turns to obsession, things can become troublesome. Obsessive love is at the core of a new film titled Love Potion. It is a psychological horror short film whose main character can’t get over a lost love.
Emily is an artist who is having a showing of her paintings at an art gallery. Things are going great; the gallery owner is optimistic about sales of Emily’s work and her girlfriends are ecstatic about the buzz surrounding the paintings. But things take a slight turn when Chris shows up at the gallery. He and Emily used to be together. Now they’re not, but you just know he’s still in love with her.
Chris learns that Emily has moved on. But he just can’t let go. An interaction with a stranger leads Chris to a woman who can help him with his situation. The solution is a LOVE POTION that will make the person given the potion to be completely, obsessively in love with whoever gives it to them.
Well, that sounds too good to be true. It’s a scam, right? Chris is skeptical, but is so obsessed with getting Emily back, he’ll try anything. But in the end, what does it cost him?
I really liked Love Potion. Not only does it deal with obsession, but the film also provides a supernatural element that has possible evil hiding just under the surface. Love devolving into obsession and good versus evil are always good plot devices and they are done well here. – Bruce E Von Stiers –http://bvsreviews.com/lovepotion23.htm
The TARA was nice enough to allow us to have a small reception in the lobby after the screening and we got to do all those cliche movie opening tropes like a red carpet, photographs with our poster and the other actors and crew. Then as quickly as it started the afternoon was over and everybody was gone. Lainie and I cleared up all the tables and swag and leftover posters, gift bags and drove away.
We are looking forward to the screening on Sunday, November 12th, when we will be sharing the bill with two other filmmakers and their films. More information to come.
THE MAKING OF LOVE POTION
We went into production in early January of 2023 and shot for two days at an art gallery located in Chamblee, Georgia a suburb of Atlanta. The studio’s name was EBD4 Gallery, owned by artist Elyse Defore. The first day of shooting we had the entire cast there which was 11 different people plus a crew which consisted of our DP/Cinematographer Ahren Steis, our production coordinator, Melissa Steis and our assistant director Justin Nicholson. Sound was handled by Rio Robertson. The costumes were by M. Todd Graham and makeup by Samantha Goodall. Lainie had also managed to find six or seven extras who were willing to stand in the background for most of the day to portray customers and art lovers at a supposed gallery opening for one of the main characters.
The second day we shot at the studio, it was Lainie as the character Ms. Devlin and the lead actor, David Lee Garver in the gallery office with our crew. Yet even though it was only two actors that day it took 12 hours to film and the day before had taken 14 hours. Shooting a film is an exceedingly long slow process where you’re constantly fighting against the clock and trying to get enough footage for your film, so you have something to edit.
The final scene that we needed to shoot was a dream sequence featuring the love interest of the film’s main character, and we shot the scene two weekends later in my apartment in Atlanta. That was a short day, but it still involved moving a bunch of furniture and getting the lights right in the bedroom where we were shooting to get multiple set ups of Alix Efaw who plays the character Emily, the love interest of David Lee Garver’s character.
Now that the filming was complete, it was time to start putting the various pieces together in what is known as a rough cut. Our cinematographer Ahren was going to be the editor of the project, but he had several other projects come up which did not allow him to finish ours. So, we moved on to a second editor who was a nice guy but what he thought the film should look like and I as the director thought it should look like were completely different. So now I had tons of footage we had tried to put together over two months and I had nothing to show for it. Lainie found an editor that she had worked with before on an earlier project that she was producing, and we hired him. Ty Yachaina became our savior because he literally saved the movie. Ty lived in another state, so all our communication was by e-mail or phone but the first rough cut that he gave me was wonderful and we worked from there. As we approached the end of the postproduction process, I began to look at film festivals to hopefully place the film. We selected a list of 12 quality film festivals and submitted our film with our entrance fee to these festivals including Sundance. I had no lofty expectations that our film would be received at Sundance as a hit movie, but you don’t know unless you try.
WHAT IS NEXT? AND VIEW THE FILM!! LINK AT THE END!
With short films it is extremely hard to make money, so finding investors is difficult unless you are lucky enough to have a star involved. The main reasons that you make a short film are: 1) because you’re a creative person and film making is one of the formats that you use as a creative artist, 2) you were using the short film as a calling card for yourself as a filmmaker or writer or producer and you’re going to show it on the Film Festival circuit, or 3) the final reason to make a short film is for what you call a proof of concept. A proof-of-concept film is one where you have an idea for a longer film or TV series and this short film will introduce the idea and the concept of what the show will look like and its tone, plot and characters will be.
During the 1990’s and early 2000’s and even before, there were film festivals like Sundance or Tribeca or Dances with Films and others, but the process of getting your film to these film festivals, promoting it, trying to get people to see it could be a tiring process. There were far fewer festivals than there are today. According to FilmFreeway.com which is the pre-eminent entry point into the world of film festivals, there are almost 10,000 film festivals around the world. Some of them are highly regarded festivals that have been around for years and are serious about presenting films to an audience that appreciates and understands film making, and then there are others that are just literally there to make money for the promoters of the festival, so finding the right festival to present your film is very important.
It is the proof-of concept category that LOVE POTION fits into. LOVE POTION is a psychological horror film much like an Alfred Hitchcock film. There is a lot of suspense, a lot of tension that leads up to a surprise ending that has a supernatural twist.
Now begins the second phase of LOVE POTION after placing it in film festivals and seeing what the reaction is, we hope to find a producer who will give us money to either complete the film or a five- or six-part series that could play on a streaming service. Yet the excitement and challenge of making a film, seeing something through from start to finish, and watching your work projected on a real movie screen in a legitimate theater makes the year and a half of struggle, heartache, exasperation, fear that it won’t get finished, and wondering where the money is coming from all worth the effort.
Here is link to the film so you can view – FOR FREE. Please take a look and let us know what you think. https://youtu.be/e8aRMrJob-k .
IN MEMORY
Our dear friend and wonderful actor, Shannon Thomas fell ill and passed away just a few days after the screening in July. Shannon was a great person, and we are so sad at his passing. We dedicated the film to him and wish his soul God Speed.
GOD SPEED SHANNON. WE MISS YOU!
GALLERY OF PHOTOS
The Film and All Photos (Except photo of Shannon Thomas) are the Copyrighted property of Carey On Creative, LLC. Atlanta, GA. 2023
This BLOG is a copyrighted property of Carey on Creative, LLC. TripswithJames is a trademark of Carey On Creative, LLC. Atlanta, GA 2023.
Leaving California and What a Long Strange Trip It Was.
“It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out of your door. You step into the Road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there is no knowing where you might be swept off too.” J.R.R.Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings.
It was 3:15 AM on March 16th and the Road was calling. I was wide awake staring at the ceiling. I had been trying to go back to sleep for the past 45 minutes and it just wasn’t going to happen. What I didn’t know was the strange last-day-in-California adventure that awaited me over the next 24 hours that would include casinos, a salt water lake, an apocalyptic ruin, an Alaskan in the middle of the desert, and a stripper/dance contest in Yuma, AZ. How did the Road sweep me away on this adventure? Well, that’s where this story begins!
The Hacienda. My home for 20 years!
My house was empty! The place I had called home for 20 years was now completely empty.
Everything is gone except these things!
Every stick of furniture, every piece of paper, every knickknack, tchotchkech, and geegaw that I had ever possessed was gone! Over the past week I had sponsored an estate sale and then a truck from a local charity had come by and picked up the last possessions that I had not wanted to keep. For weeks before that I had been packing and sorting and throwing out massive amounts of junk. Then out of a large 17 room house, I only had two small U-Haul pods of possessions left that I had personally loaded and sent on their way towards Atlanta. The only thing that was still left in the house was the long-time caretaker of the property that had allowed me to travel the world as much as I had and who also happened to be my roommate, Kirk. He would be staying in the house for about another month until it sold and then he would be off on his own new adventure. I had said goodbye to Kirk and then booked a room in a Koreatown hotel. After checking in, I had gotten a takeout pizza and two large cans of beer which I had in my hotel room while watching some terrible movie on TV. About 10:30 I realized that I was emotionally exhausted and just crashed only to find myself waking up at 2:30 AM. For the next 45 minutes as I struggled to go back to sleep, my mind kept going “It’s time to go. James, it’s time to go! The Road is calling! Let’s go!”
The Road Calls!
So finally giving in, I got up, took a quick shower and got packed. I was checked out and had the car loaded by 3:45 AM. Before I left Los Angeles perhaps for the last time, I drove by my place one last time. My house, my home, my Hacienda that had been the center of my life for the last 20 years. As I sat in the car and looked at her there in the moonlight, I said one silent last goodbye. I was off on a new life adventure, and she was waiting for the next family that would call her home. I said a silent prayer for both of us, started the car and drove the two blocks to Interstate 10. I merged into the late-night traffic and headed east out of the City of Angels.
For days before leaving, I had tried to think of which highways I wanted to head East on. My sister had urged me to take my time driving across the country and see all the things that I wanted to see. Yet, I had made this trip four times in the last year and a half, and I had stopped every place that I had wanted to stop and had seen everything that I needed to see. So that morning as I drove out of LA, I had no clear plan as to where I was going to go or what my timeline getting to Atlanta was going to be. So I just decide on Palm Springs. I didn’t know if I was going stop in Palm Springs, chill out at Desert Hot Springs or just keep on moving, but Palm Springs was going to be my first stop. Palm Springs is about 90 miles from Los Angeles and that 90 miles even on 8 lane freeways usually takes at least two and half hours because of the California traffic. Yet at four in the morning there is little to no traffic, so I pulled into the parking lot at the large Morongo Casino on the outskirts of Palm Springs about 5:30 AM.
Morongo Casino, Resort & Spa is an Native American gaming casino, of the Morongo Band of Cahuilla Mission Indians. The Morongo Casino was opened in 2004. It is open seven days a week, 24 hours a day. The hotel has 310 rooms, and several restaurants and bars are part of the complex. I was already vaccinated so I went inside to find breakfast. The 24-hour restaurant was closed because of Covid and reduced hours, so I got a muffin and coffee at the bakery. Then wandered around and played video poker with the help of a Bloody Mary until 7 AM when the Road called again urging me on.
It is at that moment that I decided to drive the 60 miles to the Salton Sea and check it out. I had lived in Southern California for almost 40 years and never even thought much about seeing it and it was now or never. I headed east on I-10 toward Indio and got off on California 86 South and drove pass Coachella, the home of the famous music festival, and continued on toward the Salton Sea. You reach a point where you can take either the eastern shore on Highway 111 or the western shore on Highway 86. I choose the eastern shore which would lead me toward an artist colony I had heard of called Bombay Beach.
The Salton Sea is a shallow, landlocked body of water that has a high concentration of salts. It was created by water runoff from the Colorado River in 1905 when an irrigation canal head gate was broken through by spring floods diverting a portion of the river flow into the Salton Basin for two years before repairs were completed. The water in the formerly dry lake bed created the modern lake that is about 15 by 35 miles. The lake would have dried up, but farmers used generous amounts of Colorado River water and let the excess flow into the lake. In the 1950s and into the ’60s, the area became a resort destination, and communities grew with hotels and vacation homes. However, by the 1970’s, the lake had begun to shrink and become more inhospitable to people and wildlife. In the 1980s, contamination from farm runoff promoted the outbreak and spread of diseases. Massive die-offs of the avian populations occurred, especially after the loss of several species of fish on which they depend. Salinity rose so high that large fish kills occurred, often blighting the beaches of the sea with their carcasses. Tourism was drastically reduced. During the 1990’s, the lake continued to shrink and the lake bed became exposed, the winds sent clouds of toxic dust into nearby communities making people sick and driving away what was left of the tourist communities. The Salton Sea has been called “the greatest environmental disaster in California”.
Advertising a place that no longer exists!
As I drove South on Hwy 111, I started to pass nurseries that grew palm trees but after a few miles even that sign of activity ended. You came into open arid desert with panoramic views of the lake on your right and nothing but endless desert on your left. I drove by what at one time had been communities, but now all the buildings were either boarded up or in disrepair. I drove by one community where people still lived, and I pulled off the highway to see what I could see. Most everybody in the community was older and at a local Community Center they were handing out food and supplies to the residents possibly because of COVID. What you soon began to understand is this is one of the last places that people with little or no resources can come to and stay in California. They could buy a cheap piece of property, or they might be able to find a room, small apartment or trailer for not much money, but there was just a sense of poverty and loneliness as I got back on Hwy 111.
The US Department of Interior has taken over much of the eastern shore of the lake and turned it into a preserve trying to maintain the wildlife and keep the lake from further eroding. There are many areas where the river has retreated so far from the lake that you can almost not see it from the highway, and these areas unless you have a pass or are willing to pay the daily entrance fee is the only way that you can get close to the lake. Finally I came to Bombay Beach which I had heard about on a television show which they had described as a colony of artists who were banding together on the edge of the Salton Sea. I turned off the highway into Bombay Beach and for the first few blocks as I headed towards the lake it seemed like it was doing well. There were a few art galleries, a restaurant, a couple of bars and a grocery store. Yet, as you drove the last few blocks toward the lake it suddenly became a cross between The Walking Dead and Mad Max. You had the feeling that you were in an apocalyptic ghost town and zombies were going to start walking down the road at any moment to eat you. For blocks, yard after yard of burned out houses and trailers were surrounded by junked furniture and trash. Every once in a while, you would see someone who had a small house or trailer who was trying to take care of their property but they were surrounded by chaos and garbage and ruin. It looked like a whole army of crystal meth heads had ransacked the town looking for anything that they could sell and moved on. The few people that I saw driving on the street or walking were all above 50 and they seemed old and beaten down. I drove out of Bombay Beach with a feeling of sadness at what looked like a desperate situation.
Desperation this way!
Continuing south on Hwy 111, it ultimately dumps out on Interstate 8 that runs between San Diego and Phoenix along the US southern border with Mexico. I turned left and headed east towards Yuma, AZ. A few years ago was the first time I’d ever gone to Yuma, and I have now been back five times. There’s something about this desert community and its colorful history mixed with it easy paced lifestyle that just appeals to me, although the extreme summer heat can makes it very inhospitable. As I drove east, I decide to stop one more time in Yuma before I headed towards Atlanta.
Yuma is located on the southwestern edge of the state of Arizona near the borders of California and Mexico. It is home to a number of snowbirds in the winter and other visitors are often enroute to Los Algodones, Mexico for cheap medical services or for the shopping. Yuma has been a stopping point for centuries. Before dams were constructed up and down the Colorado River, the river ran fast and deep and stretched wide in places, yet because of granite outcroppings the river was squeezed into a narrower channel and Yuma Crossing became known as the safest and easiest place to cross the river. The first Spanish conquistadors who helped settle Los Angeles and San Francisco did not sail up the California coast to settle those areas, they used Yuma Crossing on their way towards California.
Gowan Headquarters in the former US Post Office Building.
I pulled into town and checked into one of several hotels located in Yuma. There are all levels of hotels here from cheap to very luxurious because of the flow of Americans who cross into Los Algodones for easy to obtain medical treatment and prescriptions. I choose one relatively near the historic downtown area of Yuma. It was about noon and the weather was in the mid-80s in March as I headed downtown to get something to eat. Arizona had fairly open Covid laws so as I walked around, I saw people wearing masks and some people not. After lunch, I walked around the historic downtown area and saw many of their restored historic buildings. Some dating from the late 1890s all the way up until the 1960s. Yuma is one of the wealthiest farming communities in the United States specializing in growing winter vegetables for the US market. The Gowan Company is a family-owned agricultural business that started in Yuma and grew into a global leader in seeds and agricultural solutions. They have bought up many of the historic buildings and preserved them using them for office and storage space including many mid-century architectural gems.
Former JCPenney’s store from the 1950’s!
My odd schedule finally caught up with me and I went back to the hotel for a nap. Later, around 8 PM, I ventured out for dinner in the same downtown area. Afterward, I took another walk and ended up at the Red Bird Cage, one of the oldest saloons in Yuma, a real dive bar with friendly bartenders and a great juke box. It was a little close in there with a very casual mask and social distancing policy, but I managed to find a quiet corner of the bar to seat by myself. As the bar began to fill up, a young couple sat down next to me, and we started talking. They were cousins and both really attractive people. Turns out he was an exotic dancer working in the Phoenix area mostly, and she (who I will call Ann) lived in Alaska working at the canneries up there about half the year. The other months, she returned home to Yuma to work in a family business, but she now really preferred Alaska. She told me that she almost did not return to Yuma this year because she just loved Alaska so much.
Colorado River
After talking for about an hour, some of their friends showed and things got a little rowdier. After a couple of rounds of drinks, they started talking about going to the strip club for the “dance off”. I asked what that was, and it turned out that there was some kind of dancing/stripping contest at the local club to see who had the best routine. Ann seemed to be in lust with one of the strippers and wanted to go support her. The whole gang got up to leave for the club, and Ann invited me along. With nothing better to do, I tagged along. Now going to a strip bar in the middle of pandemic is a very interesting undertaking with everyone wearing masks inside including the strippers as they walked around trying to get men to buy drinks. It was very strange to see a woman wearing almost nothing sit at a table chatting up a potential customer with a mask on. The image was just too weird for words.
The “dance off” began and Ann’s favorite came on second. Ann enthusiastically cheered her on while throwing dollar bills on the stage. By now it was about 1 AM and this time the Road was not calling, it was my Bed. So I said good night and drove back to the hotel. Yet as I got ready for bed, I reflected back on the past 24 hours and marveled at all the different things that happened. My leaving LA in the middle of the night, the casino, the desolation of Salton Sea and Bombay Beach, then driving to Yuma, meeting a woman in a desert bar who worked in Alaska and the strip/dance off contest. All in all, an extremely interesting way to leave California.
Thanks for coming!
*Special thanks to Wikipedia for historic information on Salton Sea, Morongo Tribe, and Yuma, AZ. All photos by James Carey except The Open Road @ Popular Science/popsci.com and Leaving LA @KCRW LA.
**Quote from The Fellowship of the Ring, JRR Tolkien, Houghton Mifflin, Inc., 1938.
You must be logged in to post a comment.