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I can’t believed how cold has been here in Southern California, we have rain last couple of days and you can see the snow in the Big Bear mountains. 

So what people in Santa Monica California do when they can’t go sunbathing at the beach?
They go ice skating by the beach !!!
Yeap ! it’s is true, I am not kidding.  These people from Santa Monica always find a way to have fun in any situation.
Some of us have turn into a Grinch with this bad economy and the sight of kids and family laughing and having fun make us feel uneasy.  On this Christmas there is nothing to be happy about. There are huge money losses, everybody is going out of business, worst bear economy, the sky is falling, money is everything, money, money, money. People is wisely cutting down expenses, and maximazing on savings and is advaisable that you should do the same in these uncertain times, but don’t over do it that will ruin the Christmas for your children and love ones. You don’t need a lot of money to enjoy the Christmas spirit.
There is a slight possibility that maybe, if you join them (the ice skaters), suddenly your Grinch mood will start to disappear, and you will find yourself smiling, perhaps will be the first time you actually have fun in all this year. For your love ones everything is more beautiful and wonderful when ”you” are with them.  Well? What are you waiting for? Just give it a try and come visit the city of Santa Monica.

The city of Santa Monica in association with some business continue with a tradition of installing a temporary ice skating ring in a empty parking lot for the fun and entertainment of local Santa Monica residents and any visitant. The rental fee is $10 and that include the skate rental and use of the ice ring, the facility also have some area where you can enjoy a hot chocolate or your favorite brand name coffee or hot drink.
The Ice skating ring is located exactly in the corner of Arizona Ave and 5th street right across from the U.S. Postal  Service so is very conveniently located if you want to drop off some packages at the post office and take the kids to ice skate across the street.

Just five blocks from Santa Monica beach and two blocks from the popular 3rd street Promenade, where you can find a great selection of good restaurants, top brand name stores, movie theaters, live street entertainers, popular bookstores, fruit name computer and electronic stores, al-fresco or patio restaurant and coffee shops where you can just sit down and enjoy the view and the day.

Celebrate Christmas and enjoy the holidays, come and have fun with your love ones.

A lot of people are getting ready to travel during these coming holidays, Thanksgiving and Christmas bring a lot of visitors to Los Angeles, California.  Locals Angelinos are traveling to others parts of the country as well and a lot of people are visiting relatives on Christmas time in Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala and others central and South America countries.

Unfortunately due to the rough economic times United States has been going through, a lot of people will opt for staying at home on these coming holidays.
The slow economy has spilled to other countries that depend of a robust US economy and the holidays travelers that spend their US dollars, and stimulate their local economy as well.
Smart travelers are taking advantages of some of the great deals that some airlines are promoting to attract travelers.
You can check here Visit California Today: Book flight + hotel together and save!
with Travelocity and compare several airlines companies competing for your business.
Here are some of the tips, smart travelers use when preparing for their trip.
• Do your diligent research online and shop around for prices, airlines services, non-stop flights or connecting flights, hotel accommodations and others travels needs.
• Buy your ticket online- preferable ahead of time even though sometimes you can get “last minutes flights” at bargain prices. Buy you decide what is best for you.
• Avoid peak travel dates
• Allow yourself some extra time. You will avoid some headaches and anxiety with this tip alone.
• Find out ahead of time about packing requirement and new Airport Security Laws and Measures. (For example there are new rules for carrying liquids, gels, electronic equipment and some personal items that will be confiscated or get you in unnecessary trouble, if your try to go with them on airport security checkpoints.)
• Yes, your shoes and some cloth or metallic wear will have to be removed in securities check points. Don’t make unnecessary delays and follow the rules.
• Always call and confirm with your airline that you are scheduled to flight in your particular flight number, date and time.
Those are some of the tips that might help you have a pleasant trip and truly enjoy your holiday with your love ones.

We witness an historical event yesterday. Tuesday, November 4th 2008. Election day in the United States.

As many fellow citizens were arriving to their polling place to deal with several important issues and cast their vote.
Many of them were carrying high hopes to elect a new leader. One who will bring relief to the working class and who have been hit hard in this slow economy.
There were some key events in this important election that was a turning point for the direction America is going to take.
 1st there was Hillary Clinton who took a shot at been the first woman who could become president of The United State. She was an excellent candidate and her fight opened the door to all women to aspire for the presidential seat.
2nd Many people thought they will never see in their lifetime a black man in the white house. The world was watching if America was going to decide by the color of the skin or race of the candidate or his qualification to lead this country.
3rd McCain a very popular candidate with a remarkable record of serving this country and with the election of Sarah Palin as a vice-president was a very tough couple to beat in this election.
4th The economy, with record braking, high gas prices, increase in price of all consumable goods, laid-off, the crash of the housing market, and the losing of value in their retirement accounts. Those are some of the problems that the low and middle class families have been enduring these pass years. The backbone of America can’t allow these problems to continue damaging many families, friends and fellow Americans without looking for practical solutions.
This was a very important election and the new president will face many challenges and difficult problems to resolve.
On January 20th 2009 the new elected president will take power and will have to immediately deal with the following subjects.

• Recession
• Create confidence in the US economy
• Find a solution for this war – preferable peaceful solutions
• Health care
• Ways to help homeowners avoid foreclosure - Create accountable measures for the Banking and Real Estate Market
• Cut down our dependency on oil and support alternative fuel technologies
• Better future for our children

All of issues are not easy to resolve, and required many sacrifices and tough choices but we hope that with our new leader we can all work and find solutions for the common good.
Great Sunny Beaches salute our new president, vice president and all the people who voted yesterday for a better America.

I can’t believe how hot the weather has been this past week here in Los Angeles, California area
I guess some people got tired of surfing the internet and getting so depressed about the stock market, the recession, and the financial slum we’ve fallen into, that they grab their surfing board instead and headed for the beach.
Everybody seems to have the same idea than me because the Santa Monica beach was crowded. My kids mentioned that they want to see the kitesurfers again so we headed North in Pacific Coast Highway toward Malibu beach. (See my previous post kitesurfing at Malibu Beach California)
This seem to be the only place that this sport is practiced because I have not seeing any kitesurfing practiced anywhere but here. From San Diego, through Orange county and South Bay beaches, but I might be wrong and just happen that when I was visiting these places there was nobody kiteboarding at that time.

As we watched the beautiful colors and designs of these kite boards, we talked with some of the surfers and inquired what are the features a good kiteboard should have and they mentioned that they expect their kite to: turn faster, jump higher, loop tighter, and hang longer

If you want to try and learn more about this sport there are some instructional DVD for kiteboard training so you can become familiar with what is required for kitesurfing. Get to know the masters of kiteboarding names like Chris Moore and others professionals that practice and master kitesurfing.

Kitesurfing is a very physical demanding extreme sport and some of basic physical condition you must have as a surfer also applied to kiteboarding and they are:
· You must have good swimming skills
· Good balance abilities
· Upper body strength
· Legs and calves strength
· Endurance
· Ability to think and react quickly to a split second changing conditions.

If you think you can do it, then you must do your diligent research for the best brands, prices and quality. Sometimes you can find in Ebay great bargains in used or new kiteboarding kit and equipment.

Here are some of the popular brands and styles of kiteboards that are sold on Ebay
2007 16m Bularoo complete with kite bag and pump
2008 13 m waroo kiteboarding Waroo pro 11 meter
Slingshot machine 17.5m kite
2008 cabrinha convert 9m kite
Gk globe kites sonic 14m kite complete

Kiteboarding in a exciting sport to practice when you visit some of the great sunny beaches of Southern California

Halloween is here and some people in Southern California are looking for Halloween costumes for children or adults.
Saving money on Halloween costumes
You can search several ways of saving money on a Halloween costume for example you can make your costume yourself. All you need is creativity and imagination and look around for items and clothes you already have at home. Read a story here of how some kids made their videogame character costume. Other way is researching at Ebay or other costumes stores for unexpensive costumes or great deals for your money.
Cool places to look for Halloween costumes

• Dark and scary costumes for adults
• Children, pets, kids and adult costumes
  To continue with my beach theme what more appropriated costumes than a beautiful mermaid from costume kingdom, or a Hawaiian Luau costume, beach dud, tourist, tropical dressed girl. Well you got the idea.
  If you don’t like to wear a costume but you still like to get scare, here are some tips for you.
  Read the economic news. (Some people are having a great party with your bailout money and they don’t seem very worry about the financial crisis.) So don’t spoil the fun for you and your kids.
  Another great thing to do for Halloween is visit Southern California Amusement parks
  Knott’s Scary Berry Farm (The original Halloween haunt park and one of the favorite places to visit Knott’s Berry Farm)
  Mickey Trick or treat party (come and celebrate Halloween in Disneyland with the whole family)
  Halloween Horror (Universal Studios)

Treat or treating all you want with your family and friends and have a safe and happy Halloween

Our Mexico vacation with the family in Puerto Peñasco.
As soon as we enter our room, My kids opened the balcony to check what view we have of the area
This is our breath taking view from our room.

I got a warm feeling of satisfaction when I saw the wow expression on the face of my kids when they realize that this family vacation is going to be fun and with a lot of new and exciting adventures.
Next thing I knew we were in a warm swimming pool, drinking my favorite liquor drink and munching on Spicy Buffalo wings and fish tacos, they have an extensive menu of real Mexican food so I told my kids to place their order, each choose a virgin piña colada (no liquor) and a Hamburger.
This is a list of some of the activities and fun games to do

• Tequila Volleyball-water polo.  The teams that score a point win a shot of tequila. We must have beaten the other team  because by the time the game finished I was too booze to keep the score.
• Beach soccer – I played a few minutes
• Beach volleyball – Also played a few minutes
• Aqua-aerobic   Which I participate and have a lot of fun
• Gym and Spa – I didn’t know they have gym until later
• Learn to prepare your favorite liquor drink and mix- I miss this important class too. Damn
• Latin dance classes – Salsa, Cumbia, Merengue – My 2 teens which are excellent dancers, a boy 17 and a girl 13 liked and participate under my suggestion. In previous talk with my son I mentioned to him that if you want to have a lot of fun and at the same time be popular with beautiful girls you have to ether learn to play an instrument (guitar) or learn to dance, which he is doing both. He is enjoying the benefits now.
• Children activities – Ecological and shell collection, educational field trips, and many fun children activities to mention. If you are traveling with children this is a good place to have a family vacation.

This was like having your own private beach, because there is no other construction for miles around this place and the town is about 20 to 30 minutes driving.
As we touch the water on the beach it was as warm as the swimming pool, and there is a large area where the water level only reach up to your waist, that was good for my friend who have two children ages 5 and 7
This beach is not for surfing or bodyboard because there are no waves but other beach activities can be done here.

We were talking with my 17 year old son (who want to study and enter the field of engineering and architect in the university) about how they have turn this deserted area into this green vacation place by taking the water from the ocean and send it through a process of desalination and water purification they turn ocean water into purified water which is life for the green grass, plants and ready for human consumption and other necessities.
This place is just a small percentage of the original plan which includes several beautiful green grass and palms, ocean side golf courses, shopping centers, dance club, theaters, a marina with boat docking facilities, an soon an airport. This is going to be the next Cancun except is closer to Los Angeles.

Next going to Downtown Puerto Peñasco

As I mentioned in my previous post about our trip to Malibu Beach in search of the perfect beach to test our brand new Morey bodyboard. As we drove through Pacific Coast Highway, we spot in the distance several kites with beautiful colors and designs, but they were in the ocean.
 As we drove closer we notice that they were some kind of parachute that people where using in the water. Later on we find out that this sport is called “Kitesurfing” and use a small parachute or kite and a small surfboard.

We sat on the beach and watched how the surfer deployed his kite and the wind will drag him several feet into the air. The surfer take advantage of the moments he is airborne and he start doing some intrepid spin and awesome jumps before he land in the water with his kiteboard attached to his feet.
The Kitesurfer we were watching were ether advanced or experts because my kids were amazed of the jump and spin they were doing. At times they seem to be suspended in mid-air and landed in slow motion.
All they needed were a wind strong enough to lift them several feet into the air and water for a soft landing. This sport can be practiced everywhere that have water, So a lake or a dam are ideal to practice this sport, or perhaps a river that does not have a strong current and is wide enough to move in any direction will be good as well. But as anything that you do where you can get hurt, practicing the golden rules of common sense and safety are applied here.
Kitesurfing is a beautiful and fun scene to watch but I am sure that this sport required great strength and ability from the kitesurfer. You must be in top physical shape to withstand this demanding sport.
Ebay have several kitesurfing stores where you can find kitesurfing equipment used or brand new for good prices.
Some of the top models and popular brands I found were:
• Slingshot Turbo 2 Kitesurfing 14m complete with bar, bag and pump and is sold by a store named Kite Wind Surf
• Gaastra Phoenix 17.5M kiteboarding kitesurfing kite
• Eclipse Truster 10m 2008 Kitesurfing kiteboarding kite
• Naish 10m Torch 2008 Kitesurfing kiteboarding kite
Just to mention some of the most popular kiteboard and perhaps you will find other brands and models that will become your favorite as you get familiar with this water sport.

Kitesurfing is another fun thing you can do when you visit our GreatSunnyBeaches in Southern California

When you visit Newport Beach make sure you check our vacation package and timeshare section where you will find several deals similar to this one.

Visit Newport Beach and stay at Marriott Newport Coast Villas and enjoy this spectacular resort, located in Newport Coast, California. Between Newport and Laguna Beach.

 This 2 Bedroom 2 Bath unit resembles an Italian village. And is located in a 12-building complex set above the Pacific Ocean.
 These Marriott’s villas offer full kitchens, washers and dryers, and dial-up Internet access.

Some of the amenities include:
• Three pools offer swimming with expansive ocean views.
• On-site spa provides massages, facials, and other treatments.
• Hot tubs
• 26,000 square foot pool.
• Golf course adjacent to the resort, with spectacular trees and greens located right on the ocean
• Water and beach activities
• Oceanfront fitness center
• Whirlpool and jacuzzi

These are some of the top of the line amenities that you would expect from Marriott

If you would like to explore your surrounding, you will find a pleasant surprise on Laguna Beach, Carlsbad and San Juan Capistrano

Come just you and your love one or bringing the whole family with the children. You will find that this is an excellent place to visit, there is fun and entertainment for everyone. With shops and excellent restaurants and walks on the beach. Visit another GreatSunnyBeaches in Southern California and make your unforgettable summer.

Surfing Competition
Want to see how the experts do it? Come to Manhattan Beach this weekend.

The South Bay cities will have a surfing and other beach activities from Friday August 1st through Sunday 3rd. California’s  South bay cities of Manhattan Beach, Hermosa Beach, Redondo Beach and the Los Angeles department of beaches will be having beach-summer-activities for locals and visitors as well. A series of competitions, championships and others activities will be taking place in some of the cities mentioned above. Plenty of food, music and entertainment for the family.

Calendar of Activities
Friday August 1st
 at 7:00pm  LA County Lifeguard Championships-At Torrance Beach
Saturday, August 2nd
6:45 am International Bodysurfing Championship at Manhattan Beach Pier
7:00 am Surfing Championships at Hermosa Beach Pier
7:00 am Sand Soccer Challenge
8:00 a.m Two-Mile Beach Run — Hermosa Beach Pier
9:00 a.m Volleyball Tournament — Manhattan Beach Pier
7:00 p.m. So Calif. Lifeguard Championships Events — Torrance Beach
Sunday, August 3
7:30 a.m Pier-to-Pier Paddleboard Championship — Manhattan Beach
8:00 a.m. Sand Soccer - Torrance Beach
9:00 a.m. Volleyball Tournament — Manhattan Beach Pier
9:00 a.m. Pier-To-Pier Swim — Hermosa Pier to Manhattan Pier
10:00 a.m. Lifeguard Dory Race — Hermosa Pier
1:00 p.m. South Bay Youth Swims and Paddles — Hermosa Beach Pier.

 Fun and activities in our GreatSunnyBeaches of Southern California

We just received our brand new and beautiful Morey bodyboard (I believed it is also called boogieboard) for my daughter.  With screaming and excitement she runs showing the board to everybody in the house. Next thing I knew I felt a tap on my shoulder. And there she was. All dress up with her swimming suit, fins, bodyboard and towel. And she said “Dad I am ready for the beach” as I was wandering how did she manage to change her cloth so quickly.
Next thing we were heading for Malibu Beach where surfing is king and you can surf with a short or classic long board, windsurf, kite surf you name it everything related to water is practiced here.

Since my daughter have never tried bodyboard surfing, I decided to stay close just in any case something goes wrong but for a first time user and a beginner she was not doing so bad. She was able to take some good waves that glide her all the way to the beach sandy area.
Surfing on a boogieboard is a relative unexpensive way to have fun at the beach.

You only need a boogieboard and fins and you are ready to go. (Don’t forget to wear a swimsuit too) You might find a good bodyboard here but do your diligent research first and find out about prices, quality and brands so you can compare and choose your best deal at best prices. There are Bodyboard in a great assorted of colors and some of them come with Disney characters or super hero designs for small children but others are geared to adults and experts bodyboarders and are designed accordingly
 Choose right and you will enjoy hours and many days of surfing fun at the beach.
As a precaution, I believed that is safer not to use the fins if you are a beginner and later on when you got more experience and become and intermediate boogieboard rider you might get your fins or get a wetsuit to keep you warm on cold water.

Don’t underestimate the power of the waves and bodyboarding surfing. Experts can surf at great speed and do some intrepid jumping, spinning and turning maneuvers that are only limited to the audacity and surfing skills of this bodyboard riders. Like any other surfing sports you just have to catch the perfect wave.