Day One-part two Courthouse and to the beach

I have a few left overs from our walking tour to share...



This is a reconstruction of the original Spanish fort founded in 1782-there are two original portions.


Look who came to visit, our own Captain Vancouver!


The Santa Barbara County Courthouse with its sunken garden is an amazing place and literally around the corner from our little cottage so we were excited to go on our tour. We ran into three weddings there.




Check out the ceiling.


Murals of Santa Barbara's history. This isn't a courtroom as such but used for meetings.


Great tiled floors


Friendly natives met the Spanish, the chief was apparently a woman.





Every detail so carefully executed. The courthouse was completed in 1929 and designed by William Mooser III














You can see many examples of the Moorish influence


Great halls...


Below shows a wedding celebration of the daughter of the prominent De La Guerra family.


I love this shell arch below


Looking into the sunken garden...








now below is what I call a circular staircase...


This statue had to be rebuilt as sandstone started to deteriorate but they had to use local sandstone to rebuild it. Historical guidelines...



we are now going to climb up the Bell Tower.





It was a bit of a climb-there is also an elevator but worth it for the view.



Here is a good view of the courthouse and sunken garden.


Next we walked down State Street to the beach. It was a lively scene of stores, bars, and restaurants but I didn't take any pictures for once.


There are lots of characters around here.


Here is the beach.





We took a little electric bus back home where we planned our week a bit. Stay tuned!
-Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:San Diego