this week i joined the engineering crew (around 100+ now) at work for our tech retreat to catalina. we ferried over from long beach landing and arrived in avalon, greeted by perfect weather and beautiful land/seascapes. right away, we were guided to our awaiting golf carts, ready for our island fact-finding challenge. our team was one man short, but we were ready for the challenge as i drove the cart along the path. avalon/catalina is beautiful, and i really enjoyed driving the speed-regulated-20-mph cart around the paths and avenues, taking photos and soaking up the sun. the town is awesome... golf carts everywhere. its like some fantasy bumper-car town. our team did an excellent job of fact-hunting, talking to the locals, and data gathering. i couldn't pass up the opportunity to draw avalon's famous 'casino' when we came to that part of our guide. this drawing netted us 30 bonus points, and our team came in first place! we all got ipod shuffles, crazy! i have to figure out when i'm going to use it now...


the rest of the day was occupied by setting up camp, enjoying a nice toasty fire, laughing at jokes/stories/impersonations, avoiding very large campground deer, singing along to campfire songs and participating in (i got recruited) a good old fashioned skit. it was truly relaxing...


the next day we walked back into town from our campsite and it was basically a free for all. after a nice burger and beer at luau larry's, i went to see the tour of the casino ballroom which was actually pretty incredible... i have to remember to try and set up a gig there some day if possible. i took a ton of photos, viewable in the normal spot.