Photo Essay: Kicking Off Yet Another New Year at the Rose Parade (2025 Edition)

I don't go to the Rose Parade every year. After all, I didn't even go at all until 2015. And I skipped 2019 and 2022.

   

But this year, on the first day of 2025, the pull to watch those floats, marching bands, and horses crawl down Colorado Boulevard was so strong...

 

...that I woke up with a start (and without an alarm) at 8:15 a.m. after just five hours of sleep and made a beeline to Pasadena.

Year In Review: 2024 Updates to Past Posts

As time goes on, my maintenance of this blog shifts more to updating information surrounding places I've already been rather than documenting places that are new (or new to me). 

And that gets a little depressing—because there are more businesses and buildings that close than those that are rescued. 

But we have to take our victories wherever we can get them. 

So this year, I feel lucky that I was able to report on the now-publicly accessible abandoned church at Heritage Square Museum and the newly-added TCM tour at Warner Brothers Studios.

Unfortunately, I also had to break the news of the passing of Heritage Square's beloved museum cat Belle Boy (who died in 2023). And the closure of the Mirage on the Vegas Strip. And the shut-down of the Los Angeles Times Olympic printing plant.

Those were all written about in new blog posts—but there are plenty of other updates I made that you may have missed. (I don't always share these to social media or in my email blast.)

So here are some updates I made in 2024—although not all of these necessarily actually happened this year.

Hilbert Museum of California Art

Photo Essay: A Last Look At Two Volunteer-Built Floats of the 2024 Rose Parade

I was feeling a little bit of regret over not attending "FloatFest," the post-Rose Parade showcase of floats where you get up close to them and literally stop to smell the roses. 

But then I saw that a couple of the float builders were displaying their work for the public to continue to enjoy for even longer after the Rose Parade—and both were standouts. 

Photo Essay: The Rose Parade Started 2024 Off On a High Note

Why have I been going to the Rose Parade events in some form of another every year since the 2014 parade? 

 

Because the bands, horses, and floats change every year. And appear in a different order. And there's always something to marvel at.

Photo Essay: The Making Of Burbank's Gravity-Defying 2023 Rose Parade Float

After freelancing for our local LA public media station KCET since 2015, in July of last year I took an inhouse position there—one that may or may not be temporary. While working as a digital producer there, I've gotten to write, edit, and even help produce a digital short video. This is the story of the making of that video.

As I posted earlier this week, I started the year off right by attending the Rose Parade in person—and I hinted that I had more to say about the Burbank Tournament of Roses float.

 

If you saw the parade, it was the float that kind of looked like Utah—with a guy hang-gliding off of a red-rocked cliff.

Photo Essay: The First Monday of 2023 at the Pasadena Rose Parade

The last time I'd gone to the Rose Parade, it was 2020—and the year had already started off weird, even before the COVID-19 pandemic had taken hold. 

In 2021, it was canceled because of the pandemic. And in 2022, I'd had such a good time celebrating New Year's Eve the night before, I couldn't bear to get up early enough to make it to the parade on time. 

 

 Parade sponsor, Honda

But this year, New Year's Day once again fell on a Sunday—as it did in 2017—so the Rose Parade took place on Monday, January 2, giving me a one-day buffer/recovery day. 

Photo Essay: The Triumphant Return of the Rose Parade and Its Flower-Festooned Floats

New Year's 2021 was the first time since December 2013 that I haven't experienced the Rose Parade in Pasadena in one way or another. It was one of many casualties of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

 Reese's

Fortunately, the Tournament of Roses managed to get the parade and all its affiliated events back on track for December 2021/January 2022—and on January 1, I found myself back in Pasadena, ready for an up-close view of the parade floats at the post-parade Floatfest. 

Year-In-Review: 2020 Updates to Past Posts

This year, I finally cut myself a break and relaxed on my goal to publish a new blog post, on average, every other day. 

Up until this year, that meant 15 posts a month—or 182 posts a year. 

But I hadn't actually hit that goal since I started writing full-time at the end of 2015. And I was tired of feeling like a failure. 

So I moved the benchmark. 

Besides, as time wears on, I'm spending more and more time updating older posts with new developments—closures, demolitions, renovations, and sometimes even reopenings—and sometimes even additional, updated photos. 

This year, I thought I'd collect all those updates in one end-of-year post to make them easier to access. 

In no particular order, here are this year's updates:

1. Photo Essay: The Last Movie Theatre of Beverly Hills (Updated for 2020)

added pics of the renovated marquee and new vertical sign

2. Photo Essay: Rancho Los Amigos, Abandoned County Poor Farm, Downey (Exterior—Updated for 2020)

an update on the attempt to save several significant buildings from demolition

3. Photo Essay: A Tiny Tuscan Villa Above the Palos Verdes 'Riviera' (Updated for 2020)

an update on the sale of the property

4. Photo Essay: It's Déjà Vu for Hollywood's Most Famous Imperiled Intersection (Updated for 2020)

an update on the seemingly imminent demolition of the former Lytton Savings bank building

5. Photo Essay: Amboy, A Quintessential Ghost Town Along Route 66 (Updated for 2020)

an update on the restored neon sign for Roy's 

6. Photo Essay: Come Gather Round All Ye Islanders at the Catalina Casino (Updated for 2020)

an update on the operations of the movie theatre inside Catalina Casino

7. Photo Essay: Palos Verdes Bowl, Upon Its Imminent Demolition (Updated for 2020, Now Closed)

an update on the closure of Palos Verdes Bowl

8. Photo Essay: The Gamble House, Pasadena (Updated for 2020)

  

updated with new management info

9. Photo Essay: Farmers and Merchants, the Old Bank with Big Plans (Updated for 2020)

mostly an update of what hasn't happened

10. Photo Essay: Wildflowering at Poppy Peak (Updated for 2020)

 

added information regarding petition advocating against development

11. Photo Essay: The Ghostly Shadow of the Red Car (Updated for 2020)

 

updated with new construction information

12. Photo Essay: Joshua Tree's Barker Dam, Closed to Public (Updated for 2020)

updated to reflect reopening

13. Photo Essay: Elvis' Honeymoon History at The House of Tomorrow (Updated for 2020)

updated with info on the sale of the house and the closure of the public tours

14. Found: The Relocated and Reassembled Streetlights of the Dismantled "Vermonica" (Updated for 2020)

 

updated with new, permanent location of the reassembled Vermonica

15. Photo Essay: Wilshire May Company Building, Miracle Mile (Updated for 2020)

updated status regarding renovations and reopening

16. Photo Essay: Miracle Mile (Updated for 2020)

tweaked some info and added a photo of The Dark Room

17. Photo Essay: Neutra's Lovell Health House and Hollywood Supervillain Lair, Upon Its 90th Anniversary (Updated for 2020)

updated ownership status

18. Another One Bites the Dust: Santa Monica Edition (Updated for 2020)

added new photos and general update of closure and impending demolition

19. Photo Essay: How An East Coaster Helped Turn San Juan Cove Into Dana Point (Updated for 2020)

updated with info on the sinking of The Pilgrim

20. Photo Essay: The Many Lives of LA's Original Farmers Market (Updated for 2020)

added photos of the new rooftop sign that fooled experts into thinking it was neon

21. Photo Essay: Candy Cane Lane, Upon the Centennial of El Segundo (Updated for 2020)

updated with this year's temporary closure information

22. Photo Essay: Upon the 90th Anniversary of the Egyptian Theatre (Updated for 2020—Sold to Netflix)

updated ownership and plans for restoration

I'm hoping there will be nothing torn down, burned down, or closed up in the next 7 days for me to report on—but if there is, I'll amend this post accordingly to include it. 

Pandemic Amusements: Volcano Wash With a Lava Bath and Tornado Dry

Ever since Southern California went back on lockdown—hardcore—in November, I've been trying to reclaim the amusements that kept me going early on in the pandemic.

 

All the tiki bars and restaurants may be closed for COVID-19—but at least the tiki-themed car wash in South Gate, California is open for business. 

  

Located southeast of Los Angeles in the "Gateway Cities" region—which also includes the cities of Paramount, Downey, Santa Fe Springs, Bell Gardens, and more—it feels appropriate for South Gate to have a car-themed attraction, as it was once home to a GM automobile plant called South Gate Assembly (which closed in 1982). 

 

South Gate is, however, incredibly far from any tropical place that might experience a "mega typhoon" or volcanic eruption. 

But in true theme park style, Tiki Tour Express Wash patrons are invited to "enjoy the ride" through the tunnel...

 

...with its preternaturally blue waterfalls that are so blue, in fact...

...they practically beckon you to dive right in. 

 

Instead, you drive right through the foaming lava bath...

 

...catching a glimpse of a stoic gorilla waiting in the wings.

Of course, it's not a real lava flow. 

Thankfully, I was just there for the wash and not to become molten.

 

And as the tornado-force winds blew my washed car dry, I giggled as I always do, entertained to no end, momentarily forgetting about all the places I love that I can't go to right now.

  

Related Posts:

Pandemic Amusements: Jurassic Car Wash

Green Forest Car Wash 2: Return of the Bubblecano

Could This Donut Shop Ever Flip Back to Its 'Golden Arches' Roots?

In 1954, the McDonald brothers opened up their 7th or 8th McDonald's location at 1057 E. 5th Street in Pomona, California—about 30 miles west of their very first burger stand in San Bernardino.

circa 1954 (original attribution unknown, via RoadsideArchitecture.com)

It was designed by architect Stanley C. Meston of Fontana—the same one who designed most of those first red-and-white-tiled stores for Richard McDonald, starting in 1952. 

The McDonald's operation ceased at this location in 1968. The tops of the "golden arches" that burst through the roofline on either side of the building were hacked off sometime before the business became Star Taco—and 5th Street was renamed Mission Boulevard.



Star Taco occupied the former McDonald's building—and took over the Mickey Mouse-shaped sign, whose neon lettering and depiction of the chain's mascot "Speedee" were removed—through the 1970s and 1980s, until it closed in 1985.



Star Taco's owner, Jim Phillips, had gotten to collecting classic Chevy Corvairs behind his taco stand—as well as at the neighboring auto body shop, which he owned as well. Phillips told the Los Angeles Times in a 1991 article, "The Star Taco collection was known all over the country."



He claimed that 80% of his 120 Corvairs was restorable—but local authorities (at the time, the area was considered unincorporated San Bernardino County) deemed the "collection" a junk heap ("illegal auto storage yard") and, in 1992, stormed the property and towed and impounded the lot of them. Some of the cars went into the crusher; others sold at auction for scrap.



It's unclear how long of a gap there was between Star Taco and the current tenant, AMA Donuts—which has been operating in this location at least since 2004.



I've gone there twice this year alone—once in January to just see it in person after having read about it, and once in April during the coronavirus pandemic. Ironically, it was closed in January but open in April. Upon my second visit, I bought three donuts for $4-some-odd and gave them a $2 tip. Thank goodness for donuts during a health crisis.

Sure, the AMA Donuts sign looks a little shabby. But they should keep it. They shouldn't touch it.

Maybe one day a McDonald's could move back in—and it'll be brought back to life much in the way that the Downey location was. I'm going to put that possibility out into the Universe and see what happens.

In the meantime, if it can't be a McDonald's, it might as well be a donut shop. Both are so incredibly Southern Californian.

And that design is still so unmistakable.

Related Posts:
Photo Essay: How Billions of Burgers Got Their Start in Southern California
Photo Essay: The Oldest Golden Arches, 65 Years Later