Jackie got a great book for Christmas "Watch it made in the USA" and we took advantage while in the San Diego area of California where we headed out on a rainy day to Taylor Guitars for a great factory tour. They have one tour a day and it was only 30 minutes away. It was an excellent tour, and free besides!
Took lots of pictures but will only post a few. In this step of production one individual would match up the grain and shade of the wood pieces for the back and sides of future guitar.
Close to the end of the tour you can see the shell of the guitars and the matching necks ready for final assembly. Rather than fit by hand they now use CNC machines to cut the matching parts for a perfect fit.
In the visitors center you can pull any guitar off the wall and play all you want. These are the five basic guitars made by Taylor.
And the various woods they use from all over the world for the back and sides.
Another day trip into San Diego and a bus ride around town. The tour was over 2 hours with lots of things to see. We did the full trip then came back to the start and then back on the bus to the waterfront where we had lunch and a tour of several ships. More on that part of the trip on another blog.
After the waterfront, then downtown, we went through Balboa park with lots to see but they charge for just about everything. Must be California.
The far end of the trip was Coronado which at one time was nothing but sagebrush and rabbits. Next to the docks was a display showing pictures in tiles of the history of this area of Coronado. Yes, that's Jackie in the picture.
The boat house was built 1887 and is now a restaurant. It was open for dinner only so did not get a chance to go inside.
Going across the Coronado bridge showing just a few of the thousands of boats in this area.
And heading back across the Coronado bridge back to San Diego in an open vehicle, no seat belts and 60 MPH a little scary (not to mention how these California drivers drive!).
Outside of Taylor Guitar we found lots of these hanging from several trees and had no idea what they are. They are about 1 1/2" in diameter and get hard as they dry out. We did some research to find out what they are and thanks to the secretary and our new Droid X we got all the information. Check out our next Blog for details, that is unless you know what it is.
To be continued...
1 comment:
Nice post and great pics. We loved San Diego and it is on our list of places to go back to! I am definately going to order that book! There is always something to do on a rainy day!!!
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