San Juan

How Does 'Jurassic Park 3D' Play When You Can't Fast Forward?

Revisiting Steven Spielberg's CGI wonder

"Save Trestles" Forces Gird for New Incremental Battle With 241 South Toll Road Extenders

Orange County environmentalists, state park lovers and others in 2008 successfully fought the Transportation Corridor Agency's 20-year-old plan to extend the 241 Toll Road through San Onofre State Park, thanks to rejections by the California Coastal Commission and National Oceanic and Atmospheric ... More >>

Where to Buy Tamales in Orange County This Christmas, 2012 Edition!

This is hilarious. Every year around this time, I get asked where to buy the best tamales in Orange County. Really, the answers rarely change. Below is the article on the subject I did last year, which itself is mostly a retread of a story I did back in 2007. Other plugs I'll give right now are for ... More >>

Tortilla Tuesday: El Campeón

Geographic isolation has the unfortunate tendency of making people over-estimate the worth of their restaurants, and nowhere is this more true than South County and its Mexican food scene. Oh, there's Mexi restaurants a'plenty, mostly Cal-Mex dining (and Dana Point's own curious scene, which I'll ex ... More >>

How Did a Live Leopard Shark Wind Up at San Juan Capistrano Golf Club? He Flew, of course

We can thank Aussie legend Greg Norman for making his "Shark" nickname and logo common on the world's golf courses, but the working theory is it was not a pro golfer but a predatory seabird who brought a live leopard shark to San Juan Hills Golf Club Monday.A two-foot-long Triakis semifasciata was f ... More >>

3 OC Beaches Ranked Among Cleanest in U.S. by NRDC, But Dirty Doheny Gets Spanked Again

Three Orange County beaches are among the cleanest of 200 popular beaches around the country, according to a new report from the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC).However, the NRDC's "Testing the Waters" survey also identified three separate stretches of Doheny State Beach in Dana Point as be ... More >>

Robert Eugene Vasquez Indicted for Near- Decapitation Murder and Second Attack

​A San Juan Capistrano man faces an arraignment hearing Wednesday after the Orange County Grand Jury indicted the 34-year-old on charges of fatally stabbing--and nearly decapitating--his neighbor and assaulting a second two days later.Robert Eugene Vasquez could get the death penalty for the Dec. ... More >>

Taste of San Juan

San Juan Hills Golf Club

Where to Buy Tamales in Orange County this Christmas

​Because nothing exists on the Internet before three days ago, I'm reprinting a 2009 article I did on the best tamales in Orange County for the holidays--and I'm also ripping off a 2007 article I did on the same subject. I will also note that Gabbi's Mexican Kitchen and Taco María make great high ... More >>

[UPDATED with Arraignment Continued:] Bobby Ray Rainwater Jr., OC Homicide No. 57: Body Found Outside His Mobile Home

​UPDATE, DEC. 7, 12:41 P.M.: 34-year-old Robert Eugene Vasquez is being held without bail as his defense attorney got his arraignment continued to Jan. 6 in the alleged special circumstances murder of his San Juan Capistrano mobile home park neighbor and the assault on a second man with a metal ob ... More >>

'The Rum Diary' Channels the Ghost of Hunter S. Thompson

Johnny Depp stars in this oddly tame adaptation

Profiles in OC Pioneers Who Were Klan Members: Jesse L. Hunter, San Juan Capistrano Innkeeper, Owner of Mexican Restaurant

​Even in 1920s Orange County, Know Nothings knew that if they wanted to be successful, they had to do business with Mexicans. You could segregate against them, kick their asses, exploit them--but you needed their money, too, to make sure you could make a living.That's exactly what happened with Je ... More >>

Profiles in OC Pioneers Who Were Klan Members: Ferris F. Kelly, San Juan Capistrano Postmaster

​The Orange County men who joined the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s were almost all residents of North and Central County, specifically the cities of SanTana, Anaheim, Fullerton, La Habra, and Brea. The numerical breakdown isn't really surprising: Orange County didn't have that many cities then, and o ... More >>

A Mexican Dinner in 1890s Orange County with Madame Helena Modjeska

Wikimedia CommonsThe caption says it all...​In doing general research for my book on the history of Mexican food in the United States, I've unearthed numerous accounts of non-Mexicans enjoying Mexican food for the first time, or quickly learning how to love the stuff. One of the earlier accounts I ... More >>

'Taste of San Juan Capistrano' Tomorrow

JC Vera​I was driving up from San Clemente, passing San Juan Capistrano, when I looked up and saw birds, a flock of them, and I swore they looked like swallows. They turned out to be seagulls (I'm not exactly National Audubon Society material), but it did remind me that the Mission's big event is ... More >>

Holiday Toy Express Route Change Scrooges San Juan Capistrano

OCTA.net​Metrolink's Holiday Toy Express chugs into Orange County this month, but after making more than 50 stops over 14 days last year, the Christmasy choo-choo is only stopping 13 times over five days this December.That has one South County town feeling particularly Scrooged.

SJC Americans: OC's Latest Hate Group!

Another set of OCers makes Henry W. Head proud...​I don't really pay much attention to San Juan Capistrano because that's more Spencer's terrain, but one facet of the town that previously drew my  interest was some group calling themselves the SJC Americans. Clockwork Coker previously wrote a ... More >>

10 Bottom OC Elementary Schools*

​*based on the California Department of Education's just-released Academic Performance Index (API) rankings, which are derived from statewide test scores. We listed the top 10 public elementary schools in Orange County earlier today, so here come the bottom 10, in descending order. (Numero uno doe ... More >>

Fun With Press Releases: City Flack Doubling as Register Reporter?

​It's not particularly unusual to find stories in the Orange County Register that look remarkably similar to press releases issued by the DA's office, Sheriff's Department, or your local police department or mayor's office. But usually, the name of the writer on the byline would be a bonafide Regi ... More >>

Brad Gates, Space Cowboy

The ex-sheriff's open-space dealmaking has some in San Juan Capistrano crying foul

UPDATED: Did the Brown Act Put San Juan Capistrano in Hot Water with the DA?

Taken at the 1935 Swallows Day paradeOriginally published at 1:10 p.m. Updated 2:44 with comment from OCDA.​As is fashionable nowadays, last night's city council meeting in San Juan Capistrano saw members of the public comparing elected officials to mid-century fascist monsters. The tyra ... More >>

[¡Ask a Mexican!] Special Navidad Gifts Edition

Five Great OC Places to Buy Tamales for Christmas

Not a local brand, but who could possibly have a problem with a rockin' tamale?​Almost three years ago, I wrote up this round-up of the county's best places to get tamales. Rivera's is unfortunately closed, and I still don't understand why Central and South Americans prepare tamales (with the exce ... More >>

Orange's Barrio Cypress Residents Fought the DA's Gang Injunction—and Won (Sort Of)

Long Beach Couple Shocked (Shocked!) At SJC 'Debauchery'

Stephen Glauser / Flickr / Creative CommonsThe Capistrano Insider posted last week an entertaining, slightly depressing exchange between Capistrano Dispatch editor Jonathan Volzke and a Long Beach husband and wife who were considering moving to San Juan Capistrano. That is, they were considering mov ... More >>

Is a Popular Legal Weapon Ending a South County Gang Rivalry, or Catching Bystanders in Its Net?

The Assassination of Sheriff James Barton by the Mexican Juan Flores

In San Juan Capistrano's Schools, White Kids Are Painted Into One Corner, Latino Kids Into Another

Lon Uso is a Luser

We met San Juan Capistrano councilmember Lon Uso a couple of months ago at the Friday morning coffee klatches organized by Capistrano Dispatch editor Jonathan Volzke and thought him a swell guy for daring to speak good about Mexicans in a room full of elderly, crotchety gabachos who didn't believe M ... More >>

San Juan Capistrano Tries to Smear Ignacio Lujano

The corrido of Ignacio Lujano, the San Juan Capistrano man who has tended to some of the county's last standing orange groves for the past 40 years, continues. The Los Angeles Times, KCAL-TV Channel 9, and KTLA-TV Channel 5 have covered his battle with the city of San Juan Capistrano to boot him out ... More >>

When San Juan Capistrano Boots Ignacio Lujano From His Orange Groves, OC's Citrus Era Will End

The Reg-O-Meter©: Week Ending March 22

Shoot to Thrill

Fast cars, naked women: Ed Dellis loves his work

Surreal Estate

A short, strange trip up the winding road to the brand-new, landfill-adjacent San Juan Hills High

A Few Good Men

My own private Fallujah at the Swallows Inn

The Mission

What really makes the swallows come back to Capistrano?

Best of OC 2004: Part 1

FDA FUs Plan B

Plan Your Unplanned Sex Accordingly

Summer Guide

Its very hot right now. Heres why

Best Politics, Art, and Outdoor Sports

Death Watch

Letters

En Mi Viejo Senor Big Ed

Recreating Puerto Rico in Cypress

En Mi Viejo Senor Big Ed

Recreating Puerto Rico in Cypress

Leftist Latino

Latinos are front-runners, just like everyone else

Tiny, Unhappy People

MoLAA offers a view of the world from its edges

New York City

New Years rockin pee

Please Rewind

Welcome to the Monkey Pit

Pulled out fo gloom on pulleys of Chris Gaffney's invention

Mens Like a Plague of Locusts

And other delightful scourges of modern life