California Pictures--Mission San Luis Rey de Francia: the "King of the Missions"

We arrived in California in time for dinner with the family on Monday evening. Next morning Ken and I headed out with our nephew, Grady, to visit nearby Mission San Luis Rey, the largest of the California missions.

The beautiful white exterior gleamed in the sunshine. Bright bougainvillea flowers cascaded over the walls behind a gigantic prickly pear cactus.

Ken decided to pick a prickly pear, since they seemed to just be falling to the ground. We ate it, and some others we purchased at a roadside stand, next morning.

A chain of twenty one Franciscan missions lines the California coastline along the "Camino Real." Each has a bell like this one out front.