The Conejo Valley Guide "Welcome" blog covers a wide range of topics, local information, highlights of local things to do, compilations and other items. Focus is on information relevant to Ventura County and surrounding areas, including Thousand Oaks, Westlake Village, Newbury Park, Agoura Hills, Calabasas, Malibu, Simi Valley, Camarillo, Moorpark, Somis, Fillmore, Santa Paula, Ojai, Oxnard, Port Hueneme, Santa Barbara and Moorpark.
The Conejo Valley Guide® "Welcome" blog covers a wide range of topics, local information, local things to do, holiday event compilations, announcements and more.
The heatwave continued today throughout the Southland today, with temperatures topping off around 95 degrees in Thousand Oaks with humidity in the 60-70% range. So it was a bit sticky out there. But the good news is that these weather conditions make for great scenes of the Conejo Valley!
The 137th Ventura County Fair is off and running! This year's theme is "Rides, Ribbons and Rodeos" and visitors will certainly find plenty of that...and much more! Some of the things you'll find here...games, rides, contests, music, rodeo, motor sports, mariachi, pony rides, goats, bunnies, chickens, vendors, kids' crafts, gems and minerals, agricultural exhibits, educational exhibits, every type of fair food you could imagine, photo opps and everything in between! Visit www.venturacountyfair.org for a complete event lineup!
Believe it or not, the 2012 Olympic Games started TODAY, two days in advance of the opening ceremony on Friday, July 27th!
The first competition of the 2012 Olympic Games was a women's soccer match between Great Britain and New Zealand at 8 a.m. PST., followed by top-seeded USA vs France at 9 a.m., and other women's soccer matches. Tomorrow, men's soccer starts with Honduras vs Morocco at 4 a.m. PST. NBC's complete Olympics viewing schedule can be viewed at www.nbcolympics.com/tv-listings/index.html. There's a nice summary-level schedule available at www.nbcolympics.com/results-schedules/index.html.
The theme of the 2012 Olympic Games opening ceremony is "Isles of Wonder" and NBC will begin 4 1/2 hours of coverage at 7:30 p.m. Friday night. The show will feature over 10,000 performers, including British duo Underworld and an appearance by Paul McCartney.
Keep in mind that London is 8 hours ahead of us here in California, so many events will be shown tape delayed. The NBC Olympics website, however, will be streaming LIVE coverage of all events! But you must register your TV service (e.g. Time Warner, Verizon, Direct TV, etc.) to gain access to the streaming content. I've tried it already and it works great!
The 2012 Summer Olympics will have 19 competition days, from today, July 25th to Sunday, August 12th. The closing ceremony on the 12th titled "A Symphony of British Music" will start at 9 p.m. local (London) time. According to Rolling Stone, the lineup at the closing ceremony will include The Who, a Spice Girls reunion, George Michael and Jessie J among others.
Olympics Facts, Statistics and Tidbits
Some 10,490 athletes from 204 nations will be represented at the 2012 Summer Olympics, playing 26 sports in 39 disciplines at 34 venues. Talk about a logistical challenge! There will be 302 medal events, which translates into a total of 906 gold, silver and bronze medals (though of course many more medals will be distributed for events involving more than one player on a team).
Ten sports account for fully 74% of the 302 events. The top 10, including medal count, includes: Athletics (Track & Field) 47 medals, Aquatics (46), Wrestling (20), Cycling (18), Gymnastics (18), Canoeing (16), Shooting (15), Weightlifting (15), Judo (14) and Rowing (14).
If you include the n
A buddy of mine surprised me with these great photos from an exhibition game played in the southern Taiwanese city of Kaohsiung. NBA legends Scottie Pippen and Dennis Rodman, along with other popular retirees including Horace Grant, Jason Williams, Mitch Richmond and others, put on a show against the Taiwanese All-Star team this past Sunday, July 21st.
This team of old-timers looked great! The NBA Alumni team beat the locals by a score of 104 to 89 and the crowd thoroughly enjoyed the show! Rodman, who is now 51, played with gusto, according to my friend. In fact, he dove for a loose ball and ended up in some courtside seats. His effort was impressive. And of course, as you'll see below, he was as photogenic as ever.
The Local Buzz section of CVG is where we enjoy sharing tidbits on new restaurants opening or planning to open in and around the Conejo Valley and greater Ventura County. We also cover restaurants that close their doors.
Overall, we've noticed quite a lot of activity so far this year, so how about a quick summary for your dining pleasure (or displeasure as the case may be):
New Restaurant Announcements
On a recent whale watching trip to the Santa Barbara Channel via Channel Islands Packers (Condor Express also does whale watching trips) Conejo Valley based photographer Jonathan Stewart and others witnessed more humpback whales than could be counted, a solitary blue whale, an extraordinary number of dolphins and sea lions, and countless other sea creatures as they made their way towards the Channel Islands.
Stewart shares some fantastic shots below. For more of these, visit his website at www.jonathanstewartphotos.com or go directly to his Anacapa Island Whale Watching Album.
This is the head of one of the humpback whales they saw.
In May 2012, U.S. News & World Report published its 4th ranking of the nation's best public high schools. The study covered nearly 22,000 public high schools across the country.
Schools were ranked based on the following factors measured 2009-2010: (1) how well students tested on reading and math proficiency assessments at the state level, factoring in disadvantaged students, who tend to score lower on tests; and (2) college readiness, based on how well schools prepare students for college-level work via Advanced Placement (AP) or International Baccalaureate (IB) programs.
The median college readiness, measured on a scale of 0 to 100, was 16.3. A readiness index of 100 means that all 12th graders took and passed at least 1 AP or IB test. (More on the methodology)
There were 2,407 California high schools, 87,682 full-time teachers and 1,999,202 students enrolled during the survey period. To be ranked in California, schools must receive either a gold (top 500 nationally) or silver (top 501 to 2008 nationally) medal. 276 Callifornia schools received gold or silver medals.
We checked out local high schools in the Conejo Valley, Ventura County and adjacent areas and summarized the information below. There were 12 local schools that received gold/silver medal status and thus were ranked nationally and in California.
Malibu High School ranked 52nd in the state, with the highest local "college readiness" level. The top academic scoring school locally was Oak Park High School. Thousand Oaks High School
Conejo Valley Guide covers events, activities and things to do throughout Ventura County and surrounding areas.
Conejo Valley Guide® covers thousands of events, activities and things to do throughout Ventura County, California and surrounding areas.
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