Issue link: https://imageup.uberflip.com/i/1542244
Happy New Year to everyone! We hope you had a wonderful holiday however you celebrated. The Travel Club is busy planning day trips to parts of Southern California. Places we would like to visit and hope you will also. If there is a place you would like to visit or experience, please feel free to contact us (ohcctravelclub2025@ gmail.com) with your suggestions. Here are our upcoming trips and programs: Jan. 20. We will ring in the New Year at our Annual Kick-Off. A light meal with refreshments will be provided. Rosemary Bray will reprise her wonderful presentation on Rhino Conservation in Africa. We will also update everyone on some of our upcoming trips. Feb. 19. We will head to beautiful Balboa Park for a wonderful Architectural Tour focusing on the Spanish style buildings from the 1915-1917 Panama California Exposition. This will include the recently renovated Lily Pond and Botanical Garden. Following a lunch at Old Town Mexican Café, you may wander around Old Town checking out some of the many historical buildings including the "haunted" Whaley House. April 19. Save the date for a trip to Petco Park for Padres vs. the Cubbies. Details to follow. July 4. Celebrate America's 250th birthday on the Hornblower Cruise to view the Spectacular Big Bay Boom. Aug. 4. Join us for a Travel Club Favorite, Pageant of the Masters. The theme this year is "The Greatest of All Time. This will feature living recreations of legendary artworks by artists like Vermeer, van Gogh, da Vinci, Monet, Renoir, Rodin and Picasso. Frequently people on a trip need to cancel. Many people on our wait lists actually have had the opportunity to go on our trips. To be placed on the waitlist or to register for any of our trips, leave a check made out to the OH Travel Club, in the Travel Club envelope at the Clubhouse Front Desk. Add $5 to the price if you are not a member of the Club. You will receive an email confirming your registration. We certainly hope you will join us on one of our trips! Your OH Travel Club Board, Adele, Lynn, Amy, Jeannine and Callie Written by Amy Blount and approved by the Travel Club Board. | OHCC LIVING | JANUARY 2026 | 29 Travel Club Why Our Save the Monarch Butterfly Club Matters Now More an Ever Across North America, monarch butterf lies are in serious trouble. Over the last few decades, their populations have dropped dramatically due to habitat loss, pesticides, climate change, and the disappearance of milkweed, the only plant where monarchs lay their eggs. Scientists estimate that the eastern migratory population has declined by roughly 80% since the mid-1990s, while the western population that overwinters along the California coast has fallen by more than 95% from its historic numbers in the 1980s. In the West, the story is especially sobering. Once, millions of monarchs clustered in coastal groves each winter. In 2020, fewer than 2,000 were counted — essentially a near-collapse. Numbers rebounded to over 200,000 in the following years, but they remain far below what scientists consider a healthy, resilient population and are highly vulnerable to bad weather years and local disasters. Meanwhile, new research across hundreds of butterf ly species in the U.S. shows an overall 22% decline in butterf ly numbers in just the past 20 years — a warning sign for the health of our broader environment. That's where our Save the Monarch Butterf ly (SMB) Club comes in. By joining, you become part of a local, hands-on solution. Our members help maintain and expand the Monarch Sanctuary and pollinator gardens, plant native narrowleaf milkweed and nectar f lowers, and model pesticide-free gardening right here in Ocean Hills. We share up-to-date information on best practices, host educational talks and garden tours, and connect neighbors who care about wildlife, climate, and healthy community landscape. Your membership dues support practical, on-the-ground conservation: tools and plants for the sanctuary, updated educational signs, seeds and materials for community outreach, and programs that inspire the next wave of volunteers and citizen- scientists. At the same time, members enjoy friendship and purpose — working side by side in the garden, celebrating the first eggs and chrysalises of the season, and taking pride in knowing that our neighborhood is part of a larger regional effort to protect monarchs and other pollinators. Monarchs need safe places to breed, fuel up, and rest on their long journeys. When you join the SMB Club, you help ensure that our sanctuary — and our entire community — remains one of those safe havens. A small membership in one little corner of California may seem like a modest act but multiplied by hundreds of gardens and thousands of people, it becomes exactly the kind of change monarchs need to survive. Sources: The National Wildlife Federation, Xerces Society, and Butterf ly Conservation. Written by Rona Cole Save the monarch butterfly