On the Road is a weekday feature spotlighting reader photo submissions.
From the exotic to the familiar, whether you’re traveling or in your own backyard, we would love to see the world through your eyes.
Today we have the second entry in Bill’s “Mission” series. We saw the first one, Mission San Buenaventura, on April 1st. We’ll see the third one next week, and will be treated to the final one the week after that.
I don’t know about you, but the last photo below is the room that I would most like to hang out in. I feel more calm, just looking at it, picturing myself sitting there. ~WG
BillinGlendaleCA
La Purisima Mission is different in several ways from the other missions in southern California. First, it’s in a rural setting about 4 miles northeast of Lompoc California. Second, it’s one of 2 of the 21 Spanish missions that is not still owned and operated by the Catholic church being instead a State Historical Park. Third, given it’s status as a historical park as opposed to a working church and it’s rural location and size, it recreates mission life of the early 1800’s with livestock (cows, horses, burros, and pigs) and less manicured though maintained landscape.
La Purisima was founded in 1787, originally a mile south of Lompoc (now the southern end of F Street with some ruins remaining) and moved here in the early 1800’s after an earthquake destroyed the original mission. This earthquake occurred on December 21, 1812 also destroyed the chapel at Mission Santa Barbara though was separate from the earthquake earlier in the month (December 8) that destroyed the Great Stone Church at San Juan Capistrano and the bell tower at Mission San Gabriel. The mission fell into disrepair after the missions were secularized in the 1830’s. Archaeological digs and restoration were undertaken in the 1930’s with most of the construction being done by the CCC. Many of the other missions have portions that are not open to the public, so rooms may have been repurposed for church business.
This may have been the first mission that I visited, but I would have been about 4 years old, so my recollections are a bit vague.

Pathway to the La Purisima mission cemetery on the left and main chapel to it’s right.

This IR photo captures the La Purisima Mission chapel at the left and one of the residential buildings at the right.

Horses graze in the pasture adjoining La Purisima Mission. They also have cows and pigs.

This is the altar in the main chapel at La Purisima Mission.

There is a small chapel for the priests and mission residents at La Purisima Mission. I’ve not seen this at other missions.

This is the priest’s library where the priests and guests of the mission could study.

This room was used to great guests arriving at La Purisima Mission.
p.a.
Thanks as always Bill. Last 3 pictures: are the walls textured or is that some kind of wall treatment?
Stucco?
MagdaInBlack
@p.a.:
Maybe ? >>
P.S. I love these photos, Bill.
Mustang Bobby
Thank you, Bill. Beautiful and calming photographs. The architectural style reminds me of the missions and churches in northern New Mexico, a favorite place to visit for the vistas and the calmness.
MagdaInBlack
@MagdaInBlack:
N.M. You said the last 3. I was so taken with the paintwork i had to look it up.
more coffee needed here
zhena gogolia
I enjoyed the peacocks and Pasadena (on your Patreon)!
Laura Too
Beautiful, thanks!
arrieve
Beautiful, Bill. I love the IR shot.
WaterGirl
I am captivated by that last photo, and I am just now realizing how much it reminds me of a place i visited regularly as a child and young adult. Twice a year, like clockwork, for decades. Always for Christmas, and then sometime in the summer.
My dad’s two sisters were nuns, and this room has the look and feel of the
meeting areareception area in their convent.stinger
Ncie pictures! I love to see the natural setting against the highly decorated main chapel image.
I’ve never considered Catholicism a peaceful or calming religion — saints stuffed with arrows, crowns of thorns, pensive madonnas, fasting and hairshirts and penance and three OurFathers…. Maybe the library and the entrance hall and the great outdoors were a bit of a respite from that!
?BillinGlendaleCA
@p.a.: It’s unfinished plaster over adobe, so it has a texture.
@MagdaInBlack: Thanks, I think they may have used the fresco technique on the painting on the alter.
@Mustang Bobby: I’ve only seen pictures of the ones in New Mexico(I did see the exterior of one from a distance), but they’re similar.
@zhena gogolia: I’m glad you enjoyed them. next up will also be from Pasadena. The Colorado Street Bridge. I’ve collected all the shots(over 1400, there are some timelapse shots) and have begun the culling and processing.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Laura Too: Glad ya like em.
@arrieve: Thanks, I love my IR stuff and glade someone else does?.
@WaterGirl: That room is less of a meeting area, but more of a reception room for when guests would visit the mission. They also had room for guests as they traveled up the coast. The Convento at Mission San Fernando has a similar room. I’m guessing in their original configuration all the mission did as well.
@stinger: It’s really different than the more “churchy” missions. I really do enjoy church interiors especially the more ornate ones. Here in LA the older Catholic and Episcopal churches are really pretty, but the Greek Orthodox cathedral is stunning.
J R in WV
Nice job, as usual, Bill, thanks!
But for the lack of people, this seems much more like a living mission of the early Spanish colonialization of the far west than any of the others we’ve seen, even though it isn’t of that age so much. Livestock, quiet rural setting. Pretty nice place.
KithKanan
La Purisima is just down (okay, about an hour down) the highway from me, and so far it’s the favorite of the various California Missions I’ve been to. Beautiful photos as always, Bill. Thanks!
?BillinGlendaleCA
@J R in WV: Thanks.
It’s really special since it recreates mission life during the California mission period of the late 1700’s and early 1800’s. California(Alta California) wasn’t really explored by the Spanish until the early 1770’s.
@KithKanan: Thanks, I really enjoyed it too.
?BillinGlendaleCA
Since zhena gogolia mentioned my Patreon, I thought I’d note that it’s here: https://www.patreon.com/BillinGlendaleCA. For a preview of what my patrons saw in April, here’s a link to my public summery for the month of April.
cckids
Beautiful pictures, Bill! So peaceful.
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
Lovely pix, Bill. I’ve really enjoyed your mission photos – my parents are from Ventura County and the Catholic side had the mission there as their parish church. Have you visited Mission San Antonio de Padua? It’s my favorite (although there are a handful of missions I haven’t visited). It’s been heavily restored, but its relative isolation, extensive open surrounding fields, and air of dusty desolation gives a real sense of what life in the Spanish missionaries’ time must have been like – at least for the European invaders.
dr. luba
Thanks, this was a nice reminder of my 2016 mission trek/road trip; I managed to visit all the missions between LA and SF during an unusually hot autumn. (Is it supposed to be 100 degrees in California in late October?)
And this was one of the nicest. Now I have to go look at my old photos again…..
Elizabelle
@dr. luba: That would be an awesome trip. Save for the 3 digit heat.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@cckids: Thanks.
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice: I grew up in eastern Ventura County and remember seeing the mission in Ventura when we headed north, I visited that mission late last year and there was an OTR a few weeks ago. I was thinking of visiting San Luis Obispo, San Miguel and San Antonio de Padua in another “day of three missions” but San Antonio is a bit far.
@dr. luba: Glad you liked it. I really did like this mission, how it seemed undisturbed from the way it was in the early 1800’s.
Yup, Santa Ana winds.
@Elizabelle: It was 103°F here last Friday.
Elizabelle
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Have been hearing about the SoCal heatwave, and peeps heading for the beaches. Social distancing, peeps.
WaterGirl
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Poor choice of words on my part! Yes, reception area is exactly what it was referring to at the convent. Little groupings of chairs etc where we would sit and visit for awhile.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Elizabelle: Madame mentioned the lack of social distancing by those beach folk last night. I’ve stopped watching the local news, so I didn’t see the reports.
@WaterGirl: That’s alright, I’ve only seen a room like that at San Fernando. I’m think that all the missions probably had a reception area, but they are probably used for museum exhibits now. That was a really nice thing about this mission, the historical exhibits are in a separate visitor’s center by the parking lot.