I was early for meeting a friend at a favorite Vietnamese restaurant (The Golden Deli) in San Gabriel so I decided to stop at the Mission and do a little walk-around with the new lens.

At the end of the church there's a little attached appendage that I hesitate to call a "Bell Tower." It does have, however, six bells built into little niches at the top.

I zoomed into the maximum 400 mm range of the lens and took this shot of the largest bell:

I was intrigued by the letters on the bell and enlarged and cropped the image on the computer, and ended up with this image:

It is Latin which isn't a strong point, but I think it says it was made by Senitus and Recieus?  

A bit further on my walk-about, I came upon this brick wall and took this photo.  I think the statue is of Father Junipero Serra, the founder of the string of missions in California:

Inside the mission is a small but nice cactus garden.  I've walked by this cactus many times and finally took this picture:

And, I decided to see what it would look like in Black and White:

Do you like one better than than the other?

Lastly, my favorite of the session was this stairway on the outside of the church leading to the choir's loft: