San Diego 2020

Turns out I never posted anything about our San Diego vacation in January. This poor little blog has been neglected a bit lately, but I have been posting multiple hiking blog posts to make up for it. It’s long overdue to catch you up on our trip and it sort of feels nice to relive a time when we could travel and leave our houses. I will say that at the end of January, there was some concern about the Coronavirus in the United States, but I wasn’t sure how concerned I needed to be. I was a little worried going into this trip as there had been documented cases of COVID-19 in California, but I hoped we’d be ok. We did see a number of people with face masks and others that had traveled from China so we were cautious, but also didn’t take any additional precautions besides washing our hands. Our trip wasn’t weighed down by the Coronavirus, but there were reminders everywhere that something potentially serious was happening.

When we travelled to San Diego a couple years ago it was a warmer than usual January whereas this year it seemed a bit chillier - especially for the first few days. We arrived to cool temps, and fog with an occaisional peak of sun. Our flight was super early which left us much of the day to explore, but we were so tired that I’m not sure the extra time was really worth it. We drove to the Carlsbad area as we were hoping to go on to a winery in Temecula the following day, but timewise it just didn’t work out. So for the first day, we spent our time exploring a beach in Carlsbad where I took too many pictures - probabaly just excited to be away from the Minnesota winter grey.

From there, we went on to the Oceanside Pier where we wandered around, ate some ice cream, settled into our hotel, went to dinner, and then crashed early.

The next day was my birthday, which was the excuse for this San Diego vacation. We headed off to LegoLand for the day - maybe not my first choice for my birthday, but I didn’t really care. Riley loved it and Jesse and I liked parts of it, even if it seemed a bit overpriced for the whole experience.

From Carlsbad, we headed back to the Old Town area of San Diego where we stayed for the rest of our vacation. Jesse has a fondness for Best Western hotels because they usually provide a Continental breakfast and free parking, but he discovered that not all of them do when we stayed here. While this was slightly disappointing, this hotel was really nice and we were able to find free on street parking around the corner, so we have no complaints. We loved the area as it’s centrally located and Old Town has plenty to explore.

The next morning we were ready for a completely different experience from the day before and decided to go hiking. There are a number of trails at Mission Trails Regional Park, but we decided to stick with the visitor centor loop. We started out fairly early, but it still got hot fast and there was no reprieve from the sun. Still, no complaints as we were happy to get outside and be in nature.

Up next was the USS Midway. Jesse REALLY wanted to do this tour the last time we were here, but it didn’t happen so it was on our must see list. I almost forgot to write about it here because I didn’t take in my big camera (I was sick of carrying it) and instead snapped some pics with my phone - plus it’s six months later and my memory can’t be trusted. However, there really is no excuse because this was such a memorable part of our trip. I wasn’t sure how excited our then 9 year old would be about strolling around a decommissioned aircraft carrier for 4 hours (it takes a good 4 - 5 hours to see everything), but she did great. She even got a junior pilot wings for completing all the questions in the junior pilot booklet.

We might have explored the Midtown area more, but we were planning to meet my cousins at a restaurant in the Old Town area near our hotel for dinner. It’s nice to connect with them on these trips and catch up. We didn’t spend much time together when we were younger, but as our parents have aged (and some passed away), we’ve found our way to each other. My cousin, Ed, even presented me with an old camera from about 1917 that belonged to our grandfather when he was young. He found it in his mother’s belongings after she passed away and he knew I would appreciate having it. It is very meaningful to me and I appreciate it so very much.

The following day we went to the Cabrillo National Monument as was recommended by our friend the last time we were here. On the way we stopped to take in the Fort Rosecrans National military cemetery and it provided a nice quiet reflection at the start of the day. We were excited to see the historic light house and walk the short trail at the Cabrillo National Monument, but watching the USS Nimitz aircraft carrier come in to port may have been the high point for us.

We decided to stop at the tide pools on Point Loma before going on to our next destination and it was yet another place that we loved. Even though we weren’t there when the tide was low, it was still fun to explore, and watch the water crash against the shore.

I’ve been to Balboa Park a couple times, but had only explored 1 of the 17 museums there. This time we decided to find a couple more and finally walk through the botanical building. A couple years ago we went to the San Diego Museum of Man which I would recommend. This year, Jesse wanted to go to the San Diego Air & Space Museum and I wanted to go to the Museum of Photographic Arts (MOPA). Both were interesting, but maybe not what we expected. The Air & Space Museum had A LOT of text to read. It wasn’t a bad thing, but felt so overwhelming all the content you could consume. MOPA was smaller than I imagined, but still engrossing.

That night we met up with my friend, Karen. She lives in the Little Italy area so we met her at her condo, adored her dog, ate Thai food at a local restuarant and walked around the neighborhood.

And then the day came that we had to leave and go back to our wintery Minnesota. Seeing that I’m writing this 6 months removed, I’m sure there are a tone of things I’m forgetting to include here so I will end with a little note about food. Since we didn’t have a contenental breakfast at our hotel we actually went out to eat. Twice we went to Snooze because it was that good and on the last day we walked over to Hungry’s Kitchen in Old Town and that was also great. We made the mistake of eating at the restaurant associated with the hotel on my birthday because they gave us a coupon, but that wasn’t anything special. In fact, it was a bit annoying as they had people asking to take your picture or play music for you (for money, of course). We don’t usually fall for those things, but did this time. At least I can say that I have a picture of me on my birthday that isn’t at Legoland. And finally, it wouldn’t be a trip to San Diego if we didn’t stop at El Indio. It was the first and last place we ate at and I would have been completely happy to have eaten every meal there. Seriously.

Until next time San Diego.