We had a nice two days in San Diego. Through out this post I will scatter a few photos. I took lots and lots of photos and selected a few for my Epson on line album. You can view them by using this link:

My Epson Album

I have resized them in PhotoShop so they should load quickly.

We left for San Diego on Monday morning. We had a few errands to run like getting gas for the car and getting Jennifer's books for the Fall Semester. We made good time down, it's about a two hour trip, and traffic was light to medium heavy.

First thing we did was go to Chula Vista where we had made reservations at Motel 6 and we checked in and paid for our room. The room was not available yet but we expected that. It was now around 11:30 and so we went to McDonalds which was located right in front of Motel 6 and had a little lunch and then headed across the street to The Trolley station. The Trolley is San Diego's light rail service. It travels all around the area and down as far as the border. It reminds me a lot of our Metro Rail here in the Los Angeles area. After purchasing our tickets a trolley came by about 5 minutes later. We stayed on the trolley all the way to the Santa Fe Depot which was the nearest stop to the pier area. Just like our Metro rail we traveled through not so good areas and very nice areas. It took about 20 minutes and we didn't have to worry about driving back into San Diego or parking. Over all it cost less for both of us to travel this way (Paul, as a senior, only paid $1) then for us to pay parking.


We walked the three blocks to The Midway and got our first glimpse.

Not ever having been on or near an aircraft carrier it was pretty impressive to me. When Paul was in the Navy in the mid 1950's he was on a carrier called the Essex which was smaller than The Midway. I would say Paul was like a kid in a candy store.




After purchasing our tickets we went aboard and began our self guided tour on the hanger deck. There we found some photos of aircraft that have flown off of carriers over the years and Paul found a photo of the plane (well, not the exact one) he flew.











They also had a trainer aircraft just like Paul trained on.









After walking around the hanger deck we climbed up several levels to the flight deck. Here they had many aircraft on display. We wandered around looking at them and then went over to the control area of the carrier called The Island. Here a group of 16 of us climbed small narrow ladders and got a guided tour by a docent of this part of the ship.






After the tour we wandered out to the bow of the flight deck. It was such a beautiful day. The breeze was blowing and looking back to the East thunderheads made a beautiful backdrop.






From this area we climbed back down to the hanger deck and then down some more levels to the engine room. This was a part of the ship Paul really wanted to see and he was happy it was open to the public. From there we climbed back to the flight deck and then down again to sick bay, the galley, the post office, and the machine shop. Then back to the hangar deck and forward to the berthing spaces, the Junior Officer's quarters, and the Forecastle. Here they have laid out the anchors which have just been refurbished.



One of the areas Paul really wanted to see was The Ready Room. It was here where Paul and the other pilots hung out during the day and received their orders. So Paul found a docent who told us that part of the ship was not open to the Public yet. They were working on it. When Paul mentioned his interest and why, the docent took us up. So we climbed up two flights of narrow stairs. Boy, because it isn't open to the public yet, it was hot up there! But Paul was so happy because the one room looked just like the one on the Essex. And some of the squadron emblems where painted on the floor including his squadrons.

So over all it was a real good visit. We left the area (my feet were killing me and I didn't feel like walking around the pier area) around 4:30 and made our way back to the Trolley station. We got back to Chula Vista and got our room and rested. Around 7 we decided to go eat. There was a Denny's right across the street but neither of us is overly fond of Denny's so we looked up places in the phone book. We found they had a Home Town Buffet south of us and so went there. We aren't much for trying new food and so stuck with what we knew. We headed back to our room and watched the news and I watched the end of the movie The Sixth Sense.

The next morning we took our time. No sense in rushing around, we are on vacation! We went to breakfast around 10 across the street at a place that specializes in pancakes. The food and service were really good and we had a nice big breakfast. We walked back to our room and packed and checked out and headed to the San Diego Zoo.

We have not been to the zoo since Jennifer was little. It is such a nice zoo. Of course, it is world famous. A month or so prior to this we got a coupon book in the mail and in it was an $8 off the special value ticket so that is what we got. This gave us the opportunity to ride the tour bus around the zoo, use the in zoo shuttle bus and ride the skyway as many times as we wanted. We decided to walk the inner part of the zoo first and then take the bus around the outside part and not walk in those areas.





The zoo is very lush in its plantings and where you walk, you feel like you're in the jungle or a rain forest. The animals are in more natural habitats rather than cages.








After walking around we went to see the sea lion show and then took the skyway over to the west part of the zoo and saw the polar bears and then walked to where the pandas are. The female panda was off exhibit as she was expecting her baby any time and sure enough on this mornings news we heard she gave birth last night.





We walked along the Sun Bear Forest path to the front of the zoo and took the bus tour. Our guild was a young lady who was very enthusiastic which made for a nice trip. After the tour we headed back to a couple of things we wanted to see closer. It was getting to be late afternoon and we decided we wanted to ride the skyway again. In heading in that direction a show was going on called Living Garden. Now in the brochure there is no explanation given as to what this is and if we hadn't been walking by we would not have gone out of our way to see it. It was mesmerizing. A young woman is on a stage dressed like a fountain. Water comes out of her "fingertips" and her head. She moves slowly to music which is a recorded voice like Sarah Brightman singing Italian love songs. We watched this for awhile and then headed to the skyway and took that over and then got back on and came back. We were going to get our monies worth.




When we got back another showing of Living Garden was in progress and so we watched more. It would appear that the same girl does all the shows. They begin at 3:30, last 20 minutes and are every half hour until the last show at 7:30. I would imagine that is not easy to perform let alone carrying all the weight of that costume. I was really impressed.




Now it was going on 6 so after a short walk through the gift shop we headed out and home. The drive was very nice and low clouds had come in making for a cool drive. We wanted to eat somewhere but could not find a place in Oceanside on the street we got off on. Mostly fast food. So we ended up at Sizzlers in San Juan Capistrano. We got home around 9 to a stuffy house but after opening doors and windows it freshened up pretty fast,

We had a pile of mail both snail and e to check and took our showers and went to bed tired. We had a really nice time. Lots of walking and my feet are still recuperating today. San Diego is a really nice vacation destination. We have gone a number of times in the past for Sea World and Balboa Park and its museums and look forward to returning some time in the future.