Beautiful San Diego

The Star of India

This morning we moved out of our plush digs at the Sheraton in favor of a more centrally located hotel in Old Town San Diego. Our plan for the day was to walk a 10 km year round walk in downtown San Diego. Once in San Diego I was surprised at how little traffic there was. Finding a parking place on the waterfront was quite easy. An issue arose when I discovered that it was all three hour parking. Now normally it only takes about 2 1/2 hours to do 10 km. This walk is 11 km and goes through areas that we wanted to take a bit more time to see. Not to mention stopping every few blocks to wait for traffic lights.

The walk started along the waterfront and it was beautiful. We made really good time. Then we turned in toward the hills. The next mile and a half were almost straight up. It was great excise, but slowed us down considerably. At the top of the hills we entered Balboa Park. So we saw some of that yesterday, but everything was closed. Today everything was open, but we couldn’t really slow down to explore it (I don’t want to know how much a parking ticket in San Diego costs). We made a brief pit stop in Balboa Park and then hoofed it toward downtown.

Here comes the train!

Glaslamp Quarter of San Diego

View from the San Diego convention center

Long story short, we saw a lot of San Diego and we really liked it. We made it back to our car with just 9 minutes to spare. I wish we could have spent more time looking around in Balboa Park, but there just wan’t time. When we returned to the car we moved to a parking place closer to the Maritime Museum. After eating a lunch of sandwiches and an apple we were off to explore the museum. I have to say that the San Diego Maritime Museum is great (if you like ships and maritime history).

From the foredeck of the Star of India

Helms a-lee!!! Where did you say we were going?

Russian Foxtrot class sub

A cold war era Russian submarine

The control room of a Foxtrot class sub

San Salvador 1542

A replica of the San Salvador

When our legs finally gave out we headed to Old Town to check into our hotel. We then went to the restaurant to use our free drink coupons and relax on the deck enjoying the view. After a great dinner we walked down to the central plaza in Old Town to have a look around. Surprisingly everything was open and night life was the going strong. We finally gave in and came back to our room to rest.

Traditional dancing in Old Town

Shopping in Old town San Diego

Tomorrow we drive to Tehachapi, CA. To those of you who aren’t interested in trains I apologize in advance. The Tehachapi Loop is much like Mecca to rail fans. Tomorrow will be mostly about trains and railroads. Oh by the way, once we get to Death Valley on Thursday we won’t have wi-fi or cell service. We will emerge from the darkness on Saturday and I will post all of the episodes from Death Valley then.

Until tomorrow,

Jim