California - San Diego Coronado Island and USS Midway April 2019

We had a whole day and half of the next day before our flight home, so we spent most of the day Friday on Coronado Island. I really like Coronado, the island and the town. When I was a teenager, my family would go to Disneyland and San Diego every year on Easter vacation. We would camp in Mission Bay but we always spent a day on the beach at Coronado.

We took the harbor ferry across to the island (Yes, I remembered my hat and the sunscreen today) and walked through town to the beach. We stopped off along the way at a little Mexican fast-food place for lunch. Sooo much food. It was pretty windy at the beach and the water was freezing cold, but if you could find a place out of the wind it was warm enough for a t-shirt and shorts. We spent some time at the beach and I dabbled my feet in the water a bit. We walked through the grand old Del Coronado Hotel grounds and started a leisurely stroll back to the ferry landing. We decided to walk a couple of blocks off the main street on the way back and saw lots of charming cottages and houses. No cookie-cutter stuff here, they're all different.

Back to our hotel to change clothes then off to Little Italy for dinner. We ate a restaurant called Filippi's that has apparently been there a long time. You have to access the restaurant through a small Italian market and the line was out the door when we arrived. It moved pretty quickly though and we were seated within 20 minutes. Good old-fashioned Italian food in giant proportions. We shared a pizza and had salads but I saw the plates of spaghetti with meatballs the size of tennis balls and a giant plate of lasagna. Yummy stuff and a fun relaxed vibe.

Our flight the next day didn't leave until the afternoon so we spent the morning on the USS Midway.
The Midway is a decommissioned aircraft carrier turned into a floating museum. Both Mike and I have been here before, but it was interesting to see it again. We chatted with a docent who had served on the Midway at the end of WWII, and the guy looked great considering he had to be 90 years old. He told us a little about his experiences on the ship and it was just a real pleasure to speak with him. We toured the interior of the ship and the hanger bay, then went topside to the deck and checked out all the planes, helicopters and jets on display. They frequently have ceremonies own the deck and today was no exception. They had just finished a ceremony for a female pilot being promoted to the rank of colonel.  We had seen some other ceremonies as we went by on our harbor cruise the other day too.

                             Bob Hope Memorial with USS Midway in the background

Restaurant entrance is through that little arch you can barely see at the end of the aisle

California - San Diego Balboa Park and Harbor Cruise April 2019

After yesterday's trip to the zoo, I was pretty confident in my ability to get around by bus. Mike had a half day of his conference left, so I decided to go back out to Balboa Park ad check out the Museum of Photographic Arts. The buildings ion that part of the park were built for the Panama-California Exhibition in 1915 so they're pretty cool old Spanish style buildings. 

The museum of Photographic Art was quite a disappointment to me. It was very small and veru=y limited. You can read my Tripadvisor review here:

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60750-d128806-r665579237-Museum_of_Photographic_Arts_MoPA-San_Diego_California.html

I wandered over to the Botanical building but it was closed that day. I contemplated going back to zoo since I was within walking distance, but I couldn't justify the admission price for just a couple of hours. There are couple of other museums in Balboa Park, but nothing that really piqued my interest so I went back to the hotel to wait for Mike to finish up. 

In the afternoon, we took a harbor cruise with Hornblower Cruises. The two hour version is definitely the better option I think, because I enjoyed the second hour more than the first. If you take the 1 hour option you only go halfway along the harbor, either north or south and which way you go depends on when you board. Anyway, I enjoyed the southern loop because they take you past the shipyards where you can see ships being built and refurbished including naval ships. Our captain had been in the navy so he knew all about the different ships and talked about them as we went along. We saw several helicopters in flight and an Osprey as well. Two Navy Seal boats zoomed by us too. There was an aircraft carrier in port too.

I only wished I had thought to bring my hat as I added to my sunburn from the previous day. I did buy some sunscreen that morning but since I had already put on my makeup, I didn't put any on my face. Big mistake, I burned my face a little more and burned my scalp too. We've had so much rain the last several months, that I'm not used to thinking about sunburn. 

California - San Diego Zoo April 2019

Mike was attending a conference in San Diego, so I flew there to join him for a couple of days. We've been to San Diego many times in the past, but haven't been there for about 8 years now.

Mike was in his conference all day Wednesday, so I decided to go to the zoo.  San Diego Zoo is a great zoo - lots of things to see, a huge variety of animals, and it was a gorgeous sunny day. I checked my fitness band and I walked 7 miles that day, just at the zoo!

Fo those if you who don't like zoos or keeping animals in captivity, I understand your feelings. Most zoos have breeding programs or other animal conservation programs so I believe they have a place in our society, especially since so many people would never be able to see these animals in the wild.

Our grandkids love going to zoos and so I go to our local zoos fairly often, but the type of animals to see is fairly small and neither zoo has elephants. I have very fond memories of feeding peanuts to the elephants at our local zoo when was a child, so the first exhibit I headed for was Africa Rocks. The elephants have a nice area, about 3-4 acres in size with its own lake. Two Asian elephants and two African elephants live here.

The zoo has had an agreement with China for over 20 years to receive Chinese Panda Bears and establish a breeding program that has resulted in several baby Pandas. The breeding program is coming to an end so I wanted to be sure to see the Pandas as I hadn't seen them in person before. I got a good look from the bridge that goes above the Panda exhibit. That was a good thing because when I made it to their enclosure later that day, the bear was sleeping and couldn't be seen.

I saw lots of other animals - lion, tigers and bears, oh my! 😉 Sorry, couldn't resist that. I also saw gorillas, orangutans, leopards, meerkats, giraffes, hippo, eagles, otters, penguins, you name it and SD zoo probably has it. They also have 3 walk-through aviaries where you can see the birds close-up. I had a toucan flying back and forth over my head in one of the aviaries, they're so colorful and pretty up close like that. I realized at the end of the day that I had forgotten the reptile house so I'll have to see that another time. By then I was sunburned and a little tired so I hit the gift shop for a little present for the grandkids and then walked back to the bus stop.

Oh! That's something else I should add, it was super easy to get to the zoo via public transportation and San Diego Metro Transit has a really good transit app for smartphones that I found very easy to use. An all-day transit pass (good on buses and trams) is only $5. I was able to catch the bus just one block from my hotel and didn't even have to change buses. This is a big deal for me as we live in a rural area and no public transit options, so I rarely use public transportation and I find it a little nerve-wracking to make sure I'm actually going where I think I'm going when I do use it.