Hey guys! As I’m sure most of you know, Pearson and I spent last weekend in Southern California! Pearson was in San Diego all last week for a conference. The conference ended on Thursday so I flew out that day to spend a long weekend there with him. It was the best weekend either of us have had in a long time.
My flight left at 6:30 am EST. I flew from Columbus to LAX which was the longest flight I’ve ever been on. And I was mesmerized by the country I flew over! How can everything look so different within the same country. I actually saw plateaus which I didn’t know existed outside of geography textbooks! And to think I was flying miles and miles above it all in a man-made bird… Kinda scary yet very humbling!
When I got to LAX, I was very surprised by how terrible of an airport it was. The more traveling I do, the more I realize how spoiled I’ve been with the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. LAX is very poorly laid out, the numbering of the gates makes no sense, the only places to eat are high-end restaurants, and none of the outlets worked. I had a 2.5 hour layover and San Diego is only a couple hour drive away. I should have rented a car and left.
Once I got to San Diego, I got my rental car and navigated to the address of our Air BnB. Pearson was still with his group doing science-y stuff so I was on my own to meet the guy we rented from. I’ll be honest, I was kinda intimidated being in a strange place and meeting a strange man but it all worked out. The place was old and in the middle of the busiest and loudest party square around, but at least it was clean.
Once Pearson got there, we went out for dinner and spent the evening walking up and down the boardwalk. It was so pretty and romantic.
Among all the surf shops and seafood places, we found a really cool French coffee shop and bookstore which I thought was really out of place (and I didn’t take any pictures of it). We also saw the Navy Museum and aircraft carrier memorial. But it was late so we didn’t go in and it was dark so we didn’t get good pictures.
We went to bed pretty early that night even though it was St. Patrick’s Day. I had been up since about 5:00 am EST which is 2:00 am PST. And I didn’t get very much sleep the night before because I never do before I travel. Silly anxiety.
Friday morning, we took our time getting up, checked out of our apartment, and headed to a delicious brunch. Afterwards, we went to Balboa park because we had heard so much about it. We had no idea what to expect and we were pleasantly surprised! It was a beautiful day and I may have been a little trigger happy with the camera on my phone. These are maybe 10% of what I took!
As you can see, the architecture all over the park was to die for! These pictures don’t do it justice. And just wait till you see some of the beauties we saw in the botanical garden below.
While we were at Balboa Park, we also decided to check out the Museum of Man. This museum is housed in that beautiful building up there with the California Tower sticking out of it. The museum was definitely interesting to say the least!
After our day at Balboa Park, we embarked on the long drive to Los Angeles. It was long because we didn’t heed the warnings and get out of town before 2:00 pm. What should have been a 2 hour trip took us 4 hours thanks to traffic. It was a pretty drive though.
Have you ever been to San Diego? Did you go to Balboa Park and walk the board walk?
Stay tuned tomorrow for the next part of our trip!
