February 23, 2004 - 9:05 p.m.

Eventful Trip

Before I get into the details of my trip, let me just say that I hope to never have to fly on United ever again. Out of my four flights for this trip, two were oversold, one by 27 people! I got bumped once and also had my luggage not arrive back in Boston with me Saturday night. It wasn't all horrible, though, I must admit. I got a ticket voucher for getting bumped, and for volunteering to give up my seat on the other oversold flight I got upgraded to first class even though they didn't end up needing to put me on another flight. That was very nice, especially since it was for the long flight from San Francisco to Boston and meant that dinner was actually pretty tasty rather than just tolerable - particulalry when washed down with free wine and Bailey's with dessert. :)

Luckily, San Diego was well worth the hassle of getting there. It is a really unique, diverse, and lovely city. It has a huge variety of cultures, landscapes, and attractions, and I only had time to explore a fraction of them. More than half of my time there was spent at the city's world-class animal attractions - a day each at the San Diego Zoo, Wild Animal Park, and Sea World. Each was a wonderful day. At the zoo, I got to watch some very active orangutans and bonobos (also known as pygmy chimps), playful polar bears, and get my closest look ever at a rhino. I did not get to see the young panda, because the lines to the exhibit were extremely lengthy. I did get to see her papa, though, while he was munching on some bamboo. The apes were definitely the highlight, though. One orang used a stick to extract some sort of treat from the faux termite mounds in the habitat, another decided it would be fun to log roll right in front of the window while we humans watched and giggled, and a bonobo curiously examined an injured bumble bee on the end of a twig. Very cool.

Sea World was excellent in it's own way. The attractions there were much more varied than I expected. One of my favorites was the Wild Arctic which incorporated both a fun simulated helicopter ride and great exhibits with beluga whales and polar bears. I also got to watch feeding time in the otter exhibit. To keep the otters stimulated, they give them their food frozen into long plastic tubes. It was hilarious and fascinating to watch the cute, little creatures shake the tubes and bang them against the glass to get their morsels of shrimp and crab. I really want an otter to come live in my bathtub. :) The best part of that whole day, though, was getting to touch and feed the dolphins. They sell little plates of fish, and the dolphin swims up, you can touch it, and then you reward it by feeding it the fish. The dolphin I fed squeaked and clicked at me and was basically utterly charming. As usual, I was so excited that I acted like a little kid, and I had to call Sam to share the experience. It was an awesome day, despite whatever was wrong with my foot that began towards the end of my day at the zoo and still hasn't quite gone away.

The Wild Animal Park was probably the best of the three attractions, primarily because it was the most unique. The big draw of the park is the huge fields in which multiple species of animals from a given geographic origin (West Africa, East Africa, Mongolia, etc) are allowed to roam together mostly unfettered. It was there that I got to see several rhino moms and their young, an incredible array of deer and antelope from various continents, and gorgeous giraffes, including a couple running (which is much cooler than it sounds - they are so graceful and quick) and a two week old baby. To see these fields you ride a little open train with a driver who points out various critters and tells you about them. It was very cool even though it started to absolutely pour about two thirds of the way through. The park also has great shows, one with elphants and one with birds. During the bird show I volunteered to participate - I ended up holding out some money which a gorgeous rosy cockatoo fetched after landing on my wrist, took away, and later returned. The highlight of that day, though, was feeding giraffes and lorikeets. Getting close enough to feed a giraffe was incredible - they are one of my very favorite animals. They were very greedy, especially the older ones, but I got to feed a young one (about six or seven months old) too. I was expecting to feed them leaves of some sort, but they actually give you these things that look sort of like dog biscuits and are made of soy, beet sugar, and such. It's actually kind of cool, because they eat them right out of your hand. A couple times I got slobbered on by a very rough giraffe tongue. :) To feed the brightly colored lorikeets, they give you a little cup of nectar. The birds are not at all shy about landing on your arms, shoulder, and even head to get at the stuff. It was fun, but boy were they loud!

The rest of my time in San Diego was spent seeing various historical sites and beaches. I didn't get to swim in the Pacific, but I did wade a bit into the chilly water, and got to feel plenty of sand between my toes. I even managed to find a sand dollar completely intact. Even though the water was cool, and the air temperatures were generally only in the low to mid sixties, there were lots of surfers out no matter which beach I went to.

San Diego, even though it has only really been populated for about two hundred years has tons of history, and I got to glimpse bits of several eras. Old Town is the site on which San Diego first became a town in the early 19th century. It has restored and reconstucted versions of most of the original buildings, including some original adobe buildings. It was fascinating to learn how people settled in the area, which was at that time a desert. They got what little wood they could afford from Mexico or Northern California, so they had to make their own adobe bricks out of mud, straw, and cow manure. A little later, San Diego became a more typical, rough, wild west sort of town. Old Town is a wonderful, compact site that packs a lot of information about the city's earliest residents. It was fascinating.

A little less foreign and more opulent, was San Diego around the turn of the century. I visited Coronado, a peninsula in San Diego Bay, which was a Victorian resort community. The huge, fancy hotel that made it famous is still there along with many of the wealthy residents and visitors, though, as of World War II, half of the peninsula was being used for Navy bases and training grounds. Because of Coronado's dual purposes, it is an intriguing mix of people and attitudes. Also at the turn of the century, the center of San Diego shifted from Old Town to the current downtown area. Many of the gorgeous storefronts and brownstones are still there, but are surrounded by gleaming, modern architecture. The two manage to coexist in a remarkably harmonious way.

Just blocks from the charming, but dense downtown area is Balboa Park. The park is a huge, lush oasis that is mind-boggling when you see pictures of the landscape before it was transformed. The park developers took parched plains and rocky gorges and managed to turn them into grassy lawns dotted with gardens and palm groves. In the midst of all this are the stunning neo-classical buildings built for the 1905 expo to celebrate the completion of the Panama canal. Now the buildings house some of San Diego's many art and history museums, and it is a lovely place to escape the hustle and bustle of the city and stroll while taking in the sights.

Near the park, I also explored an incredible Craftsman style house built in 1905. The house is perfectly restored, and is a prime example of why it is one of my favorite types of architecture. The home was both beautiful and practical, with built-in bookshelves and cabinets, a surprisingly modern open floor plan, gleaming redwood and fir trim, and simple lines. Tours of the house are led by very informative guides, and I drooled over just about every square foot of that house. It was stunning.

So, I packed a lot into my five and a half days there, and enjoyed every minute of it. There was plenty I didn't see, like the art museums, so I would love to go back. I highly recommend it as a place to visit. It is easy to get around with something fun for just about anyone.

I am glad to be home, though. It felt good to curl up in my own bed, with Percy back in his cage, and the cat sleeping next to me. After all that walking, my body was happy to slow down a bit. And it was nice to see the kids again.

However, two out of the three kids have now come down with a stomach bug. I spent most of the day trying to keep them comfortable and entertained. They watched more TV today than they usually see in a couple weeks with me, but they really weren't up to much else.

Anyhow, this entry is much to long as it is. Congratulation to those of you who stuck it this far - or had the good sense to skim over my travelog! Plus, I have to make sure I get plenty of sleep so that I don't succumb to the stomach bug! Once I get photos uploaded to shutterfly, I will post a link here so anyone who wants to see pictures of some of the things I saw in CA can do so.

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