San Diego, CA – 01.25.15

-Sunset Cliffs area was beautiful!

-The San Diego Zoo was huge!

 

After being in the snow back home, San Diego was a dream. 75 and sunny every single dang day. Why do people live in places other than Southern California? We parked the Airstream at a County Park in Bonita, just twenty minutes or so from San Diego. It was open, quiet, and just what we needed. We lounged on the beach, took Willow to lots of dog parks, and tried to catch the sunset as much as possible.

One day we rented kayaks at La Jolla and rowed all the way out into the Pacific. It was Toni’s first time taking a kayak into the ocean. After getting over the fear of Great White Sharks ripping the kayak to shreds and swallowing us whole, she eventually enjoyed herself. We were all fine and dandy, dry and sun kissed until we were three feet from shore. Crash! A huge wave came and toppled us. Backpack, phones, sweaters…all in the ocean. Oops.

We dedicated a day to the San Diego Zoo. We’re not typically huge fans of zoos, they make us sad, but this is the best zoo in the country, we had to go. Toni’s eyes were as wide as they could be the whole day. A mama Gorilla with her baby, peacocks walking around aimlessly, and a petting zoo?! Toni’s heaven. We were there the entire day and we didn’t want it to end. We ate cotton candy and frozen lemonade, took silly photos in cutouts, and gushed over every animal that looked our way.

Encinitas stole our heart. It’s a small surf town thirty minutes from San Diego filled with coffee shops, vintage stores, yummy food, and lovely beaches. We went to a beautiful garden there called the Self Realization Fellowship Hermitage and Meditation Gardens. What a mouthful. We caught the sunset from the cliffside before getting dinner with our friends Lex and Loren. We all met up for East coast style pizza and chowed down while giggling over how adorable their one year old son Arrow is.

If you’re visiting San Diego and you’ve got a pup, you have to find the secret dog beach by Sunset Cliffs. We don’t know the name of it, we just followed the lead of others, but it’s great! We followed some surfers down the sketchy cliffside and made our way across the bed of rocks until we reached the sand. Toni wasn’t prepared, in her dress and sandals, but she survived! Willow freaked. It was her dream come true. A huge beach with ten other dogs and no way to escape, so mum and dad weren’t yelling at her to stay close all the time!

Superbowl!! The Super Bowl was perfectly timed with a visit from our friends Paul and Katie. We met up at a sports bar in downtown San Diego and all yelled at the screen together while rooting for our hometown team and snacking on appetizers. We were definitely the only Pats fans in the bar… which only made it more fun. Paul and Katie came back to the Toaster after for a celebratory dinner and bonfire. It was so nice to have friends around. Especially friends who hadn’t seen the Toaster yet! We made plans to see each other again in Los Angeles and said our sad goodbyes.

We gave ourselves a lot of time in San Diego. You have to, there’s so much to do! We also washed the Toaster, explored Sunset Cliffs, ate lots of Acaí bowls, got banana lattes with Toni’s old friend Mary, popped in and out of antique stores in Ocean Beach, ate Phó at OB Noodle House, went on a tour of the haunted Whaley House, and reveled in the fact that it was February and we got to wear shorts and a t-shirt every day. San Diego was the ideal introduction to Southern Cali.

-D&T