ROAD TRIP! California & Arizona 2023 - 1 thread - Day 18 Yuma, the eccentrics and home COMPLETE!

[anji]

Originally Posted by 2point

Fabulous trip report.

We've been to San Diego before(for 3 days after a Disney cruise), going in May for 10 days after a 4 day Disneyland visit.

Getting us very excited about the trip!

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How exciting! The Disney ships dock very close to our hotel, but we didn’t see any. Have fun!

[Aims]

Originally Posted by anji

Day 3 - San Diego

Don’t you just love waking up at silly o’clock on your first morning and looking outside to see what’s going on and how light it is? The whole holiday in front of you 😊 Having done this, I went back to bed for a while!

Today’s plan was to do the Old Town Trolley and then to go on the Harbour cruise in the afternoon. The Trolley started at 9am from Old Town and we were the next stop on the route. This was from the Maritime Museum right opposite the hotel.

We were on floor 11. There were 3 lifts to summon – one of which was an outside glass elevator! This one arrived and at first I didn’t like it but soon got used to it as it seemed to arrive the most 😊

First port of call was the Portside Café, again opposite the hotel. They freshly make your food and you pick it up from the next window. We ate in the domed covered seating area overlooking the sea, which was dead calm. Will had a breakfast bap of egg, sausage etc and I went for a lovely apple Danish, washed down by some coffee.

At 9am we walked down to the Trolley stop. Old Town was quite a distance away so it arrived about 10 minutes later. Not many people on it at all. We’d got our Go San Diego Explorer tickets through Viator and Quidco and had 4 things to do – tour, cruise, zoo and USS Midway. It was £246 for both of us. This saved us $$s and I’d definitely recommend it.

The whole tour is 2 hours and covers 25 miles of San Diego, including across the bridge to Coronado Island. The guide was really informative, funny and clearly loved his job – he also spoke in a real Disney type voice.

We went along to Seaport Village, over the bridge (longer than Golden Gate Bridge due to the big curls at either end) to the beach and Coronado Hotel, Gaslamp area, Petco arena, Balboa Park, Little Italy and then to Old Town, which was the terminus. We had to get off here and get on another Trolley to return to the hotel.

We had a short look round Old Town (we were returning next day) and had a drink. The next driver was very different, much louder in all respects, and he told us a lot about the airport as we drove past it and along the waterfront. Definitely a good tour to go on to get the lie of the land and very comfortable – certainly more than the rickety Vancouver one last year.

There were the sailing ships associated with the Maritime Museum near our hotel and also a massive super-yacht. This was being cleaned and they were polishing the silver eagle on the prow. Very nice! The galleon was used in Pirates of the Caribbean.

We popped back to the room and freshened up before heading down to the Embarcadero and the Harbour Cruise. They scanned our QR code and we were onto The Hornblower 😊 We sat on the top deck in the sun. It was a bit windy going along!

There are two 1-hour cruises – one which looks at the sealions and houses and the other which looks at all the military goings on. The idea was that we did one, stayed aboard and then did the other.,

First up were the sealions and pelicans. The sealions were making a lot of noise – I love their barking!

On the far side of the bay were 3 aircraft carriers lined up – this is unusual apparently.

We had two cocktails and snacks, which had to be ordered via QR code rather than going to the bar, and at $17 each drink they were a total rip-off. Very small and weak. ☹

We returned to the dock, some people got off and more got on, then we were off again to the other side of the bay. The boat goes from right next door to the USS Midway aircraft carrier and when you’re on the sea next to it you appreciate the sheer size of the thing.

We went off round the military areas, under the Coronado Bridge and learned about all the ships and aircraft.

There was a strange looking aircraft, which is new apparently and we were very lucky to see in the air,

and a really cool trimaran warship that goes 45mph on the water.

We returned along the Seaport Village area and completed our cruise.

Definitely worth doing on the Go City but keep away from the cocktails!

After this we walked down to the Seaport Village area and had a look around the shops. The Village was designed by Disney imagineers. They were getting ready for Halloween.

We brought some cold drinks from a shop and sat under the trees. It was about 74 degrees, so just right!

Some people had elaborate kites flying.

We walked back along the waterfront to the hotel and got back around 4.30pm. I had a table booked at 7p at the Old Spaghetti Factory in the Gaslamp area. We’d been to one of these last year on Vancouver Island and enjoyed it.

This was the view from the other end of our balcony - over a lovely park and play area.

We took the Green Line tram to get there from Santa Fe Depot, about 5 minutes walk from the hotel. We got off at the Gaslamp Quarter Station.

At the Old Spaghetti Factory you order your mains but also have soup or salad, their beautiful fresh bread and also ice cream too in the price! Will ordered Spaghetti with Rich Meat Sauce and I had Spinach and Cheese Ravioli. Very good but of course we’d eaten too much of the lovely bread and butter to start with, plus the salads.

The choice for desert was either Vanilla Ice cream or Spumoni. This is a blend of chocolate, cherry and pistachio ice cream. We were just given Spumoni without asking and one spoon each was enough – vile! We both hate marzipan and the cherry and pistachios really made it taste like this. The server kindly brought us vanilla instead 😊 Sorry, no photos.

After the meal we had a bit of a walk and went to Bar 207, which is actually the Hard Rock Hotel and had some beers. By this time our busy day and time difference were catching up with us and we called it a day, getting the tram back and arriving back at the hotel at 10pm

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Lovely first day in San Diego! Great idea to do the trolley tour on the first day to get your bearings and you got so many great pictures 👍 The Spaghetti Factory is such a great deal, isn’t it? 😊

[anji]

Originally Posted by Aims

Lovely first day in San Diego! Great idea to do the trolley tour on the first day to get your bearings and you got so many great pictures 👍 The Spaghetti Factory is such a great deal, isn’t it? 😊

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We really enjoyed the trolley tour. We had a 2 day ticket as part of the deal but never used it the next day. Far quicker to get to Old Town on the tram

[anji]

Day 4 now posted! USS Midway, Old Town & haunted house

[cornishfrogboy]

Really loving your trip report and the awesome photographs.

It is really bringing back good memories and making me want to visit a third time!

[anji]

Originally Posted by cornishfrogboy

Really loving your trip report and the awesome photographs.

It is really bringing back good memories and making me want to visit a third time!

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I'm glad! I did think of you when we went on the Midway

[OB1LukeLucas]

Originally Posted by anji

I'm glad! I did think of you when we went on the Midway

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I thought of CFB too, it’s funny how you associate people with things! You have got off to a cracking start, loving all the photos and food so far, those margaritas look fantastic at least they made up for the other terrible overpriced cocktails.

Sorry to hear about your mam no wonder you didn’t have the best sleep, you know she is well looked after but it doesn’t stop you having her in your thoughts. She is the same age as my dad and sounds just as resilient-I sent him a message to tell him Bobby Charlton had died, he looks remarkably similar to my dad and throughout his life he has been mistaken for him, my dad’s reply was “I am still here though…they will have a job to get rid of me!”

[smithlane]

What a fab first couple of days Anji! I adore San Diego and can’t wait to go back one day.
The USS Midway sounds really interesting, I’ll definitely add that to my list, as does the haunted house. I always think of you when I see any ghost tours as I know you love them!
I’m so sorry to hear about your mum too, what a fright 😢. I can imagine it was on your mind a lot but glad she was almost back to normal when you saw her 😊

[anji]

Originally Posted by OB1LukeLucas

I thought of CFB too, it’s funny how you associate people with things! You have got off to a cracking start, loving all the photos and food so far, those margaritas look fantastic at least they made up for the other terrible overpriced cocktails.

Sorry to hear about your mam no wonder you didn’t have the best sleep, you know she is well looked after but it doesn’t stop you having her in your thoughts. She is the same age as my dad and sounds just as resilient-I sent him a message to tell him Bobby Charlton had died, he looks remarkably similar to my dad and throughout his life he has been mistaken for him, my dad’s reply was “I am still here though…they will have a job to get rid of me!”

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Thank you! Your dad sounds like he's made of strong stuff too Good for him!

Originally Posted by smithlane

What a fab first couple of days Anji! I adore San Diego and can’t wait to go back one day.
The USS Midway sounds really interesting, I’ll definitely add that to my list, as does the haunted house. I always think of you when I see any ghost tours as I know you love them!
I’m so sorry to hear about your mum too, what a fright 😢. I can imagine it was on your mind a lot but glad she was almost back to normal when you saw her 😊

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Thank you! It was a huge worry but thankfully she's ok

Whaley House is open during the day too for normal tours. Yes, we do love a ghost tour and did another in Flagstaff

[Ilovedisney]

Just read through, all looks amazing. Thanks for sharing.