Friday, July 22, 2016

California 2016: Day 2 (PCH and San Diego)

In case you read the title of this post and were confused about the location of the Day 1 entry, don't worry, you didn't miss anything. Our first day in California primarily consisted of us driving around my hometown of Thousand Oaks. I probably bored the hell out of Lucas and Marilu as I went on a deep nostalgic journey through all my old haunts, such as schools, baseball and soccer fields, and parks. The only pictures are of me standing in front of said schools so there's not much to see from Day 1. Day 2 is when things get interesting, which is where blog coverage will begin.

We woke up bright and early on Day 2 since our plans were to drive down the Pacific Coast Highway and then spend the rest of the day in San Diego. There are plenty of scenic routes from Thousand Oaks to the PCH, and we took what I consider one of the best: Malibu Canyon. Unfortunately, we couldn't get any good pictures of the big drop-offs, but we took a family picture near the beginning of the canyon and then stopped to pose at a rest area.



Our next stop was just past Malibu. We pulled over and took a couple of photos right from the side of PCH. I didn't really think it through that well since traffic was getting bad, and it could have been tough pulling back out, but I got lucky and there was a break in traffic right after we got in the car. Probably the last break I got while driving that trip.



Next up was Venice Beach. We'd been there before, back in 2008 when Lucas was 1, but we wanted to let him see it at age 9. However, due to our early start, we got there between 8 and 9 so there weren't many people there yet and nearly all the shops were still closed. Throw in the fact that it was overcast (the sun broke through with a vengeance about an hour later), and it was a quiet visit. Still, we got a chance to walk down and see the ocean. Right before we left, Lucas, in his infinite wisdom, fell over in the surf so when we returned to the car, he was very wet and sandy.



After that, we drove for a long while (with a quick stop in Dana Point for lunch at Jack in the Box) until PCH hit I-5, which we took the rest of the way to San Diego. The trip would have been much faster on one of the freeways, but I felt that PCH was a more scenic trip. It was, for the most part, but by the time I reached Laguna Beach, I was tired of the traffic and ready to get to San Diego.

Once we did reach SD, we checked into our hotel and then headed downtown to sightsee in the Gaslamp Quarter, which is the place to be downtown when it comes to shops and restaurants. Our walk down there was easily the biggest lowlight of the trip for me. I ended up stubbing my toe REALLY hard on a utility box platform, so hard that I thought I broke the smallest two toes on my right foot. It turns out I didn't, but it made walking that day excruciating. For what it's worth, it's 2 weeks and a day later and one of the toes still aches slightly. So I wasn't exaggerating at the time!

Our first stop on the walk was Petco Field, the home of the San Diego Padres, which also happened to be hosting the All-Star Game less than a week later. We couldn't go in, but we got a picture through a fence from a little park behind it and then another picture of Lucas standing in front of it.



Right next to the aforementioned park was MY reason for heading down to Petco Field: the Stone Brewing Tap Room! Anyone who knows me well knows that Stone is probably my favorite brewer so this was a nice treat. You'll see more of Stone on Day 3 when we visited the actual brewery itself.



You can't tell in the latter picture, but I am in so much pain right there. The toe stubbing was literally less than 10 minutes before that was taken.

We then walked (or limped, in my case) all over the Gaslamp Quarter, going into various shops (Lucas's favorite being a candy store) and bars/restaurants. I resolved to suck up the pain so that it didn't ruin the day for Marilu and Lucas so I drank quite a few beers to take the edge off.

Here's one of our stops, a sports bar named Barleymash. They had a pretty good selection of beer on tap and we watched a bit of the Euro Cup while there.



This next photo was taken near the southern entrance to the Gaslamp Quarter. If you look closely in the background, the building with all the glass is the convention center. This weekend, that happens to be the location of the San Diego Comic Con, the world's biggest convention of comics, movies, and various pop culture.



We had a couple more stops before finally having dinner at Union Kitchen & Tap. Before writing that last sentence, I had to ask Marilu for the name of the restaurant since by that point, everything was a little fuzzy. :)


After that, we headed back to the hotel since we had an early morning the next day as we were visiting Sea World. Thanks to a combination of the beer and the pain, I was asleep moments after my head hit the pillow.

See you on Day 3!

1 comment:

Mom/Grammy said...

Yep, I was confused looking for part 1 before I even read your explanation. After that I checked out the pictures and commentary. All wonderful and now I can't wait until we leave for CA next month. I really liked the picture of you and Lucas at the beach with your backs to the camera. All photos were great! Looking forward to part 3.