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Going Back to Cali: dpk4588’s Return to The Golden State SD-LA-SF

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dpk4588:
Intro/Planning

The idea for this trip began, as many of my trips do, in the Next Vacation - Ideas thread.  I asked for suggestions, and after weeding out the cities I’d already done, I got a suggestions of San Diego/San Francisco and both. If figured those were both good for a few days and I could spend Shabbat in Los Angeles in between.

Once I decided on my destination(s) it was time to figure out how to get there. I (thought I) had an interesting idea, of possibly flying VX using Alaska miles since Alaska allows you a free stopover. I thought I’d be able to fly VX (not lie-flat) JFK-LAX, then a few days later, fly LAX-SFO on the same ticket for 25k. I know the VX first/business isn’t the best product in the world, but since I was flying on a late night flight but not a red-eye, I’d be able to get a little sleep and then sleep when I got out west. The problem with my plan was that apparently you can only use an Alaska stopover domestically on AS metal, so while AS and VX are theoretically in the process of becoming one airline, this didn’t seem to help.

Since my Jetblue mileage run last year, I’ve thought about flying Mint, and figured this was a great chance to do it. I knew, in general availability on transcon flights in business is hard to come by, and surprise surprise, UA and AA had nothing in their lie-flat business for saver availability. DL doesn’t have an award chart so I’m not sure what saver availability would be, but I the cheapest I saw JFK-LAX was 115k, yeah...no thanks. I figured Mint would be my best outbound option. While not cheap at 73.2k, it was the specific redemption I had in mind when I earned the miles so I was ok parting with it. The flight SFO-JFK would have been cheaper but I didn’t have enough miles to fly Mint R/T and I didn’t have any other options so Mint it was.

When I started looking for the inbound flights out of SFO, my big three options were slim yet again, at least on direct flights. I was able to find a DL flight via BOS for 31,250 FB (which I’m assuming means it had “saver availability”). That flight was Delta One, but it was on the 757, so unfortunately there was no direct aisle access from every seat. My other DL option was shelling out 65k for Delta One on the 767 which is (AFAIK) the only Transcon business where each seat has direct aisle access. I had flown Delta One on the 767 JFK-FCO on my way to Israel a few years ago, and it was nice, but I didn’t really wanna spend that much, especially since I’d be spending over 70k on my Mint flight. I had decided on the SFO-BOS-JFK for ~31k FB.

I thought it might be a good idea to get the Barclays Jetblue Business card for the 10% rebate (plus the 30k signup bonus and 5k anniversary points) to cut down on the Mint cost. I applied for the card which turned out to cause some problems. I didn’t get instantly approved, which caused me to delay booking my flights. I applied on a Thursday night, and after being given the runaround by Barclays recon and having to send in some documentation about my Business, I was told it takes 7-10 days to review the docs. That was Monday morning. There was no way I was gonna wait 7-10 days to book my flights so I decided to just book the flights and lose out on the 10% rebate. I checked Jetblue and FB to make sure the flights I wanted were still available, but uh-oh, the DL flight was no longer available. I was pissed as hell since I couldn’t think of another option to come home. For a while I toyed with the idea of flying in economy JFK-LAX (I know the horror!) and using my Jetblue miles to fly the red-eye SFO-JFK, but in the end, I didn’t want to sit in economy for ~6 hours especially since after landing at LAX I’d be driving halfway to San Diego and with the time difference my body would think its 3am.

It looked like my trip was dead. Monday night, I get an email from Barclays that I was approved for the card. That was pretty helpful now. I’d never been so annoyed at having been approved for a credit card.  Now knowing that I’d be saving 7.2k on Mint flight I was willing to pay a little more for my other flight, if I could find one. I was thinking of even (and to some this might be worse than sitting in economy on a transcon) spending 50k on UA standard, which was on the 757 and didn’t have direct aisle access. When thinking maybe I’ll spend 50k I thought, why don’t I look to see what AA charges in business and maybe I’d use my TYP and get 1.6 CPP. I looked and saw that the red-eye SFO-JFK was $808 which would cost ~50k TYP, but it would also be considered a revenue flight so I’d earn miles. I decided that was the way to go and was ready to book. I looked back at Jetblue to see if the flight to LAX was still available and much to my surprise the price actually dropped from 73.2k to 57.7k (plus I’d be getting the 10% rebate from Barclays for a  net of 51.9k). I booked the Mint and the AA on the A321. I later booked on the LAX-SFO segment on DL for 5.5k, which turned out to be pretty good value since flights were around ~$110.

After my flights were complete, it was time to start working on hotels. I had a Marriott Cat 1-5 night that was expiring 8/24/17 so I wanted to use that, I also had a Hyatt Cat 1-4 night (not that it was expiring any time soon but I figured I might as well use it), and a Hilton weekend cert that was expiring 11/1/2017.

So here’s what I booked: I decided a good place to stop between LA & SD was Mission Viejo so I used my Marriott cert to book the Fairfield Inn Mission Viejo. I generally have trouble find city hotels that are cat 5 or lower so I was fine with using my cert on a cat 4 here. For San Diego I booked the Hyatt Regency Mission Bay Spa and Marina for two nights, one with the anniversary night and one for 15k Hyatt points. I was planning on spending Shabbat in LA with a friend, but for a reason he couldn’t explain he could have me for meals but not to sleep so I ended up booking the Beverly Hills Marriott for 40k/night. In SF I used my Hilton weekend night for the Hilton San Francisco Financial District for Sunday night and booked the Sheraton Fisherman's Wharf for the 12k SPG for the other night.

Summary:

Flights:
B6 1123 JFK-LAX - 57.7k B6 (plus 10% rebate) - Cash Cost $758.2 - Value 1.45 CPP
DL 2756 LAX-SFO - 5.5k DL - Cash Cost $110.20 - Value 1.9 CPP
AA 276 SFO-JFK - 50,162 TYP - Cash Cost $802.60 - Value 1.6 CPP

Hotels:
Fairfield Inn Mission Viejo - Marriott Cert - Cash Cost $215.32
Hyatt Regency Mission Bay Spa and Marina - 1 Hyatt Cert +15k Hyatt - Cash Cost $599.17 Value - 2CPP
Beverly Hills Marriott - 80k - Cash Cost - $768.21 - Value .96 CPP
Hilton San Francisco Financial District - Hilton Weekend Cert - Cash Cost $313.25
Sheraton Fisherman's Wharf - 12k SPG - Cash Cost $375.46 Value  - 3.13

After all accommodations and travel were booked it was time to figure out what I was gonna do in SD & SF for three days each. I headed to the San Diego Master Thread and saw the wiki was full of suggestions. Balboa Park is listed, but what is unclear about that is that Balboa Park is not just a park, it’s a park which includes a number of museums and the San Diego Zoo (not to be confused with the San Diego Zoo Safari Park which is north of the city). My only real problem with planning my SD portion of the trip was that many of the attractions are only open 10a-4p/5p. When you’re limited to 6/7 hours and certain things like the Petco Park tour are at specific times, it can be tough to fit in all you’d like to do.

dpk4588:
Tuesday - August 8, 2017
Finally after all my planning, the time for my trip finally arrived. I was excited until 1:30 when i got an email from Jetblue that my flight was delayed 2:20 from 8pm to 10:20pm. Since I was supposed to be driving from LAX to Mission Viejo having a 2:20 delay would mean that I was driving an hour, somewhere I didn’t know, in the middle of the night. While annoying, it shouldn’t have been too much of a problem. I thought about trying to make the 4:50p flight out of JFK, but I didn’t bother calling Jetblue to try and change it for two reasons. Firstly, I didn’t think I’d be able to make the 4:50p, and secondly, because while there were Mint seats available, they were only the buddy seats, and I didn’t wanna miss out of my Mint suite.

I had originally planned on going to the airport straight from work, but with the 2+ hour delay, that was no longer necessary, which was annoying because it means I had to take my bags on the subway twice for no reason. And of course while on the train home, I got another email that my flight was pushed another 35 minutes.

I eventually got to the airport, and after flying through security (thank god for TSA-Precheck), I headed for the Airspace lounge. While I had heard it was nothing to write home about, I figured it would be better than sitting at the gate for a few hours. Well, everything I’d heard was spot on, the place was tiny, their WiFi was terrible, I ended up using the free WiFi Jetblue has throughout the terminal. The one perk of the lounge is that if you enter using an AMEX plat card (as I did) you get a free $10 drink card. I got my free drink and sat down at one of the few seats available, which was a stool on the upper level. While in the lounge (actually shortly before I planned on heading to the gate) I got another notification that the flight was delayed another 20 mins. That’s 3:15 in delays (so far).

I finally left for the gate, getting there about 2 minutes before boarding was supposed to start, and I noticed that they somehow expected to be able to finish boarding by 10:59p despite the fact that they hadn’t started by 10:25p. Then they pushed it another 13 minutes (we’re now up to 3:28 in delays). Finally they started boarding us, or so we thought. They let us through at the gate but then once we got to the plane, we were told we had to wait since they weren’t actually ready to board. Come on JetBlue, get your stuff together. After about 5 minutes standing at the door to the plane they actually let us on the plane.

I got to my seat (2F) one of the Mint Suites and was not disappointed. Shortly after settling in, I was greeted by my flight attendant Marv. He was very friendly, asked if I’d flown Mint before and after telling him it was my first time, he showed me all the features of the seat and how to use the controls. He then offered me the Mint signature drink which was some mint flavored drink available with or without vodka. I opted for with. After boarding was completed and we pushed back from the gate we were informed that we were 16th in line for take off. By the time we finally took off it was 12:15a a total of 4 hours and 16 minutes of delays. That was the end of my JetBlue issues.


JetBlue Mint Signature Drink

I was informed before we took off that my KSML was on board and would be served about 30 minutes after takeoff, which was fine with me. I started watching a movie and before I knew it my food was ready. I appreciated that the three main dishes come in actual dishes instead of just tin containers. I started off with the Pan-seared Moroccan salmon With spicy lentil stew & saffron rice. I’m not generally a fan of fish, particularly salmon, but I figured it was worth a shot, and it wasn’t bad. I then moved on to the Braised beef With summer vegetables & roasted red potatoes which was delicious. The beef was melting in my mouth. I then ended with the Seasoned chicken With herbed orzo, sugar snap peas & pineapple green peppercorn sauce which was also good, but not as good as the beef. I’d rate the courses beef, chicken, salmon.


JetBlue Mint ‐ KSML ‐ Braised Beef


JetBlue Mint ‐ KSML ‐ Seasoned Chicken


JetBlue Mint ‐ KSML ‐ Pan‐Seared Moroccan Salmon


I had originally planned on only sleep about 2 hours on the plane, but since we were delayed 4 hours I thought I’d be better off if I got more sleep since I’d be driving to Mission Viejo and I’d rather not be falling asleep during my drive so right after dinner I turned my seat into bed mode and took a nap. I slept pretty well, for about 3.5 hours. My only complaint about the seat in bed mode was that I found it to be a little narrow. I’m not a large person but I found it to be a little tight.


JetBlue Mint Suite Door


JetBlue Mint Bed Mode


JetBlue Mint Seat Mode


I woke up about 20 minutes before landing, I got back into seat mode and woke up. We landed and taxied for a while to our gate. When we finally got off the plane, it was what seemed like a crazy long walk to baggage claim, but thankfully the trip didn’t take as long for the bags, since they were there when I got there. I headed out for the rental car shuttle.

The ride was relatively short, and I took the escalator up to the National section (Alamo is on the ground floor). I’m Emerald Club Executive from the Sapphire Reserve so I technically had the option of choosing from any car in the regular emerald aisle or the executive aisle. The problem was that there were a total of 3 cars in the regular and 5 in the executive. The 5 in the executive were all SUVs and I didn’t want/need one so I ended up picking a Chevy Cruze, which was fine for what I needed but I was very disappointed by the selection available. Anyway...I got in the car, and headed to Mission Viejo for the night. The drive wasn’t too bad, took me about an hour which is roughly what I expected. I checked into my room and was in bed within 10 minutes. Unfortunately I couldn’t fall asleep because I slept 3.5 hours on the plane. It took me a while but I eventually did fall asleep.


Fairfield Inn & Suites Mission Viejo Orange County

dpk4588:
Wednesday - August 9, 2017
I woke up around 8 went down for breakfast, had some cereal and was on my way shortly. I think in retrospect I should have gone to the Museum of Making Music first, but I chose to first head to the San Diego Zoo Safari Park. The reason I chose to go there first is that they open at 9a and the Museum of Making Music doesn’t open until 10a. Because it took me longer than expected and I got out a little latter than I planned (and got a bit lost) I didn’t get there until almost 10a anyway. But it what’s done is done.

The Safari Park was awesome. The GoCard comes with the 1-day pass which includes a ride on the African Tram and all the shows (another reason I should have gone later was that the cheetah run is at 3:30p and that’s supposedly awesome). I’m not saying the order in which I went around the Safari Park is the best route or plan, it’s just what I did. I started with the gorilla forest, which was cool, I got to see several different gorillas of different ages and sizes and I even got to see a few little fights which were exciting. 


Safari Park ‐ Flamingos


Safari Park ‐ Gorilla

After the gorillas, I moved on to the Lemur walk, I’m not sure why the Lemur walk has a separate enclosure but it does, and you walk through a gate to their area. I saw two of them just hanging out on a ledge. Seeing animals being lazy was a common theme on this trip.


Safari Park ‐ Lemurs

After the Lemur walk, I headed over to the Africa Tram, which runs around some of the field exhibits, giving you a chance to see the animals from a closer perspective. I saw lots of different animals on the Africa Tram, Cheetahs, Giraffes, Rhinos, Flamingos, Antelopes, Zebras, and others. The Africa Tram gave me the most varied experience in terms of the different animals I saw in a short period of time. It was really enjoyable (except for the kid across from me who kept kicking me).


Safari Park ‐ Cheetah


Safari Park ‐ Rhinos


Safari Park ‐ Zebras


Safari Park ‐ Giraffes

Once I finished the Africa Tram, I moved on to the Lion Camp. I saw one (massive) male lion and two lionesses. They apparently sleep a lot, and while the male was awake and moving around a little, one of the lionesses was sleeping and the other was moving around a little. It’s really amazing how big those things really are.


Safari Park ‐ Lioness


Safari Park ‐ Lion

Once I was done admiring the lions I walked along the African Plains and got to see a lot of the animals I saw on the Africa Tram from another perspective, and some of them much closer than I got on the Tram.


Safari Park ‐ Uganda Kob

Next on my trip through Africa was Elephant Valley. If I thought the lions were big, I was blown away by the size of the elephants. These things were just huge. Sadly they didn’t really get that close but I was still able to get a pretty good look at them. Talking to the park associate, I also learned some interesting things about the elephants, firstly, they go through a number of sets of teeth (I don’t remember how many), when they’ve run their teeth down, the teeth growing beneath them push them out. Also you can tell the difference between African and Indian elephants from their ears. The ears of African elephants kinda look like the continent of Africa and the ears of Indian elephants kinda look like India. Pretty cool.


Safari Park ‐ Elephant


Safari Park ‐ Elephants

My last stop in the Safari Park was the Tiger trail. Unfortunately I got roped into some pitch about supporting the park which I had trouble getting away from, but eventually did. They have two Sumatran tigers, one male and one female. The male was walking around like it was nothing, but the female kept hiding, she’d come close to us, then quickly turn around and hide.


Safari Park ‐ Sumatran Tiger


Safari Park ‐ Sumatran Tigress


Overall the Safari Park was awesome. I really enjoyed it. I don’t know the last time I went to a zoo before this trip, but I really enjoyed it. I ended up spending about 3.5 hours there.

After the Safari Park I headed to the Museum of Making Music. It took me longer to get there than I expected (a theme of this vacation) and I finally got there around 2:30p.  The museum is in the National Association of Music Merchants building, which explained why much of the museum focused on the rise and fall of instrument purchases. I saw the NAMM logo on the building not knowing what it was, and once I saw what the acronym stood for the museum made more sense. It was an interesting museum which focused on progression of musical instruments, their sales, and their popularity. It was a nice little museum, I spent an hour there. They had an exhibit (I believe it was temporary), about the future of music creation, through new technologies. That was pretty interesting (not that the rest of it was uninteresting, I just found that particularly interesting).


Museum of Making Music ‐ Mason & Hamlin Organ


Museum of Making Music ‐ Story & Clarke Portable Organ


Museum of Making Music ‐ Carola "Inner Player" Piano


Museum of Making Music ‐ Deagan Vibraphone


Museum of Making Music ‐ Fender Strat


Museum of Making Music ‐ Yamaha DX‐7 Digital Synthesizer

I left around 3:30p, and since I hadn’t eaten anything other than the small breakfast I had at the hotel, I decided it would be a good idea to stop at the JCC in La Jolla for some food. I didn’t know whether to call it lunch or dinner, but considering it took me about an hour to get there instead of the ~35 minutes it should have, it was closer to dinner than lunch. If I’d known it would have taken that long I would have skipped lunch and headed straight to downtown San Diego for my Harbor Cruise & Sea Lion Adventure. Instead, by the time I was done with “lunch” it was already almost 5p and there was no way I was gonna make it to Downtown SD for the 5:30p cruise.   

After “lunch” I headed (again in heavy traffic) to the Hyatt Regency Mission Bay Spa And Marina. I checked-in, and was “upgraded” (without it being mentioned, I didn’t notice until I went up to the room) to a Tower King from a Lanai King. I kinda wanted the room with the Lanai (which I’m not exactly sure what that is, I kinda wanted to find out), so it’s a little annoying that they “upgraded” me without mentioning it or asking if I wanted it. Although if this was the “upgraded” room, I’m not sure if I would have been happy with the lower class of room. I got up to the room and it’s kinda like a suite with a living room which had couches, a desk and a TV, and a bedroom which has a bed and TV, but there wasn’t a wall to separate them, it was like a curtain. Weird.  I could tell the hotel was dated before I even stepped inside the room, it was the first Hyatt Regency I’d ever stayed in that didn’t use RFID key cards. I also noticed that a bunch of the furniture was old and cracked in some places. The two things that really bothered me about the room were that there were stains on the carpet, and there was old food and garbage from the previous guest in the fridge. I’ve never been in the room when it’s being cleaned after a guest checks out, but I would have hoped that they’d clean out the fridge. It was pretty gross. It wasn’t like it was moldy or anything, but it did smell a little (but that just might have been the original smell of the food, I don’t know what it was).


Hyatt Regency Mission Bay Spa & Resort ‐ Living Room


Hyatt Regency Mission Bay Spa & Resort ‐ Bedroom


Hyatt Regency Mission Bay Spa & Resort ‐ View from the Room

Shortly after I got to my room, I saw I had a PM on DDF and it said the following:
--- Quote ---Hey I saw on the Forum you will be at Hyatt regency Mission Bay today/tomorrow. I just checked in and am staying until Monday. What are you doing for Kosher Food?
--- End quote ---
I mentioned that I was planning on going to Moishe's Grill at Beth Jacob Congregation San Diego and he then asked if I minded giving him and his wife a ride. As a New Yorker and a general skeptic, I was a little apprehensive, but then I noticed that I’d seen him asking questions in the San Diego Master Thread and he wasn’t a guy with only one or two posts so I figured I wasn’t likely to get kidnapped and killed. It turned out he was also a New Yorker and a nice guy. It was actually the first time I’d met a DDFer in real life. We went to Moishe's Grill and I got a burger which was solid, nothing special, just a solid normal burger.

dpk4588:
Thursday - August 10, 2017
This would be my only full day in SD and it was mainly focused on Balboa Park. But before I headed to the park I did the tour of a different park, Petco Park, home of the San Diego Padres. The tour was at 10:30am so I got to sleep in a little, and I got to the park around 10:15am. The tour begins at the Western Metal Supply Building, which is a historic building which Petco Park was built around. As with pretty much every stadium I’ve toured, Petco has it’s unique characteristics, like the Western Metal Supply Building and the Park at the Park, which is a park which is open to the public not during games and available to fans with tickets during games. Overall I enjoyed the tour and it lasted about 75 minutes.

Petco Park


Petco Park ‐ Flag of Baseballs


Petco Park ‐ Earthquake Proofing


Petco Park ‐ View from the Press Box


Petco Park ‐ Western Metal Supply Building


Petco Park ‐ Portrait of Tony Gwynn in Lexus Home Plate Club


Petco Park ‐ Visitors Clubhouse


After the Petco Park tour I ate my sandwich I had bought the day before at the JCC cafe, and headed to Balboa Park. I would be spending the rest of my day at Balboa Park but bouncing around from place to place, thankfully, parking is free throughout the park. I began at the San Diego Air & Space Museum. The museum is set up in a circle by time period from “Early Flight” to the “Modern Age” with a section in the middle with some oversized aircrafts which wouldn’t fit in the other areas. They also have a 4D theater which has a few short (~5 minutes each) films which were cute, but nothing too exciting. I spent about 2 hours at the museum and enjoyed seeing the the evolution of both military and commercial flight.


San Diego Air & Space Museum ‐ SR‐71


San Diego Air & Space Museum ‐ Apollo 9 Capsule


San Diego Air & Space Museum ‐ Bell AH‐1E Cobra Helicopter


San Diego Air & Space Museum ‐ Boeing P‐26A Peashooter


San Diego Air & Space Museum ‐ Grumman F6F‐3 Hellcat


San Diego Air & Space Museum ‐ Blue Angels F/A 18A Hornet

Next up was the San Diego Automotive Museum which is literally right next to the Air & Space Museum, so I didn’t have to move my car. The museum is relatively small but it has a lot of different cars. At the time there was an exhibit called Japanese Steel, all about Japanese cars. They had a large selection of classic cars and motorcycles which I enjoyed seeing. I spent about 45 minutes there and then moved on to the next museum.


San Diego Automotive Museum ‐ Signs


San Diego Automotive Museum ‐ 1975 Isuzu 117 Coupe


San Diego Automotive Museum ‐ 1969 Toyota 2000GT


San Diego Automotive Museum ‐ 1974 Lamborghini Countach 50005


San Diego Automotive Museum ‐ 1981 Delorean DMC‐12


San Diego Automotive Museum ‐ 1947 Indian Chief


San Diego Automotive Museum ‐ Indian 1942 Army Model 841


San Diego Automotive Museum ‐ 1981 Harley Davidson Heritage Edition FLH80


San Diego Automotive Museum ‐ 1962 Harley Davidson Model A "Peashooter"


San Diego Automotive Museum ‐ 1987 750 Ducati Paso


San Diego Automotive Museum ‐ 1950 Vincent Rapide Series "C"

The next museum was San Diego Model Railroad Museum. I had to drive there from the Automotive museum, but it was right next to the science center which was up after the Model Railroad Museum, so that worked out well. They claim to be the the largest model railroad museum (I don’t remember if they claimed in the country or the world) but there’s on in NJ which also claims to be the largest in the world, so I don’t know who is right. It was a cute museum, which I appreciated since I used to build model trains with my dad as a kid. I spent about 45 minutes there and then took the short walk to the science museum.


San Diego Model Railroad Museum


San Diego Model Railroad Museum


San Diego Model Railroad Museum


San Diego Model Railroad Museum


San Diego Model Railroad Museum


San Diego Model Railroad Museum


San Diego Model Railroad Museum


San Diego Model Railroad Museum

After the model railroad museum I walked to the Fleet Science Center to catch the 4p IMAX showing of National Parks Adventure, which was an interesting look at the US National Parks from the viewpoint of climbers. The movie lasted about 45 minutes and then I was done. I didn’t plan on actually visiting the science center other than the IMAX, although walking through to the IMAX theater I saw an exhibit on classic arcade games which looked cool, but was overrun with kids, and I wasn’t about to go back fight with all those kids just to play the arcade games.

After the IMAX I drove to the San Diego Zoo. While I had been to the San Diego Zoo Safari Park which is about 35 minutes north of the city, the actual zoo is much smaller (I think about 18 times smaller).  I think there was a lot of overlap between the two, but the options that the Safari Park offers in terms of being able to go out into the habitats (the safari aspect) makes it special. The regular zoo also has panda bears and koalas which the Safari park doesn’t. If the aspect of going out into the habitats of the animals doesn’t particularly interest you, then the regular zoo should be good enough for you. Since there were many animals that I saw at the Safari Park which were also available at the regular zoo, I didn’t mind missing them at the regular zoo. I wanted to make sure I saw the animals which weren’t available at the Safari Park.


San Diego Zoo ‐ Southern Hairy‐Nosed Wombat


San Diego Zoo ‐ Andean Bear


San Diego Zoo ‐ Schach


San Diego Zoo ‐ Panda Bear ‐ Bai Yun ‐ Mama


San Diego Zoo ‐ Panda Bear ‐ Xiao Liwu ‐ Baby


San Diego Zoo ‐ Koala


San Diego Zoo ‐ Giraffe


San Diego Zoo ‐ Greater One‐Horned Rhinoceros


San Diego Zoo ‐ Zebra


San Diego Zoo ‐ Reed Kangaroo


San Diego Zoo ‐ Cheetah


San Diego Zoo ‐ Zebra


San Diego Zoo ‐ African Elephant


San Diego Zoo ‐ Southern Gerenuk


San Diego Zoo ‐ Cuvier's Gazelle


San Diego Zoo ‐ Polar Bear


San Diego Zoo ‐ Llama


San Diego Zoo ‐ Lion

The one day pass includes a ~35 minute bus tour around the park, which I found to be a waste of time. I would have been better off spending that time walking around seeing the animals closer up than from the bus path. The one day pass also includes a ride on the SkyFari which is an aerial tram which goes from one end of the park to the other. It was nice as a way of getting from one end to the other but I didn’t feel that it offered much in terms of views since most of the animal habitats had trees which blocked you from seeing the animals. If I had to do it over, I would have skipped the Safari Park and spent more time at the regular zoo. I spent about 3.5 hours there, and stayed until after dark (which made it harder to find my car).

After the zoo I rushed back to Moishe's Grill which on Thursday nights does pizza and fish and chips. I’m not normally a fish guy, but since it’s tradition for me to have pizza on Friday I chose to go with the fish and chips. I was a little disappointed with the amount of fish provided (two relatively small piece of tilapia, but other than the portion the fish itself wasn’t too bad. I grabbed it to go since I just wanted to get back to the hotel eat quickly and crash. Obviously when I wasn’t in a real rush to get anywhere is when I didn’t hit any traffic so I made it back to the hotel in about 15 minutes, ate my dinner and called it a night.

dpk4588:
Friday - August 11, 2017
For my final day in SD I was planning on going to the USS Midway Museum. According to the website they don’t open until 10a but I got there at ~945am, and was able to get on right away, so I’m not sure what time they really open. This would be my first of several ships which I would be touring on this trip. The Midway an aircraft carrier turned museum, basically has three levels, two of which (the flight deck and the hangar deck) have aircrafts on display and the 2nd deck displays life on the USS Midway, showing where the sailors slept, ate, bathed, prepared for their missions and relaxed. On the flight deck there were a few talks from docents about how planes took off (using the catapult) and landed (using the traps). Aside from seeing the old planes and learning how planes could take off and land in such a short space, I also enjoyed the lower deck and seeing how the sailors lived.  I spent about 3.5 hours there and that was it for SD for me.


USS Midway Museum ‐ Welcome Mat


USS Midway Museum ‐ SBD Dauntless


USS Midway Museum ‐ Sleeping Quarters


USS Midway Museum ‐ Anchor Chains


USS Midway Museum ‐ Repair Department


USS Midway Museum ‐ VFA ‐ 151 Ready Room


USS Midway Museum ‐ Brigg


USS Midway Museum ‐ F4U‐4 Corsair


USS Midway Museum ‐ A‐4 Skyhawk


USS Midway Museum ‐ F9F Panther


USS Midway Museum ‐ F14 Tomcat


USS Midway Museum ‐ H‐60 Seahawk


USS Midway Museum ‐ Naval Retirement Ceremony


USS Midway Museum ‐ Catapult (Take‐Off Equipment)


USS Midway Museum ‐ F‐8 Crusader


USS Midway Museum ‐ Trap (Landing Equipment)


USS Midway Museum ‐ F9F‐8P Cougar

Realizing how late it was and that there was no way I was making it back to LA in time to get lunch I stopped to get gas and pick up some snacks for the road. It looked like lunch for today was going to be oreos and twizzlers.

It took me about 3.5 hours to get to LA and once I got there the next issue I had to deal with was parking. I was staying at the Beverly Hills Marriott which charges $39+ tax for parking per night, no thanks. The problem was that in Beverly Hills proper (about a block from the hotel) there is no parking without a permit, and much of Beverlywood (the other side of Pico) has the same restrictions but only on certain streets. I spent about 20 minutes driving around before I was able to find a spot about 6 blocks from the hotel, but it beat paying ~$85 including tax for parking. I was eating by a friend for dinner and lunch and then went to see another friend in BH on Shabbat afternoon which worked out well because it stopped me from going back to the hotel and sleeping all afternoon which would have prevented me from sleeping Saturday night which is never good when you’ve got a flight Sunday morning.


Beverly Hills Marriott


Beverly Hills Marriott

Saturday - August 12, 2017
I went to Schnitzly for dinner Saturday night which was close but kinda slow, but the food was good so it was worth the wait.

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