South to San Diego

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We left Los Angeles on the Friday morning, headed for San Diego. The idea was to take in some of the coast en route, so Juliette suggested we aim for Seal Bay in the south of LA. Here we would pick up the Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) and head for Huntington Beach. The first part of the journey simply underlined the scale of LA. We'd been driving for over an hour, mostly on the freeway, before we got to Seal Bay, and this was still effectively in LA. The scenery here was not particularly appetising - there seemed to be a lot of drilling going on (for oil I think), and there were a couple of huge oil rigs just off the coast. However, once on the PCH things improved, and we arrived at Huntington Beach at around lunch time. The area is styled as "Surf City", and indeed there were loads of people on surf boards, despite the waves not being that great We parked by the pier and spent an hour or so strolling the prom and pier before lunching at a very pleasant restaurant.

On leaving Huntington Beach we headed inland and took the main freeway to San Diego. Probably because it was a Friday afternoon the traffic was very heavy. As we approached San Diego it deteriorated, although the volumes exiting the city were the worst - the freeway was mostly seven lanes in each direction, and traffic was at a standstill for miles in a northerly direction.

We reached our hotel on the outskirts of SD at about 4.30pm. I had chosen the hotel mainly because they did "suites" which took 6 people - everywhere else needed 2 rooms to accommodate us all, with resultant high costs. Well, the hotel certainly lives up to its low price billing! our "suite" is just about big enough to fit us all in, but it's a lot smaller than it looked in the pictures on the web site. We had a brief rest before jumping back in the car and driving into the centre of the city. We headed for the historic "Gas Lamp" district, and spent a very enjoyable evening wondering the streets, eating a copious Mexican meal (as ever the portion sizes were HUGE), and admiring the costumes on all those who had dressed up for Halloween. On returning the girls made use of the hotel swimming pool which was actually quite pleasant in the evening warmth (despite the sound of the nearby freeway in the background).

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Photos

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Huntington Beach

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The girls on the pier at Huntington Beach

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Surfers at Huntington Beach

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On the pier

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Liz on the pier at Huntington Beach

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By Huntington Beach

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Olivia & Lydia at the Mexican restaurant in San Diego