San Diego

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April 16, 2015 Hello from beautiful San Diego! What a day we've had! I was up in time to see the lights of San Diego while a tiny sliver of moon was still visible. It was an awesome sunrise. Today we took a trolley to Balboa Park. Loved the trolley ride through town. Once at Balboa Park we had to decide what we wanted most to see as there is too much to see and do in the 5 hours we had. First stop was the Japanese Friendship Garden. The best part of the garden was the koi pond. I would love to have one but we have already tried a pond at home and it was a disaster. But I sure did enjoy this one. Next up was the rose garden where Mom and I got quite enthused about roses again. It reminded me so much of Germany where the rose gardens were spectacular. This one wasn't as nice as the ones in Germany but was beautiful enough to have Mom and I making plans for our rose garden at home. Our plans are extensive and Mom even said forget the cost, we are going to fix our rose garden this year. Thank goodness our rose garden is small so we can't go too crazy. Even outside of the gardens there are plants and flowers everywhere. I couldn't help but think how much Grandmother would love it here. She loved gardening so much. I wish Mom or I had inherited her ability to garden, but we seem to have missed that gene. Next we were off to the Museum of Natural History. We didn't plan on staying long, but got so interested in the exhibits we stayed for quite some time. Had to take a picture of the extinct Harlan's Ground Sloth for Steve. For some reason he loves sloths. Don't ask.
Between the Museum of Natural History and the San Diego Art Museum was the Lily Pond. A huge pond with water lilies and small koi. We missed the water lily bloom but there was still one hanging on for us to see. There was also a heron at the upper pond, which looked like it was stocked with little fish for him to eat. Probably to keep him away from the koi. We stopped in the San Diego Art Museum to look around. Mom and I both agree we are uncultured. Neither of us understood anything we saw. We were in the modern art section when we discovered this. We tried looking at other exhibits but our appreciation did not improve. We also walked through the artist's town where local artists display their work. Once again we decided we didn't get it. I did see one sculpture of some koi and water lilies that I liked but it was pretty expensive so we kept walking. Next up was the Museum of Photographic Art. That was pretty interesting and different from any other museum I've seen. They had films of different people from different cultures talking about their lives. And one whole wall of nothing but wallet sized pictures of people that constantly changed. We finished the day off walking around looking at the architecture and stone carvings on various buildings. Then back on the trolley and back to the ship. We sat on the deck for cast off, then went to dinner. After dinner we were off to the Crooner's Lounge to listen to music, then Mom stayed in the Explorer's Lounge to watch a show. I headed off to our room and a shower. Tomorrow we dock in Ensenada, Mexico! back to San Francisco. It's a shame the cruise is almost over.

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