The end of May Gray !!!

It's June !!! May Gray is behind us, but we'll still have a month of June Gloom :(

I'll catch you up on the last couple weeks of May:

TWINS come for a visit.

We first met niece Laura's twin boys Robin and Rowen 3 years ago at their home in Denver.

The following year the twins came to visit us.

And now in mid-May they have made a return visit.

Still a bit young (not tall enough) for most of the rides at Belmont Park, so I was in charge while mom, dad and Fran rode on the Giant Dipper Roller Coaster. With sister Lucca, Rowen and Robin at Belmont Park

With Sister Lucca Robin and Rowen

Belmont Park was built by John D. Spreckels in 1925 to attract visitors and investors to Mission Beach.  The Giant Dipper is again showing its age, Fran says "Never Again!"  Too many jerks, no smooth spots.

Walking, talking and running in the surf in Pacific Beach. No cares that the last storm left kelp on the beach. Maybe surfing lessons soon.

ANNIVERSARY CRUISE:

With the Bikes loaded on the truck we went to Liberty Station to take our favorite cruise in San Diego to celebrate our 42 anniversary. However, we might have not left enough time, we have 5 miles to ride, get tickets and board with the bikes in 30 minutes. But we made it! Under May Gray skies we were on the Cabrillo, the Coronado Ferry! Did you think we'd actually take a Caribbean Cruise?

Fran's not sure this counts as a cruise ... but we still enjoy it and it remains a favorite.

We're riding a different route this time, we avoided the traffic of town and rode to Glorietta Bay. The park there is home to an awesome Community Center, Playhouse and parkland

The Naked Warrior is a tribute to the Underwater Demolition Divers of World War II. These 'Naked Warriors' swam unarmed into enemy waters with explosives to clear the way for landing craft. The Basic Underwater Demolition/Seal (BUD/S) training is still held in Coronado. The best of BUD/S can receive advanced Seal Training, also in Coronado.

Naked Warrior, Coronado Bridge on the left

Coronado Bay Bridge from Glorietta Bay.

John D. Spreckles also took ownership of the Hotel del Coronado. During the refurbishment of the hotel he set up Tent City on the sand south of the hotel. There is a 3D collage paying tribute to Tent City.

Tent City with the Hotel del Coronado in the upper-left background.

Tent City had its own 24 hour restaurant.

After returning to the Ferry Landing, we enjoyed some of our favorite BBQ at Little Piggy's Bar-B-Q.  Although we have tried other items there, we typically order the brisket and pulled pork sandwiches. The sandwich comes with a side. Fran typically has fries, but I always have the beans! Best beans with fresh green onion garnish.  BTW the pulled comes with cole slaw, as it should.

We will share the sides, but cut the sandwiches in half and swap halves for dinner.  Pulled Pork for lunch = Brisket for dinner

The view from our table as a member of the Pasha Hawaii fleet sails into the San Diego Bay.

I think this might be Mark Zuckerberg's superyacht, Launchpad, which he purchased here in San Diego last year.

We're looking at the superyachts as the superyacht Hodor is docked at the Embarcadero.  Billed as the worlds largest floating toy box, the Hodor is the companion tender to the superyacht Lonion. Both owned by billionaire Lorenzo Fertitta.

There is a landing craft and a race boat on board, one with 5 massive Mercury engines the other with 7!

It is said to carry a landing craft, 9 jet skis, 4 quads 2 side-by-side ATVs, trail bikes, scuba gear and more. The dive room is equipped with a decompression chamber. That's a lot of toys. So of course it has a helo pad.

We never did see the Lonion.

BARRIO LOGAN

The Barrio has a new park and finally one on the waterfront. Cesar Chavez Park is near the better known Chicano Park National Landmark. Chicano Park is located under the Coronado Bay Bridge at I-5. It has the slogan painted on the bridge pillar “All The Way To The Bay".

That's finally happened, with the opening of Cesar Chavez Park. 

Barrio Logan is an easy trolley ride on the Blue Line, so for less than the cost of gas we hopped on. On the short walk, we stopped to admire sculptures honoring the tuna fleet.

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The park is not large, but has a large grass area for a couple soccer fields.

and a picnic area on the waterfront of San Diego Bay.

There were a lot of local vendors showing off their crafts

For the park opening there was live music, but not mariachis nor Folkloric dancers as I'd think more in theme than Rock and Roll for the Barrio.

And numerous food trucks that honored vouchers provided by the Barrio.

I'm checking out the fresh cooked Lumpia.  The voucher is for 3 lumpia.

Fran checking out the taco truck. The voucher was for two Birria Tacos.

No picture, but the best voucher was Fran's teriyaki chicken on rice.  Wish I'd selected one!

A fun/scary lightening storm started up while waiting for the tacos. With 3 seconds between flash an the noise makes about 6 miles away.  After getting caught in heavy rain after taking the trolley to Little Italy, we have to skip those trolley rides.  But we left then and it never did rain!

That's the end of May, and we are planning for a mid-June departure for road trip 2025.

Yupper Coast-to-Coast!

I'll leave for now with bit of advice from the ocean.

September - a wrap-up

These last two weeks of September are pretty much a blur, although we stayed busy, I took very few pictures.

The Blue Line Trolley stops at the bottom of our hill and for $1.25 each way we chose to  ride it to a Wednesday afternoon Padre game at PetCo Park.

Junita climbing the steps

Fran likes to sit high behind home plate to get a better view of the whole field.  I can hardly see the ball from up here :)

The one-way trolley ticket is good for two hours.  We took advantage of this, as it gave us time to hop off in Old Town to enjoy a Margarita and share a platter of Nachos at Barra Barra.

Barra Barra is a good choice as it is close to the Old Town Transit Hub and typically offers good food and fast service.

On Sunday the Moonlight Theater was performing Saturday Night Fever.  We typically stay overnight at Guajome County Park rather than make the hour drive back at night.  It’s $34 for a FHU site … much less than parking at the Padre game :) 

There’s usually a site open for a Sunday night.  Despite a Sunday performance the Moonlight had a nice turnout.

And a huge cast for the performance.

Before Marty left Tacoma his doctor recommended he have an Ablation to lessen the chance of another heart beat malfunction.  He got a second opinion from a local cardiologist, who concurred.  Marty was comfortable with the local surgeon and they scheduled the procedure to be done here on Tuesday afternoon.

Sleeping Beauty

After our visit at the hospital, where Juanita was able to spend the night with him, we returned home.  That is, we returned after a dinner stop for Taco Tuesday at Off Shore

One of Fran’s high school chums lives in north county, in fact Barbara and Fran came to San Diego together and never left!  A mutual friend from high school was in town to visit them and will stay with Barbara.  This turned into a perfect opportunity to have a slumber party. 

That left the three of us to figure out what to do with ourselves.  Juanita suggested Tri-tip for lunch.  One of the best places for brisket and pulled pork is found at the Coronado Ferry Landing.  So that was our adventure for the day.

Once there we walked around the park to where the original auto ferry landed until the bridge was complete in 1969.

We stopped for a wine tasting at the Coronado Tasting Room.

where they offered us a tequila tasting, too.

Both of the tequila offerings were quite good, their wine not so much.

Somehow I have no picture of lunch at Lil Piggy’s Bar-B-Q.  Where we ordered brisket and pulled pork sandwiches.  The sandwiches were cut in half for sharing.  Juanita declared the pulled port best and ate both halves!  

Fran and the gals were also at the Ferry Landing having lunch at Costa Azul.  I had to stop in to say Hi.  They were sitting in the same area where we recently met Gay and Joe for lunch.

We then caught the ferry for our return home.

We are now getting ready for October's annular eclipse.

Coronado - Heritage Trees

Currently Coronado has 13 trees designated as Heritage Trees.  To be selected a tree must have a “significant combination of attributes that make it worthy of receiving acclaim and protection.“ ~Heritage Tree Program

For my bike ride I chose to ride the Silver Strand, rather than take the ferry across.

The trees can be viewed in any convenient order.  For my purposes I created a Google interactive map that can be found HERE.  As the City Map only shows the first 9 trees. 

001 Torrey Pine (Pinus Torryana)
Located in Palm Park.  The Torrey Pine is the official tree of Coronado.  There are 3 fine examples on the Coronado Heritage Tree List.

002 Torrey Pine (Pinus Torryana).
Located at the entrance to the Coronado Library.

Although the San Diego County libraries are open, many of the city libraries are still Covid-Closed.  It’s worth going in to see the Oz themed stained glass wall that separates the children's section.  I have a couple pictures on my blog HERE.

003 Star Pine (Araucaria Heterophylla)
Located in Rotary Plaza.  The Star Pine is native to Norfolk Island in the South Pacific, hence it is also called the Norfolk Island Pine.

004 Torrey Pine (Pinus Torryana)
Located on the traffic island at 6th St and Pomona

005 Moreton Bay Fig (Ficus Macrophylla)
Located at 1121 Flora Ave across the street from the ‘Oz House’, where L. Frank Baum wrote the book.
Not as large as the Moreton Bay Fig in Balboa Park.  It’s still quite impressive.

I  have more information on the Oz House and a couple pictures on my blog HERE.

006 Fern Pine (Afrocarpus Gracilior)
Located at 525 I Ave.
A very impressive East African fern pine tree

007 Italian Stone Pine (Pinua Pinea)
Located in the backyard of 731 I Ave.  This beautiful Stone Pine is the largest n the city and was planted in 1965 as a living Christmas Tree.  I sure would not want to decorate now.

There is not a plaque on the street for this tree, which is on private property.

008 Italian Stone Pine (Pinua Pinea)
I did not find a plaque for this beautiful tree in the backyard of 1027 Adella Ave.  Must be a thing to omit plaques for trees on private property.

009 Deodar Cedar (Cedrus Deodara)
Located at the 2nd block of Orange Ave.
Native of the Himalayas this is the best example of the 42 deodar cedars that form “Christmas Lane”

010 Sugar Gum (Eucalyptus Cladocalyx).
Located on the 1st block of E Ave.  The eucalyptus is a native of Australia. 

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There are many fine examples along E Ave.  The sidewalk was relocated to protect this big boy.

On thee opposite side of the street is this awesome Brazilian Pepper, that looks out of place among the eucalyptus.

011 Norfolk Island Pine (Araucaria Heterophylla)
Aka Star Pine, is located at 1000 Adella Ave.

012/13 Norfolk Island Pine (Araucaria Heterophylla)
This matched pair stand on either side of the library entrance.  The single plaque is on the tree to the left side, for this blog I'll call that tree 012.

Tree 013 then will be located behind the Imagine Dragon on the right side of the walkway.

I followed the walkway behind the dragon to the fun little garden with, of course, more trees.

Bay View park is always a welcome rest stop.  At this point I was thinking 'if I'd taken the ferry, the ride would be almost over now.'  I still have 12 miles to go!

I finished my loop with at stop at Lil’ Piggy’s Bar-B-Q at the Ferry Landing before my return ride back down the Silver Strand.

I can recommend their pulled pork or beef brisket sandwich.  The pulled pork includes the coleslaw in the sandwich, so order their yummy beans as your side dish.  I order coleslaw as the side with the brisket and add it to the sandwich.

Although the bike path is paved the entire length of the Silver Strand, it's relaxing to ride the nature trail that often parallels the path.

Although this turned out to be a 30 mile ride it is nearly all level.  No bike?  No problem!  Either standard bikes or eBikes can be rented at the Coronado Ferry Landing.  Or across the bridge is Rad Power Bikes rentals.  A new additions to Phase 2 of the Bikeway Village at the south entrance.

Now it's time to get the RV loaded for some travel time, starting next week.  I'm looking forward to being on the road.