lewis and clark had a journal. you, beth-annie, have a diary.

Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Trip-o-logue. Day Two. Ships and Shopping.

I feel I need to prepare you... there are a lot of photos here. A LOT. Hopefully it won't make my blog load too slowly.

Since we got in so late Friday night, the plan was to sleep in a bit Saturday morning so we'd actually have energy to do things the rest of the day. Not to be. As Ava woke us at 7:30, we got going sooner than we'd planned. Breakfast at the hotel was about as good as you can get and still be able to call it "continental:" make-your-own waffles, donuts, bagels, muffins, croissants, hard boiled eggs, yogurt, and fresh fruit in addition to the typical cereal, toast, juice, milk and coffee. We certainly didn't mind getting that for free for five mornings.

We hit a couple "Veronica Mars" filming locations (I'm going to save all of those for one blog at the end of the 'Logue, so won't post the photos now) before heading downtown to the pier area.

We took a two-hour tour of San Diego Harbor, on this here boat (no, we weren't whale watching -- not the right season for their migration).

We started out on the open-air upper deck of the boat, as we figured that was where the best view would be. (Unfortunately, it was also where the hot, hot sun was beating, beating down.)

It was nice to be out in the open, but there were also always a lot of people in the way of whatever shot we wanted to get -- this is the USS Midway aircraft carrier, which served from just after WWII to Desert Storm and is now a museum. We decided not to tour it as it wouldn't have been a very 22-month-old-friendly activity.

There were lots of sailboats out that day as it was nice and breezy (funny how we couldn't seem to feel the breeze much up on top). Our tour guide said it made for interesting steering of our boat at times since wind-propelled vessels get the right of way (obviously). In front of the modern downtown buildings is Seaport Village, where we would go later in the day.

We went under the Coronado Bridge, which connects downtown San Diego to the island of Coronado. It's very tall. (The bridge, not the island.)

Here's a better look at the awesomeness of the 2-mile-long bridge.

Some pictures speak for themselves. :-)

Due to the hotness and peopleness, we decided to move down to the main, mostly-enclosed level of the boat. We wished we'd done it sooner. There were a lot fewer people, shade, and comfy padded benches right by the windows so Ava could see much better. And if you stood by one of the open-air windows, you got a magnificent, cool breeze that was somehow nowhere to be found out in the open on the top level.

"You see this, here, this is what holds up the bridge."

Ava's hair looks so messy both because of playing with Daddy's hat and how sweaty her head got when we were up in the sun (have I mentioned how not fun that was?). [Video: Ava playing with Daddy's hat. The boat and tour guide are kind of loud, but Ava's saying "Daddy hat."]

The Star of India, built in the mid-19th century, is the oldest active ship in the world.

Once Ava spotted these letters and numbers, she was down on the floor naming each one for us. :-)

How those people didn't fall off this boat at that angle I have no idea.

"Hold on one second..."

This is a U.S. Navy submarine they were working on above the water. They keep it mostly enclosed as there are some sensitive things they don't want just anyone getting a look at (such as the propellers).

This is the last sailboat picture, I promise. I liked the angle and city in the background on this one.

After our cruise we went to Seaport Village and ate lunch at Edgewater Grill. I had sea scallops for the first time (yummy) and Josh did not. :-P If only all restaurants had an ocean view... *loving sigh* [Video: Proof that you don't have to be soft and cuddly to get a hug from Ava. And here she's saying "Ronald Donald." :-)]

Seaport Village, incidentally, is a charming (if intentionally manufactured charm) pedestrian area of shops, restaurants, and a harborside walk. And several pretty fountains. I bought most of my souvenirs here (thankfully it was late enough in the year to be able to get some Christmas ornaments, though there was also an entire Christmas store), and Josh got very tired of the shopping thing. :-P

I liked the juxtaposition of very different architectural styles here. (The modern building is of course not part of Seaport Village, but is actually a block or two away.)

These trees (at a park area adjacent to the shopping area) were everywhere. And very pretty.

After seeing so much water she couldn't touch, Ava was itching to actually get her feet wet, so we took her to Mission Bay Park, which has lots of little coves where surf is non-existent and the water is very shallow.

"Whoa..."

"Hehehe... just kidding!"

"Yay! Water is way fun!"

This isn't technically a picture of a sunset, but it is that time of day, as you can tell from the colors in the sky.

We headed to the west-coast-famous In-N-Out Burger for supper. We went inside to order (the drive-thru line made that way an unattractive option) but took it back to our hotel to eat. For all the raving about this place, I was expecting something spectacular. Maybe that was the problem. It was... good. No better than a Wendy's burger, I'd say, and certainly not up to the level of what I've had at some sit-down restaurants (though admittedly much cheaper). To hear some people talk, this is the best burger on the planet, but I just don't quite see it. Eh, maybe my tastebuds are off. :-P (This photo courtesy of theseversons.net, btw... I didn't have the foresight to snap a photo while we were there. This is the same one, though.)

Someone gets caught with her hand in the cracker box. :-)

beth, 11:42 PM || We are 6 comments. Read us!

Saturday, September 20, 2008
This post is...

...for Patty, but I'm sure others will appreciate it as well.

Every time Beth and I drive to visit Matt and Kim, we take US 30 through eastern Iowa. One town we pass through is Clarence, IA, which has the most awesome welcome sign ever.

That is all.

josh, 12:01 AM || We are 2 comments. Read us!

Friday, September 19, 2008
Trip-o-logue. Day(-ish) One. In flight.

I've never flown for vacation before. Every time in the past has been to visit family or friends, and the major vacations I've been on (California x 2, Florida, New York) have all been either road trips or via train. We hadn't taken a big trip since a couple years before Ava was born, and we wanted to take advantage of not having to buy a third plane ticket for her as long as she's under two (for a couple more months), so we settled on somewhere we've been wanting to visit but didn't want to drive to: San Diego.

We flew out of Omaha, even though it was a four-hour drive to get there (trust me, what we saved on airfare made it more than worth it). And I just plain like smaller airports, they're so much less of a hassle. To maximize our time, we decided to fly out Friday evening rather than waste all of Saturday traveling, even though that meant our flight wouldn't get in until almost 1am CDT.

Ava did very well sitting on Mommy's lap on the plane. Our main strategy was to distract her from anything out of the ordinary going on (since it was her first flight and we didn't know how she'd react), so I read to her and let her have a lollipop as we took off. She didn't seem to notice.

There's not a man, woman or child who doesn't enjoy a lovely beverage...

Our flight arrived in San Diego at 11pm local time (somehow Ava didn't fall asleep at all until that final landing). We still had to get our luggage, wait for the Hertz shuttle, get our rental car, and drive to our hotel. Everything actually went quite smoothly on all of those fronts.

Ava sleeps at baggage claim.

Ava sleeps as we load our rental car (a Mazda 6 we ended up being very happy with) and check it for dings (always check for the dings).

Ava sleeps at our hotel.

By the time we got to bed, it was 1:20am (which means it felt like 3:20am). For simplicity's sake, we just slept with Ava between us in bed that night (she's too big for pack-n-play-type hotel cribs at this point, and we weren't about to noisily blow up the air mattress at that time of night). In retrospect, that probably wasn't a great idea, since I never sleep well whenever Ava's in bed with us, and this was no different, despite how tired I was. And then she woke us up at 7:30 the next morning. Ugh.

This is the scariest max room rate notice I've ever seen. (Thankfully we ourselves were still in double digits.) That's a California tourist destination for you.

beth, 11:17 PM || We are 6 comments. Read us!

Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Beth-Annie update.

Sorry I've been gone for a while. We were in San Diego for a vacation last week, and the time leading up to it was very busy with preparing for that trip, trying to get stuff done around here, etc. The good news is, give me a few days to get things back to normal and start going through our pictures (we only took around 1500 -- stupid digital cameras with huge memory cards -- so it shouldn't be that hard, right?) and it should be Trip-o-logue-Ho 'round these parts! Lots of work for me writing it, lots of work for you reading it. Everyone wins!

In other Beth-Annie news (though that's a stretch), the LPGA tournament I thought about not bothering to record the ten televised hours of while we were gone (but then actually did) ended up being won by my favorite player (Angela Stanford), who had only won one other time, five years ago. Good thing I changed my mind! :-)

Finally, the finale of "Big Brother" is tonight, and my favorite, Dan, is actually in the final two (whether he'll win or not I think is a toss-up). That's only happened for me one other time in ten seasons, and that was six years ago. So I'm relishing this right now. It's refreshing to be happy at the end of the show instead of disgusted that some miserable person is going to win.

beth, 1:59 PM || We are 3 comments. Read us!