The drive from Las Vegas to San Diego was pretty dusty until we got to LA. Then it was just a lot of traffic! We met Kim at a pizza place in Visa, CA around 4 pm. She had a break between clients and her last client of the day was in Vista.
Wow, it was so good to see her! It had been 10 months since Alyssa’s baby shower which was the last time I saw her. After our grand reunion with Kim she headed to her next client and we head to La Jolla to walk and see the Pacific Ocean. You know you are in California… when even a dog is wearing shades!
Stew and I enjoyed our first west coast sunset and walk in the sand. Its been a long trip out here – of course, we loved the entire trip, but it was nice to feel “we made it” to Cali!
September 27 (Wednesday) – Kim had to work, so I got up with her and joined her for breakfast. She is in a new apartment from the last time we were here (Oct 2022) and has a new roommate – a 48-year-old lawyer named Bre. Bre, unfortunately, was on the tail end of her recovery from covid. But that also meant we had some time to get to know her as she was housebound for a few more days. We enjoyed the morning hanging out on the apt porch in the hammock (maintaining safe distance) chatting with Bre.
We spent the rest of the day cleaning the car and doing wash. We hit the grocery store for some ingredients to make shrimp chowder for dinner. Had. a nice evening with Kim.
September 28 (Thursday) – Kim had to work again today so we decided to spend the our day down at Mission Beach area. We needed to get some wet suits and the rest of our snorkeling gear (Kim had some gear that we could use) so we hit some thrift stores where I found my wet suit and Stew was able to get one on Facebook marketplace. By early-afternoon we had all our gear in the car and we headed to our snorkel spot: Mission Bay Point Park. It was really cold even in the full body wet suit but we had fun and saw some cool things – Garibaldis are always pretty neat fish to see with their bright orange color.
September 29th (Friday) – Kim was off today so we worked on getting her a wet suit and then headed to snorkel again at Mission Bay Point Park. We had great fun and it was actually Kim’s first time really snorkeling at a coral reef. She had tried to use the snorkel equipment at La Jolla cove when her friend Kayleigh was in town. But the water was not very clear and there is no coral reef to speak of.
The water was very cold again – maybe even colder today (around 58-60). We spent too long in the water and Kim got too cold. We headed back to her place to get her in a hot shower. We watched some movies and had tacos for dinner.
September 30 (Saturday) – We headed to the Little Italy Farmers Market. What fuin that was!! We had a great time seeing all the vendors and there were a lot of them. Plus the area is down by the Sea Port area so that was fun to see the port with the barges etc.
After the farmers market we walked around Kim’s new neighborhood (new to me, she has been here since
October 1 (Sunday) – Spent the day at Mission Beach, played some MatKot, Kim’s favorite game!
October 2 (Monday) – We were supposed to leave Cali today but we decided to stay another week (I mean why not, right?), so we booked an airbnb down in Mission Beach on San Jose Place. Kim worked all day and we got ourselves moved into our new digs. Stew and I spent time walking on the boardwalk and relaxing.
Kim joined us for dinner and sunset at our new airbnb location.
October 3 (Tuesday) – Stew and I woke and walked for a while on the Mission Beach boardwalk with our coffees. Very Fun! After lunch we headed for some more snorkeling at Mission Bay Point Park. Kim joined us for dinner and ended up staying overnight with us at the airbnb.
October 4 (Wednesday) – Kim headed to work and Stew and I relaxed at MIssion Beach all day. Kim had a meeting with a client until late so she stopped down for a late dinner and stayed the night.
October 5 (Thursday) – Rented a catamaran for the afternoon. Had a lot of fun racing around Mission Bay. Wind was really good for sailing. Kim joined us later for dinner and the sunset. She stayed overnight again.
October 6 (Friday) – Kim didn’t have to work today so we had a nice breakfast and moved out of the Airbnb. We decided to spend the day over by the Missin Bay Aquatic Center. There is a nice grassy area where we could lay out, play matkot, and sail. We rented another sailboat, a laser. Stew gave Kim a crash course in sailing. With Kim at the helm, they only capsized once! It was very cold, but they righted the boat quickly. We had a nice time just laying around and listening to tunes.
The park right beside us had outdoor showers so we could clean up for dinner. We headed to the seaport area to eat. Nice area to walk around – the bicycle rickshaws were all lit up and the entire seaport area had Christmas lights already.
We spent the night sleeping in the car at Kim’s apt. We were happy to be back in our comfy car. With the window cardboard cutouts on each window, we had complete privacy.
October 7 (Saturday) – We took Kim to Broken Yolk for breakfast, said our goodbyes, and headed east, back on the road again!
