Random Thoughts of Mine...

My first flight left in the afternoon, followed by about an hour layover before heading out to San Diego. On the flight, a guy, who was from California was saying how much he loved living in San Diego. So that made me even more excited about visiting. It was after 2000 when we were coming in for the landing. I looked out the window to see the lights of the city everywhere, it seemed. Carla was there to pick me up at the airport. We walked outside to a beautiful night, walking past the palm trees to the car. The weather was beautiful. A dry climate which felt so much better than the humidity we have on the East Coast. Everyday I was there in San Diego was about 75-80F (23.88-26.66C). Most of the days were sunny, except the last 2 which were cloudy. It was still good weather either way. The nights were great too thanks to the dry climate there.

She introduced me to her next door neighbor, Sherry (not her real name), who also has 2 kids. They are best friends along with being neighbors. Sherry is a cool person that is a disabled Navy veteran. She wears some funny t-shirts, one of which you can see here. Sherry watches some of the neighborhood kids, including Carla's, plus her own! They live in Navy housing which is not on the naval base, but is in the City of San Diego itself. Most Army housing is on base, but the Navy does things differently.

Carla works at the auto hobby shop on the Navy base, Naval Air Station North Island, as a cashier. She took me in to work with her a few days where I got to meet her co-workers. They are some cool, funny guys that she works with. Many of the pictures that I took were from the passenger seat of Carla's car as we drove around the city. From the Naval base you get some great views of downtown San Diego. The problem is cameras are not allowed on base. If I had brought it to take some pictures they would have confiscated it from me. I did get some pictures on the way to the base though. I got some heading towards, then crossing the San Diego-Coronado Bridge. I also managed to get some pictures of Downtown San Diego and the Naval Shipyards while crossing the bridge. The U.S.S. Nimitz was in the shipyards being refurbished at the time. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get some good pictures of it.

San Diego is spread out among the surrounding hillside. The desert is not too far away from the city, just on the other side of the mountains. They don't get much rain in San Diego, but the area is full of palm trees and other foliage. I tried to get a bunch of pictures of the area to show how beautiful it is.

Carla likes to go gambling at the casinos sometimes. There are 2 casinos on nearby Indian reservations. We went to the Barona and Sycuan Indian reservations. We only went to Sycuan 1 night, but we went to Barona 4 days. I'm not much of a gambler, I have to admit. The night we went to Sycuan I won about $40 on the slot machines and the blackjack table. At Barona, I didn't do very well until the last day that we went there. I won a little over $90 on a slot machine after starting off with $20. I stopped playing the machine to make sure I didn't end up losing all the money that I had just won. We went to the food court in the casino to get some pizza. While we were waiting on our food, Carla glanced over at the bakery where she found some large donuts for sale. She bought 2 of them so she could give one to Sherry, then keep the other one. I took 2 pictures of Sherry holding that large donut, one of which you can see here. I wish I had gotten a picture of the look on her face when Carla later handed her the donut.

We watched some movies, played with the kids and hung out some. It felt good to relax, take a break. It was only for a week, but it was better than not taking a vacation. I enjoyed this trip and want to thank Carla for her kindness & hospitality during the week, even though she was feeling a bit under the weather. Here is a picture of us at the airport. You can see the pictures I took in my new San Diego photo album.


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