Sunday June 13th

Palm SpringsTo San Diego California

Before we left Palm Springs we just had to go touch the mountain. After checking out, we snuck behind the office to get our mountain "feel". I told you readers earlier that the mountain was close enough to touch. I had flip flops on, but managed to crawl up a few feet for a picture. Memories!

Instead of driving down I-10 again for the third time (that is the route we had to use to drive to LA and Anaheim), we opted for the scenic route up over the mountain. The BK chugged up and up and up until finally we reached the top of the mountain. From that viewpoint, we had a great view of the rocky brown arid desert surrounding the Cochina Valley oasis. It was a very interesting sight. Palm Springs is close to sea level so as we drove up the mountain we ascended 5,000 feet through arid desert. However, we only came down 1,000 feet on the other side to reach civilization.

Our hotel, the Vagabond Inn located on Hotel Circle is very nice and conveniently located to everything, including the stadium. The front desk did a nice job of welcoming us and providing city information. I was impressed with their degree of customer care which included a map of San Diego in our room. Free local telephone calls plus free newspaper and continental breakfast in the morning completed the package.

After relaxing for a few minutes in our room, we headed down to Old Town San Diego. Dinner at the Nino Italian Restaurant was delicious. Evidently, the Mexican restaurants in San Diego are very popular. The lines were fifty people long at several of them. We couldn't believe people would wait in line for Mexican when the Italian Restaurant had plenty of seats and was very good.

Monday June 14th

San Diego

Today if seemed like we got nothing accomplished. My Dad suggested that we go over to the stadium and try to talk to someone about our trip. After a late start and a false start (we missed the turn-off), we reached the stadium. The Padres had moved all their corporate offices to the Hyundi Building which was 2 miles away. However, we did get into the stadium to look around. There is something really cool about an empty stadium and being the only people in there walking around. On the way out, Fred stopped at the ATM. We could not find the exit so I asked a security guy that was walking past how to get out. He asked me sternly how I had gotten in and if I had talked to security. I guess he thought we snuck in. I quickly explained that customer service had said it was ok for us to look around and if we were on the sly we would have been hiding, not hanging out at the ATM. He smiled at that and showed us the way out.

We drove over the Padres office but the people we needed to talk to were busy. I wanted to get information on the history of the stadium and Padres franchise to use for my journal. I tried to get a name from the receptionist but she would only give me a department to call back later. I left a copy of our article.

After leaving there, we passed the newspaper office. What the heck. I went in and asked to talk to the sports editor. The editor, through the receptionist, said they get dozens of letters per season of people doing the same thing and unless we had a unique angle, they were not interested. I can't hardly believe that many people could organize such a trip. We would love to talk to some of these other people to compare notes.

OK, that is enough of baseball stuff. Time to be tourists and see San Diego. We found the ticket booth for the Old Town Trolley Tour but since it was 3 pm and they stop running at 6 pm, they told us we should wait until tomorrow when we had more time.

Ok, how about the the zoo. The Panda Bears are a must see for me. We arrived at the zoo and paid for our tickets. As we turned to go in I thought it might be wise to ask for a hint about the best time to see the pandas. When he told me they are only on display from 10 to 3 and that we had missed them for the day, I begged to exchange our tickets for the next day. Fortunately, they agreed.

Balboa Park, where the zoo is located, is all the City Park. Since we were striking out on the tourist stuff, we decided to go for a run. We both had running stuff in the car and since we were already at the city park, we changed and off we went.

Before going out for the evening, I talked Fred into going to the Marriott where the Phillies team was staying. I was hoping that maybe we would get lucky and bump into Scott Rolen or one of the boys. We had a beer at the bar, but no one looked familiar. The bartender was a friendly guy and told us all about the San Diego local beers which we sampled.

I decided the players must all be out to dinner and what better place to go than Seau's, The Restaurant. Someone we had met in Palm Springs recommended that we go there. Seau's, The Restaurant which is owned by Junior Seau, an all pro linebacker for the Chargers, was an excellent choice. The wait staff was friendly and the food was great.

At Seaus, Fred and I had a good time picking out different people and making up stories about which player they were. We had a good old chucklefest among ourselves. A group of young guys, fitting the prototype of jocks, came down from upstairs. Fred tried to convince me the one guy was Bobby Abreu. The odds were against them being Phillies players, but we had fun pretending they were.

On the way back to our motel, we stopped by the Marriott just in case someone might be hanging around the bar. As we walked past the glass doors, Fred deadpanned, hey, there's Larry Anderson. Yea right, Fred. No really, he and Chris Wheeler are standing at the bar talking to some other guys. We hightailed it in the door , slid into two empty seats at the bar, ordered beers, and surveyed our opportunity to go over without appearing to be obnoxious.

Fred went to the bathroom and while he was gone, Chris Wheeler left and Larry asked for his bill to pay up. I was freaking, on the inside. Just then Fred came back as Larry started walking out. I was so proud of Fred, he spun around and called, Hey Larry. He walked right up, introduced himself and they started talking. I grabbed the camera and went over for Fred to introduce me. I told Larry I didn't want to be an obnoxious fan, but could I please take a picture of him and Fred. He joked that he didn't mind at all, he gets his picture taken with obnixious fans all the time. Larry was nice enough to ask a guy he knew at the bar to take the picture of all three of us. After another minute of chatting, Larry excused himself because some guys were waiting for him to go out, Before he left, he introduced us to the picture taker who happened to be Paul Hagen, the Phillies beat writer from the Daily News.

We were reluctant to bring up the Phillies figuring Paul would not want to talk about work. However, the bartender came over to join the conversation and it was not long before the talk was all about baseball. Fred was thrilled to be talking about the Phillies with someone so knowledgeable. Pauls main focus or fascination of our trip was the fact that we had walked back to our hotel from Turner Field at night. He couldn't believe we did that.

What an evening this turned out to be.

Tuesday June 15th

San Diego

We did the tourist thing and took the Old Town Trolley Tour this morning. One of the stories the driver told was about a lady who bargained with the city back in the early 1900's to give her 30 acres of land at the city park. In exchange, she planted 100 trees on the acreage and 200 trees in surrounding land on the outskirts of the park. She did that for 35 years and is responsible for 6,000 trees in San Diego. Amazing what one person can do.

We spent three hours at the zoo. I just had to see the Panda Bears. I have loved panda bears for as long as I can remember. They are my absolute favorite. The Pandas in San Diego are on loan from China for 12 years for research and have been the star attraction for three years. So far, no luck making a baby panda.

Only the male cooperated for pictures. This exhibit was so popular they had a line going by that was constantly kept moving by zoo personnel. Fred was laughting as, on my third time through the line, the I was blocking everyone by taking so many pictures. I couldn't hepl it. They were so cute!

A pandas life consists of eating and sleeping. We were fortunate to catch the male eating his bamboo lunch. Another attraction for us was the hippo. The San Diego Zoo has an underwater display to see the hippo. He was a big fattie. We also had to go take some pictures of the Mear Cat for my mom.

Before we headed out to the stadium, we stopped back at Seau's for another round of Chicken Quesedillas. Yumm.

San Diego

We arrived at the stadium early and visited the Tony Gwynn On the Way to 3,000 Hits Museum which is a tractor trailer of Gwynn memorabilia. His collection of gold gloves, silver slugger awards and all stars were impressive. Tonys' milestone baseballs were also on display: six out of six hits in a game, 100th home run, 2,000 hit to name a few.

Qualcomm Stadium is a football and baseball facility. The stadium used to be open behind right field, but when it was renovated for football, it was ruined for baseball. Center field was closed in and the seats that were added for football remain empty during baseball games.

We got there early enough to see the teams work out. We went down to the lower rows and got a good look at all the Phillies soing their exercises. Some of them, including Curt Schilling,were not really into it. He was just going throught the motions, shooting the breeze. I'm not sure why but I always want to get an autograph. I was able to get Manager Terry Francona to sign a shirt even though he didn't seemed that thrilled. I don't understand why players who sign are not more friendly about it. If your going to be negative, why bother.

There were only 16,000 fans at the game, but they were very enthusiastic. Interestingly, when the crowd is low, the first two rows on all levels are left empty due to the railings being in the way of the fans views.

Our seats were in the 2nd deck behind home plate, a great place to watch the action. Too bad the Phillies did not cooperate. They lost 6 to 1. A very poor showing considering how many runners were left on base. Maybe the Phillies still had jet lag. We could see Paul sitting up in the sportswriters box busy doing what sports writers do. Wonder what this article is going to say as there is not much to report on this evenings game.

There is a huge choice of food items including carved turkey, roast beef, garlic french fries, salad and 3 different hot dogs. Fred and I want to know who owns the Super Pretzels distributorship. They are available at every stadium and very tasty.

We changed our original plans and took off after the game. We would have had an 8 hour drive Wednesday from San Diego so we decided to drive tonight and try to get above LA. Hopefully we will find a hotel.

Wednesday June 16th

Oxnard, California

We stayed at another Vagabond Inn last night. This hotel chain is very smart. There had been a California map in our room in San Diego that had all the Vagabond Inns marked. They also gave us a $5.00 off coupon at check-out. So, at 1 AM, where else are we going to stay? Fortunately, the Vagabond in Oxnard had one room left.

We got our first real glimpse of the southern California coast. Compared to the Atlantic there is no comparison. Every view of the Pacific coast is new and different. We love driving on these shore roads.

The drive to San Simeon went smoothly and we arrived at the Sand Surf, our home for the evening, around 2 in the afternoon. San Simeon, population 100, is the home of the Hearst Castle which is open for tours. The town itself sits in total contrast to what is up the hill. The general store is about the only thing in the town besides a few scattered small wooden houses. Hearst did not spend any of his millions down here. The castle is so huge that four tours, each two hours long, are offered. From the visitors center it is a five mile bus ride up the hill to the castle.

W.R. Hearst was born filthy rich and throughout his life became even richer. The Hearst Castle in San Simeon is one of 7 "homes" Hearst had built throughout his life. The Castle was started in 1919 and built as a show piece for Mr. Hearst's art collection. Interestingly, his architect was a woman, Julia Morgan. She worked with W.R. for the thirty years it took to build the estate. Some parts of it were never finished.

W.R. used this castle to entertain Hollywood celebrities.The lavish estate contained two pools, three guesthouses, tennis courts, riding stables and the main house. The outdoor swimming pool and deck was built in roman style with tile, marble and statues. Hearst changed his mind three times while the pool was being built and had it reconstructed. Obviously, money was no object.