Another sunny day in San Diego! This morning I went to visit Coronado which is an island in San Diego Bay. You can catch the bus over the bridge but I chose to take the ferry which goes right from the Downtown Pier about five minutes walk from my hotel. It was a nice 30 minute ride across the bay – half of Coronado is a naval base and there’s also a retired aircraft carrier museum on the bay as well, so there’s quite a lot of activity around.
When I got to Coronado, I had some brunch at a restaurant right beside the water. There was a huge group of cyclists who were dressed up in red and green, who were brunching half way though their ride. Always amazing in America how people are keen to dress up – I even saw a car with fuzzy reindeer antlers!
I walked over to he other side of the island – Coronado is quite posh and there were some lovely houses to look at. On the other side of the island is the Hotel Del Coronado which is a huge distinctive complex which was initially built in 1888. It was the location for part of Some Like It Hot and is still very popular. There was even a wedding venue set up on the beach, and an ice-skating rink! Loads of nice cafes and small shops on Orange Ave, the main road across the island.
I took the ferry back to the mainland, then caught the trolley out to Fashion Valley shopping mall – there are three trolley routes around central San Diego – I had to change once, but it was very efficient. Fashion Valley was pretty busy with pre-holiday shopping. It was an outdoor mall, with all the normal mall-type shops as well as a Bloomingdales, Macys, Nieman Marcus and Nordstroom. There were loads of discounts and sales going on – the sale in Banana Republic was pretty good, but a queue at the check-out of at least 30 people so I decided not to indulge. Picked up a few summer tops – most of the stuff in the shops were really wintry and I don’t have any immediate need for that! I also visited the other two malls (Hazard Center and Mission Valley) but they were not as good.
Had dinner in the Gaslamp District in central San Diego – lots of bars, Italian and Indian restaurants!
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