Whale watching on The America

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The weather today was perfect for our adventure, we took a trip aboard the schooner America, which is a replica of the the boat that was built to take part in the Round The Island Race from Cowes in 1851, as part of the Great Exhibition of 1851. This one was built in 1995 and is a beautiful two masted ship 128ft long. We joined the ship, which sailed through the bay, out past the headland and onto the open sea. Almost immediately whales were sighted and we sailed to follow them. The whales are still migrating south, so we have to sail southwards if we want to get alongside them. It is also apparently good to keep on the seaward side of the whales, as otherwise we may drive them out to sea and into unfamiliar waters. During our day we tracked at least half a dozen whales on their migratory journey. The boat was amazing, the weather was fantastic, the whales were exciting and the day was unforgettable.The story of the day is best told in pictures, so select the slide show view, press F11 on your keyboard for a full screen viewing (you may have to click on the little play triangle at the bottom and also slow down the slide show to read the captions)

Dining Out at The hotel Del

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Wednesday.
After visiting the Hotel Del Coronado last week we have been planning a way to be able to dine there, as ordinarily it is far too expensive for us.
However, we have found out that there is a festival of food in San Diego called  Restaurant Week, whereby a lot of good restaurants offer an affordable fixed price menu.
By checking out the Internet we find that the Sheerwater Restaurant in the Hotel Del Coronada puts on a two course lunch menu for Restaurant Week for a mere $20.
So we  phoned up and booked a table for 1.30 today, we then got ourselves poshed up and drove back over to the island.
On the way, since we had time, we stopped at the Maritime Museum and had a coffee, while we watched the old boats, then we drove across to the island and had a drive round the Bay shore, where we found a nice little park and watched the waders on the shore and a seal, who was relaxing in the shallow beach waters.
We turned up at the appointed hour and were seated and a window table. Sally had the soup and I had a plate of mussels and clams with lemon grass.
We followed this with a main course, Sally had a salmon burger, without the bun, but with the salad and avocado pear, while I had the BBQ Brisket sandwich, both of which were excellent and so completely filled us that we did not have room for desert. So our great adventure of eating in a posh restaurant in a posh hotel was a great success, which we enjoyed immensely.

Midway

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Today was overcast and cool so we decided to visit the U.S.S. Midway aircraft carrier, which is now a museum. This ship is large, very large, it's flight deck is 2.4 acres.

We discovered that the ship has four main areas. Right at the top is the flight control and bridge, which is sort of stuck on the side of the flight deck. Then there is the flight deck , which is the top of the ship, below that is an enormous space called the Hanger deck and below that are about four floors of ship, which house the crew, parts, engines and things. We started at the hanger deck.

Fortunately their is an elevator to take us up to the hanger deck. Once there we could roam around looking at all the bits to do with storing and maintaining the aircraft, as well as see a number of aircraft on display, including the famous Bird Dog plane that was used by a South Vietnamese major to escape from Vietnam in 1975. He and his family just flew out to sea, hoping to find somewhere to land(?) fortunately they found the Midway. in order to land on it the captain ordered that about $10 million of helicopters be pushed over the side to make room for it! It succeeded in landing safely amid huge shouts of support.

We then went up to the flight deck, where all the planes take off and land. There are two runways, one for take off and one for landing. We listened to Bob, an ex pilot talk, about the take off system, which uses a steam catapult to accelerate the planes up to 160 mph in 150 yards!

Following this we went right back down to explore the rest of the ship, looking at the crews quarters, the dining halls, the post office, the engineering shops and the officers quarters.

All in all we had a great day, which was helped by the ship being quite accessible for handicapped visitors.

Finally we visited the Fish Market area, where there is a giant statue of the now famous couple kissing, which is taken from a photograph of Times Square on VJ Day.

Whale Watching on Loma Point

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Today we wanted a gentle drive out, so decided to go to Loma Point, a headland on the far side of San Diego. They built a lighthouse there, which is now a National Monument. From San Diego the headland can be seen a mile or two to the north, however from the Headland you get an amazing view of the entire region, all the way into Mexico.
We went to the visitor centre and had a look around, noticing that you could borrow binoculars, so we were able to get brilliant views of the whole area. The weather was calm with medium high cloud cover, so it was not too bright, just right for looking around.
San Diego was laid out beneath us, we could see all the downtown skyscrapers, the big navy ships, the miitary aircraft going in and out of their airbase as well as all the ships going in and out of the bay, just beneath us. It was very interesting.
However the real fun began when we turned our attention to the seaward side of the headland, as there is a special lookout for whale watching. We stopped there for our picnic lunch listening to people looking enthusiastically for whales. After lunch we had a look for ourselves, without much luck. All we saw were a couple of pod of dolphins, still that was fun. The sea was absolutely flat calm, except where the rollers hit the beach, where we could see people surfing beneath us.
After a while we noticed that among the many small fishing and leisure boats (it was Saturday) were a couple of boats with lots of people on, these were Whale Watching Cruise ships, also a very large yacht. All attention was paid to these ships as the cruised beneath us, about half a mile off shore, because if we couldn't see whales, perhaps they could, as they are the experts.
Sure enough after a while the yacht started to circle and we could see something in the water! We couldn't see a whale, but something was making a gentle wake on the water. As the yacht circled one of the Whale Watchers approached and stopped, so we the view was that there was definitely a whale there. Then it broke surface, not spectacularly, but it was definitely a whale, we had seen our first whale! The a whole scene played out before us as the Yacht followed the whale and the other cruise ship had a quick look then  disappeared to the North. Shortly after the whale started to spout and break the water, not the spectacular 'breach' but enough for us to easily watch its progress South past us about half a mile off shore, the binoculars were very helpful as we watched it for about half an hour braking surface and spouting. After it had passed by we packed up, returned the bins. and drove back to the trailer having immensely enjoyed watching the whale today.

Some Like It Hot

Today was a perfect day for weather. The sun shone, it was warm, it was lovely.
We chose, for this our first day trip in San Diego, to visit Coronado.
We did so for several reasons. It is an exclusive little almost island across the bay from San Diego. It has the most amazing beach. It has a main street that looks like Rodeo Drive in Beverley Hills.
And it has the Hotel Del Coronada. Possibly one of the most amazing hotels in the world, along with Raffles in Singapore, the Dorchester in Hyde Park and the Fairmont in San Francisco. It is a hotel of a certain age, built in the 1880's and comes with a history that reflects, and has even shaped, the history of California and the USA. It sits right on the edge of the Pacific Ocean and spreads untidily along the shore, with it's red roofs and white balconied facade rising above the many pools, bars, restaurants gardens and sun decks. The restaurants are of course expensive (although we may have a story on that one next week!!).
Ultimately though for us it's claim on our vacation time is because it is the hotel that Billy Wilder chose to shoot many scenes from his film 'Some Like It Hot'.
To get to Coronado we drove across the Coronado Bay Bridge. Built in 1969 it was until 2008 the longest box girder bridge in the world, built high enough for the tallest of tall navy ships to pass underneath. We drove up and over it and as we dropped down the far side we could see Coronado laid out before us, big houses, wide avenues and palm trees. We cruised down the Main Street past all those expensive shops and turned along the beach front road, stopped a couple of times to take in the sunshine and the views, wandered down to a lifeguard tower and watched some surfers take on the long Pacific rollers that were coming in. We then worked our way back to towards the Hotel Del, as it is known locally. We found a nice parking pace down by the beach and wandered along the beach sidewalk which passed between the beach and the hotel. We then explored the hotel itself, stopping for a coffee in one of their beachfront bars, very nice. Continuing through the hotel we wandered round the shopping area and the lobby, all was dark stained wood paneling, which made it dark, but kept a cool feel. We went into the ball room, which is circular and opens out onto the beach front. Everywhere outside there are manicured gardens with views of the sea.
We could see how the hotel had changed in the 50 odd years since Some Like It Hot was filmed, the front entrance had been lawned, but now is a car park and gardens, but the beach where Marlyn Monroe played beach ball was still the same and I took a picture of the hotel from the same spot. It was very interesting, but you have to remember that we are easily pleased.
After visiting the hotel we finished our day by driving South along the long sand spit that links Coronado to the mainland, returning to our trailer having enjoyed our day immensely.

San Diego Here We Are

We have now made the short hop to San Diego and we are now safely pitched in the local Sweetwater County Park, we have a  nice shady site with plenty of space. Time now to catch up on those things that have been left to one side for the moment.

Peggy Sue's Diner

 

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We left Las Vegas and headed south on Monday morning. It was so good to be in sunshine again after all the darkness and cold back home. Just north of Barstow we stopped at a 1950's Diner, Peggy Sue's, which had been advertised several times as we headed south. It didn't look too impressive from the outside, but inside it was very interesting. It had the original diner consisting of three booths and nine bar seats which then opened out to three more rooms which had been added over the years.  Peggy Sue was obviously a film fanatic as the place was filled with film memorabilia - signed photos of stars, life size models of Elvis and other stars etc. etc. There was a five and dime shop and an ice cream parlour to one side as well. The shop was full of film knick knacks on sale from The Beatles, Betty Boop, to Disney and Elvis. We spent a very enjoyable time having a drink and their famous curly fries and wandering round the shop. The waitresses were dressed in authentic style 1950 uniforms.  Only in America!! We continued our journey and got to San Bernadino to find our rig in excellent condition - all safe and sound. We spent a couple of nights there - sleeping a lot to make up for the jet lag.

A promptly dealt with problem.

All went well until they brought my manual wheelchair to the door of the plane. Terry tried to open it and it was obvious that it was quite badly damaged. The seat would not lie flat, the metal had been twisted, and something was wrong with one of the wheels. The Virgin Atlantic Service Delivery Manager was called and arrived within a few minutes. She took one look at the chair and said it would have to be  replaced. She took us to her office where she arranged for a local shop to open for us ( at 5pm on a Sunday) and show us a wheelchair that sounded to be a  good match for my chair. She also said it would be too late for us to travel to San Bernadino, as in our original plan, after we had sorted the wheelchair and arranged a night with dinner and breakfast in the newly refurbished Tropicana Hotel on the Strip in Las Vegas.
So, after collecting our hire care, we went to the shop and tried out the wheelchair. It had all the same features as on my old one, quick release wheels, drop down handles etc and was quite comfortable. The man adjusted the foot plates and even gave me a cushion as the seat was not padded as my previous one had been. We signed the papers, which said the bill was to be sent to Virgin Atlantic, then went to the Tropicana.
We have stayed twice before at the Tropicana, but the last time it was quite run down. Now it has had a full refurbishment or remodeling , as they say in the USA, and is plush. They have kept the beautiful old stained glass roof over the casino but everything else is brand new. Our room was very comfortable and the food was delicious. In fact Terry was feeling quite guilty as we ate our dinner - only one course followed by coffee- which came to about $100 dollars!!! But, as I said, we didn't ask to stay in Vegas, Sharon, the service manager for Virgin Atlantic suggested and arranged it for us. Breakfast was a very good buffet and then we had a wander round the pool area and the rest of the hotel, all beautifully redecorated. So we set off to San Bernadino on Monday morning with a brand new wheelchair and my old wheelchair in the boot after having a wonderful night and a refreshing sleep.
I cannot fault the promptness with which our problem was dealt with and the bonus of a night in a good hotel on the strip - all courtesy of Virgin Atlantic. Wonderful.

The Journey

We had a very good journey, starting with a train from Middlesbrough to Manchester airport. We then caught the shuttle to the Crown Plaza Hotel which, on first sight, seemed very nice. The room was very well appointed but cold, so we turned up the heating thermostat and waited for the room to warm up. It didn't. So after a couple of hours we called the main desk to tell them. They sent a man along with a portable radiator and eventually the room began to warm up. I decided to take a shower to warm up and nearly jumped out of my skin, after I turned the shower off and was getting dried, when the shower head just fell off with a clatter into the bath. It turns out that it was broken. The meals were expensive so we just ate the food we had with us and had an early night. Terry managed to have a shower the next morning by fiddling with the shower head. I don't think this is a hotel where we would stay again.
We had breakfast at the airport after check in and the flight was on time. The plane was practically empty so we had room to spread out which enabled us to stretch out on empty rows and sleep. Terry got some good photos of the frozen sea over Northern Canada and snow covered mountains over Northern USA. We landed in Las Vegas early and thought we were doing so well until we ran into a problem.

The Night before we leave

Last night before we set off, we said our farewells to Helen and Stu.
Almost all ready to leave.
Off to bed now