california adventures: san diego edition

The funny thing about being from Atlanta is that traveling by air anywhere else seems kind of ridiculous. Meaning...the airport experience of traveling anywhere else is ridiculous. 2 Fridays ago as we hit up the Charleston airport to head to Cali, Freddie and I couldn't help but laugh. Yes, we were laughing because we were absolutely 100% giddy about the trip, but also because there was one security line. One! And it wasn't even a line, I mean we walked right up and were in and out within mere minutes. To make matters even crazier our gate was in one of two terminals which were both about 10 steps from one another.

So giggle giggle and all that. Let's move on to the good stuff.

San Diego.

Remember Wi? Well these are the kind of faces we make at baggage claim after being reunited. I mean, can't you just hear the squeals and screams coming out of those loud mouths? 

In going to San Diego Freddie and I had both thought about things we wanted to do during our one full day there. Here were our lists...

Freddie: Stone Brewery

Emily: spend all the time with Wi

Obviously we both did very thorough planning for this trip. Wi saved the day and managed to think of a full day worth of San Diego activities that included both Stone and spending all the time with her. We were busy from sun up to down and it was wonderful. 

The horrible view from Dr. Wi's house. 

First stop of the day was the boardwalk which had strange beach houses that looked nothing like the beach houses in the Motherland (Charleston). Second stop was to Little Italy for food and a farmer's market. We stopped at a pizza place that I don't even remember the name of (oops) because I was too busy devouring my insanely amazing pizza to even glance at the name of the place. So...just know that somewhere in Little Italy in San Diego there is an amazing pizza place. My travel advice is golden. 

In addition to the pizza, we had delicious berries, amazing almond butter hummus, and scrumptious macaroons and cannoli type pastries. Someone needs a thesaurus for her adjectives...

There was also an option to feast on live sea urchins, but...we passed on that. You know, too full from everything else.

From there we did the most speedy driving tour of the city. Over and around the Midway. Right by the crazy ridiculous gas prices. Over the Coronado bridge.  Down to Mexico. Off on the last USA exit. Around the cove. And up a mountain.

By the way, there is a McDonald's on the last USA exit off of I-5 so use that information however you see fit.

We finished the afternoon with a hike drive up Mount Soledad. Talk about take your breath away beautiful views. Well actually, instead of talking about them let's just look at 'em.

A more accurate depiction of the adventure. 

Oh yeah, we ended the day with two of San Diego's finest: Stone Brewery and In-N-Out. Doubt there's a better combination than those two.

Oh hey there, picture. We've seen you in a blog post before.

Wine, beer, and a milkshake. Evening complete.

...except the evening was not complete because we had not dipped our toesies into the Pacific Ocean.
So we did.

And that's the story of how we fell in love with San Diego.

Good news: my sister was around for the rest of the trip so we'll have the legit camera pictures from here on out. Thank God <<<what you're saying right now.