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SAN DIEGO - JANUARY, 2008

The month of January in San Diego was the coolest we’ve seen and temps were usually in the upper 50s instead of the mid 60s during the day.  But we had plenty of sunshine, unlike most of the west coast that had a very wet and gray January.  Near the end of our stay there was a report that San Diego had measurable rain seven of the last eight days which hadn’t happened in more than five years.  Also, 3.34 inches of rain had fallen in January, making it the wettest month since Feb, 2005 when it rained 5.83 inches.  Normal is 2.28 inches.  But during our stay most of the rain was at night.  One night the street in front of us was flooded a couple feet deep and there was a television news crew out filming it for the eleven o’clock news.  It seems that when there is a high tide at Mission Beach they have to shut valves in the storm sewers so seawater doesn’t back up into the streets, but with the valves closed, the heavy rain couldn’t drain away, causing the flooding.  It was all gone the next morning.  We got a special deal on a rental car that was a convertible.  We got to ride around a couple times with the top down, but most days it was too cool.   

We really don’t have much to report about the time we spent there because we continue to fall into a rut when we are there.  We walk 4 – 5 miles/day, mostly along the beaches at Mission Beach, Ocean Beach, Pacific Beach, or La Jolla.  And we sit in the sun and read for the middle part of the day.  We didn’t do an overnight train trip to Santa Barbara this year because of the cool weather, but we went to SeaWorld - for the first time - even though it is less than 5 miles from where we stay.  We enjoyed the day there and realized that it is very show biz oriented, not too much on stewardship of the animals like you get at a lot of zoos.  They have mostly shows with trained animals.  We saw a dolphin show, a sea lion show, a dogs and cats show, and then the Shamu show.  All were very entertaining, if not educational. 

For a couple days there was extra high surf and watching the surfers was interesting.  We also saw a rescue operation when a couple surfers got caught in a rocky cove.  They had to be lifted out by a crane. 

 As usual, at the beginning of our stay Arlene enjoyed the sunshine so much she wanted to stay more than 4 weeks, but by the 3^rd week she knew 4 weeks was going to be enough.  One day we took a drive up into the mountains east of San Diego where they had forest fires in the fall.  We saw a lot of the damage, but it didn’t seem as widespread as the TV reports would suggest.  We went up to Julian, an old mining town that has been brought back from being a ghost town to being an old west themed tourist trap.  It was loaded with specialty shops, restaurants and bakeries. 

Overall we had a good time again and have made reservations for next year again.

THE END