There were some cool sounding museums that we didn't go to with the kids when we were there last summer, so first we headed up to Balboa Park. We first tried to go to the Photography museum, but they were changing out the exhibit and said there would be much more to see if we could come back tomorrow. So we did. There wasn't a lot to see when we did make it back, so I can't imagine what they were actually showing the day before. There were some interesting photos, though.
Oops, let's try that again.
This cool building was an arboretum filled with cool plants. We ran into it on our way to an art museum. Here's a close up of me under the yellow flowers you can see on the left above.
There were a lot of cool orchids and other tropical plants.
Next we went to an art museum. They had some cool Russian religious icon stuff all done on wood paneling. Also they had a bunch of religious themed sketches by Rembrant. Yeah, I didn't know he sketched either. I think our favorite painting was The Torment of St. Anthony by Giovanni Girolamo Savoldo , which you can't really see in that picture. There's all these little demons or something chasing him, which are really pretty whimsical. Here's a sneaky close-up mike took (we didn't know if photography was allowed). I mean, what kind of demon stops to read a book? 
Next we went to the Museum of Man. It was an anthropology museum. Ancient civilizations and all that. They had reproductions of Mayan pillars and Egyptian mummies. Also information about the Genographic Project. It's about how you can track your ancestors through your mitochondrial dna. It's really interesting, and we have considered participating, if only the kit weren't so expensive. While we were looking at the exhibit and random guy came up and wanted to try to explain it to us. I thought that was pretty weird til he finally told us he was in training to become a docent.
We also spent time in Little Italy. We ate dinner (and breakfast) at Cafe Zucchuro.
Dinner was great, but what would vacation be if I didn't leave my purse behind? And it was raining?
I realized I had left it as we were on the trolley back to our hotel. So we got off to reverse course. As we were waiting, we were approached by some guy. "Oh, great, a crazy", I thought, though he seemed clean cut unlike most crazies you might meet on the street.
He proceeded to tell us about how he had up and left from Florida, planning to just leave his life (and cell phone) behind for a couple of weeks. Sounds adventurous, right? (or curiously like a man fleeing the law.) But apparently he wasn't that smart in planning his finances because he told us he dropped an envelope with 4 grand somewhere on his travels.
"Oh, the angle," I thought and expected him to ask us for money. Surprisingly, he did not. We chatted a few more minutes before the train came. Mike and I talked about it and thought maybe he was just lonely from leaving his life behind and needed someone to talk to.
So, the trolley arrives and off we go again through the pouring rain (we did have an umbrella, but still), back to the restaurant and got my purse back. Yay. I really gotta stop doing that.
I'm getting out of chronological order. I can't remember which night we did what. One night we went and listened to a blues band in a club right next to our hotel. Another night we went out to a Spanish tapas restaurant and enjoyed live flamenco band and excellent sangria.
After the breakfast and Cafe Zucchero (did I mention they have the best espresso ever?), we hit a small farmers market, even though it was raining. I was hoping it would be more Italian themed since we were in the Italian district. But it was just your typical market. We did find a cool booth with a woman who made spice mixes.
We walked around Seaport Village which I swear we wandered around when our cruise ship on our honeymoon stopped briefly in San Diego. Later we had dinner at a really good seafood restaurant that I can't remember the name of. But they have their own fishing boats and reprint the menu daily to reflect what they have. Below is Mike at Seaport Village. That is the Coronado bridge and we could see the hotel where we stayed with the kids.
The last morning Michael wanted to sleep in but I got up to wander around where there was supposed to be good shopping. I didn't find any shops that really caught my eye, but I did run into another farmers market and found a jewelry maker who makes pendants and things out of glass and got a really cool necklace.
There it is! Thanks Teri and Grant for keeping the kids for the weekend!
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