So…we’re moving here, seriously. This has been the best 24 hours EVER.
After the Geff Experience, we checked into our gorgeous hotel overlooking Mission Bay (and Mission Beach beyond that). From our balcony, we saw several crew boats rowing underneath a bridge below and we later learned that there is a competition going on in the bay this week.
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| View from the Mission Bay Hyatt |
One of the must-see places on our list was The Wave House (http://www.wavehouse.com/) in Mission Beach. It’s a wave park with two different pools that create standing waves which can be altered to suit either surfers or body boarders. When we first walked in, a group of body boarders were in the main pool and MGMT’s “Kids” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBd46BbdTfs) was playing on the sound system.
So. Cool.
We ordered a couple of Mexican beers and watched a girl boogey-boarding for a while. She made it look so easy!
Then we moved on to the small wave pool where the learners start out. A group of Canadian kids were trying to surf and we quickly realized this is where the real entertainment is. While most high school guys execute any new activity with reckless abandon, one guy in particular went at it with seemingly no fear, regardless of how beat up he got. This was amusing enough to film so I feel it should be shared.
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| Mission Beach at Sunset |
We watched as a couple of shortboarders caught their final waves before heading in to greet their families. Their wives had wheeled their baby strollers out into the sand for their older children to play as their fathers surfed. It was such a precious sight seeing how they adapted their new family life to coastal living.
For dinner, we found a fabulous Mexican restaurant (http://www.elfandangorestaurant.com/) in Old Town – the settling place for the first Europeans who came to California. Now a neighborhood made up of authentic Mexican restaurants, boutiques, and museums, Old Town is considered to be the birthplace of California.
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| El Fandango's Patio |
We sat on the patio under a canopy of blooming bougainvillea; I hadn’t seen that vine so prolific in an area since I left Sicily. Our server brought us homemade tortilla chips with fresh salsa and guacamole before we even ordered. The guacamole, in particular, was phenomenal! We could have made it into a meal…I guess we technically did; we were full before our meals even arrived.
So the next morning, I made up for it. While Ted was in his conference, I set out for a jog around Mission Bay. I love running in new places because it always leads to exploring areas I never would have otherwise. It’s like a privileged vantage point into a place that the tourists never get.
I found a bike path that ran alongside the bay and past sweet bungalow-styled homes. It was so interesting to see the creative ways the residents turn their backyards into great outdoor living spaces. The artistic outdoor furniture, the pergolas entwined with wisteria, the little gardens (both flower and vegetable) – it was the epitome of delightful.
The path eventually reached the Pacific, where it curved north and began to parallel the ocean. As I rounded the bend, I saw a few surfers out in the lineup, so I sat on a park bench to watch them for a while.
Just then, an old van pulled up and several surfers in bare feet and unzipped wetsuits got out. They circled coats of new wax on their boards and then walked down to the water’s edge.
It was so…Californian. A group of professional-aged men were surfing in the middle of a Tuesday morning instead of cranking out spreadsheets in a cubicle somewhere. This is one of the images I’ve had in my mind when I think of California. God bless it for not letting me down.
