Wildlife Trip to San Diego

 10/7/21

I had a 4 day weekend due to the holiday, so we decided to take a trip to San Diego to enjoy the nice weather and the ANIMALS! We left in the morning to San Diego, going through Yuma. We arrived to our really cool hostel (California Dreams Ocean Beach Hostel) and checked in. Due to covid we rented a private room. The hostel is really cool with some cool hang out areas (both inside and out), a small pool, hot-tub, table tennis, foosball, bikes and surfboards, yoga area, full kitchen, big screen tvs, and yummy breakfast. In the evening we took out the beach cruiser bikes and biked to Ocean Beach to watch a beautiful sunset and then ate tacos at Roberto's tacos (a famous taco stand).

10/8/21

Today we visited the San Diego Zoo, which is one of the best zoos in the world and very famous for their endangered species conservation and breeding programs. They have helped bring many species back from the brink of extinction. They have such beautiful grounds and really great exhibits and are animal friendly. It has all the classic zoo animals and more. My favorite animals were probably the snow leopards, Asian leopards, Malay tigers, Serval, Mountain Lion, Cheetah, Orangutans, red panda, lemurs, gelada monkeys, sun bears, and lions. I had gone many, many years before when I worked for Sapidyne and used to travel frequently to San Diego. When I visited then I really liked the giant pandas (since given back to China since they were on loan) and polar bears (they were hiding today so we didn't seem them). But my favorite had been an exhibit that has Asian otters and some sort of monkey. It was my favorite because the otters and monkeys fought each other (in a playful way) and the otters always worked as a team.

10/9/21

Today we visited SeaWorld. I always love looking at all the marine animals. Of course the Orcas and Dolphins are so special, but I also really enjoy the sea otters, sharks, turtles, walruses, sea lions, and belugas. And they also have a cold room with snow that features many species of penguins. They have theme areas, and I like the the Arctic Research area b/c it reminds me of Summit Station in Greenland, and I just like polar research. Today we went to 3 of the Orca shows and 2 of the dolphin shows. We also spent a lot of time watching the Orcas from the underwater viewing area. It was very crowded being a holiday weekend, so the lines for most of the thrill rides were long, so we ended up only doing one: Journey to Atlantis. 

Several years ago (2016 I believe) a former student of mine who worked at SeaWorld Orlando gave us free tickets to go. We had gone in the winter on a weekday, so we both remember that trip to SeaWorld being more magical. Fewer people can always make a difference. Also that was before PETA had lobbied so that SeaWorld dropped having people participate in the dolphin shows and also made the orca show less of a tricks style show. Don't have the time to get into it now, but you can ask me sometime what I think of PETA when it comes to this stuff. But the short of it, is there are way bigger and more important issues that would really help animals and wildlife that PETA should be focusing all their money and energy on.

Tonight we cooked up yummy pizza at the hostel and soaked in the hot tub

10/10/21

Today we drove out to Escondido to visit the San Diego Zoo Safari Park, which is affiliated with the San Diego Zoo. It's also really awesome and has some large open space areas where multiple animals and species all hang out together, just like they are on the savannas of Africa or the bush of Asia. This park also has some cool research style exhibits that I like, and I of course love the familiarity of the African names and places where Elisha and I have visited and even worked. In the "walkabout" area you can walk in the enclosure with the kangaroos and wallabies. The outback area also has tree kangaroos, which are really cute and even some platypuses (this is the only place in the Western Hemisphere that has them). I of course liked watching the Sumatran Tigers in the Asian area. We hung out at the Cheetah area for a long time, especially b/c one of the zoo keepers came out and was hanging out with the Cheetah, petting it, and having it do certain behaviors for treats. The cheetahs here have a domestic dog friend that they hang out with. The dog and cheetah were raised together and are friends. Also of interest, b/c the cheetahs have lots of human contact, they are vaccinated for covid-19. We also spent a lot of time with the gorilla family, which was very entertaining and also some time with the lions as they were waking up from the afternoon siesta. We also took the tram ride, which is a vehicle that drives you through the open spaces of the park where you can see rhinos, giraffes, zebra, and many different antelope species.

After visiting the park, we drove to the Sunset Cliffs area to catch the end of the sunset.

10/11/21

In the morning we took out the beach cruisers and biked to Ocean Beach, then Mission Beach (and the Mission Beach boardwalk), then Pacific Beach, then to La Jolla. At La Jolla, we walked along the cliffs and coves where we could watch the pelicans, sea lions, and harbor seals. We then sadly had to leave San Diego and drive back to Phoenix. Once we hit El Centro, we ran into really highs winds that caused blowing dust and sand the whole drive back to Phoenix.