So my complaing about my blogsite changes were not as bad as I thought. I figured out all the changes pretty quickly and now I know what I am doing. On Wednesday, Tim and I were 100% tourists. We drove to Old Town San Diego State Historic Park and bought tickets to ride the Old Towne Trolley. If you have been in St. Augustine, FL, Key West, FL or Savannah, GA they are the orange and green trolleys you see running all over town. We have done the St Augustine and the Savannah tour. If you stay on the trolley for the whole City of San Diego tour it takes around 2 hours and has 11 stops. You can pick up the trolley at any of the 11 stops but we decided we would start at the first one. There are several things to do at each stop and we had a hard time deciding which one to stop at so we did the entire tour so we could check out everything first. Tim and I thought we knew downtown San Diego pretty good but after 28 years things change. For one thing, downtown! Tim never went downtown in the 1970's and when we lived here in the early 1980's you only went downtown for county business, Balboa park or to see The Star Of India at the harbor. The rest of the downtown area you really did not want to hang around in. In the 1980's San Diego started to revitalize the downtown area and today it is a thriving metropolis that has so much to do there is no way you can do it all in one day. We will be taking more trips to downtown San Diego to check things out and maybe even catch a ballgame. The Cubbies are coming to town!
San Diego is the birth place of California. It is the 8th largest city in the U.S. and is the 2nd largest city in California. It is known for its mild climate, its natural deep water harbor and its long association with the U.S. Navy. The population of San Diego is 1,301,617 with a median income of $45,700 and a median age of 32. In 1542 Juan Cabrillo landed at what is now know as Point Loma and claimed the entire area for Spain forming the settlement Alto California.200 years later. The Presido and Mission of San Diego founded in 1769 is when the first Europeans settled in what is known as California today. In 1821 San Diego became part of the newly indepentdent Mexico and in 1850 it became part of the U.S. following the Mexican-American War when California was admitted to the Union. The original San Diego was located where Old Town San Diego is today. In the 1860's there was a fire that destroyed most of Old town and the city was about to rebuild in the same area when Alonzo Horton began to promote a move to New Town several miles south of old town which downtown San Diego still sits today. New Town quickly developed due to the location on the bay. In the early part of the 20th century San Diego hosted two World's Fairs; The Panama-California Exposition in 1915 and the California Pacific International Exposition in 1935. Both expositions were held in Balboa Park. Many of the Spanish Baroque style buildings in Balboa park were built for the exposition and today are still the central features of the park. At the 1915 exposition there were exotic animals featured which became the basis of the San Diego Zoo. The U.S. Navy presence began in 1901 and contiunued to grow through the 1930 when the city had the Naval Base San Diego, Naval Training Center San Diego, San Diego Naval Hospital, Camp Mathews and Camp Kerney (now known as the Marine Corps. Air Station Miramar). Today, San Diego is still home to several Naval and Marine Bases. The city was the home to Ryan Airlines founded in 1925. Ryan Airlines built Charles Lindbergh's plane the Spirit of St. Louis in 1927. The international airport in San Diego is named Lindbergh field in honor of him because his plane being built here.
Downtown San Diego was in a decline in the 1960's and the 1970's with suburbs being built outside of the downtown area. In the 1980's the downtown area experienced an urban renewal including the opening of Horton Plaza, the revival of the the Gaslight District and the construction of the Convention Center and Petco Park, home of the baseball team the San Diego Padres. Other neighborhoods were developed and there are now over 100 neighborhoods with 8 major areas. One of the fastest growning areas is Little Italy that is now bigger than the two other "Little Italy's" in New York City and San Fransisco.
As I stated earlier, there is so much to do and see that in San Diego and because we will staying in the area for a little while longer I will be featuring diffent areas. Please continue to check back while I journey into San Diego to check the city out.
Today, I am back at my sister's, Pam, house and spending the week end, again, because we are going to another stamping event on Saturday. We are going to be picking up my mom today and take her to see the movie, The Help. We all have been wanting to see this movie and since it is going to be overcast and gloomy today in Carlsbad it is a good time to catch a movie.
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