1. EARLY Tuesday morning, I'm talking 3 AM, we woke up and got ready to head to the airport. Garrison slept on the way there but Peyton was too excited for our vacation and talked the whole way about getting in the airplane and going to San Diego. Daddy dropped the kids & I off at the gate and then parked the vehicle. The line looked very short so I decided to give going through security with two kiddos on my own a try. Amazingly this went very smoothly and we got through without incident - especially nice since I was traveling with extra milk and food for Garrison plus a stroller! Peyton did a great job following my instructions and Garrison gladly came along for the ride. The line still wasn't bad when Daddy came through but we definitely had more room to move around once we were through security. Our two flights were uneventful and we made it to San Diego at 9:30 AM - a full day ahead of us!
2. After getting our car and checking with the hotel to see if our room was ready (it wasn't) we headed to our first destination - the zoo! San Diego's zoo is absolutely amazing and HUGE! We were starved so enjoyed lunch right away and then walked around for a few hours seeing all kinds of animals. Peyton especially enjoyed the giraffes and bears on our first day. Since we had been up since well before dawn we called it a day a little early and headed to the hotel. We had a two bedroom suite which was awesome and provided us with lots of room. The hotel even provided dinner on weeknights which worked out great - saved us money and more importantly a trip out after we had called it a day! We had some fish tacos, watched a little tv and then called it a night around 8 - all of us! Day one was a success!
3. On Wednesday we enjoyed breakfast at the hotel and then headed to Sea World for the day.
Going to Sea World on a Wednesday during a non-peak season was the best way to see the park! We never waited in line for any of the rides and arrived at all of the shows about 5 minutes before they started and found great, dry seats! We started our day in the Sesame Street Bay of Play area where Peyton rode several rides and even met Zoe & Elmo. She wasn't super excited about actually meeting them (only wanted to see them from a distance) but with a little push she took a picture with them on Daddy's shoulders. We then walked around to see several of the animal exhibits - Peyton's favorite was probably the penguins that we had to walk through a second time. Next we started our "show circuit" with the "Pets Rule" show which had dogs, cats, pigs, kangaroos and even an ostrich that put on a fun show. Peyton didn't seem to know what to think but enjoyed it in the end and even went up to meet a few of the "stars"! Then we headed over to "Blue Horizons" which was the dolphin show. Peyton was quite impressed with the divers and dancers and thought it was pretty cool to see the dolphins jump - I tend to agree! Lastly it was time for the big one - "One World" which featured several killer whales and they were amazing! By this time Peyton was really getting into the shows and had fun watching the huge whales jump high in the air. Afterwards we visited Shamu as well - very cool! Lastly we wrapped-up our day with a skyview trip across the bay and a few more animal exhibits. And through all that, Garrison was quite a trooper - what a great baby! His favorite seemed to be the fish in the Turtle Reef area - he was mesmerized!
4. Thursday was our "quiet" day in San Diego and we started our morning by heading to Torrey Pines, a famous golf course in the area. They had just hosted a PGA tournament the week before and were still tearing everything down but since we arrived early and the course was not yet full we even got to walk around a bit and see the 18th green where Tiger Woods caused the US Open in 2008 to go into a play-off. Pretty cool!
After our trip to Torrey Pines we took the scenic route back to San Diego and enjoyed our drive along the coast. Since we were nearing lunch time we stopped just south of La Jolla at the beach and dined at a great place with an ocean view - they had been voted the best fish tacos on the beach and I must say they were tasty! After lunch we enjoyed some play time on the beach and Peyton was definitely in her element here. She would run and jump over tracks in the sand, helped Daddy build a sand castle and even got her toes wet in the cold Pacific Ocean! We then continued our drive down the coast (while the kiddos got in a short nap) and headed over to Coronado Island. I love the huge bridge that goes over to the island so we drove over that way for some more beach fun. We found a really cool sand castle that was built for Joe's Crab Shack and then Peyton & Daddy built their own again. I think Peyton's favorite part of the beach was just running around on the sand!
5. On Friday we headed back to the zoo to see all that we had missed during our first visit. We started our day with a bus ride around the zoo - Peyton loves riding on buses right now! The highlights from our trip this day included seeing the panda bears (who eat bamboo Peyton proudly announced to us!), elephants, "Momma Jaguar" (from Go, Diego, Go! - Peyton was a little concerned that "Baby Jaguar" wasn't with Momma but she thought it was pretty cool to see "Momma Jaguar" from one of her favorite shows!) and taking lots of pictures. Every time Peyton would see a statue she would ask me to take her picture with it and even asked for a picture by herself with the Zebras! Garrison again took it all in and was quite a happy camper throughout the zoo!
5. On Friday we headed back to the zoo to see all that we had missed during our first visit. We started our day with a bus ride around the zoo - Peyton loves riding on buses right now! The highlights from our trip this day included seeing the panda bears (who eat bamboo Peyton proudly announced to us!), elephants, "Momma Jaguar" (from Go, Diego, Go! - Peyton was a little concerned that "Baby Jaguar" wasn't with Momma but she thought it was pretty cool to see "Momma Jaguar" from one of her favorite shows!) and taking lots of pictures. Every time Peyton would see a statue she would ask me to take her picture with it and even asked for a picture by herself with the Zebras! Garrison again took it all in and was quite a happy camper throughout the zoo!
We wrapped-up our day with dinner at In-n-Out Burger. Luckily I researched the secret language of In-n-Out Burger before we placed our order and I must admit I felt like a pro - two double doubles, animal style, fries well done, cheeseburger plain and a neapolitan shake. Whew! The double doubles were a little much for us but all in all we enjoyed our experience!
6. Saturday we headed into downtown to the Maritime Museum. We started with a tour of several old ships & submarines (man, those working on submarines must be small!) including the HMS Surprise which was used in the Master and Commander movie (one of Daddy's favorites!!). After a quick bite for lunch we then boarded the Californian, a replica of the 1847 Revenue Cutter C.W. Lawrence, which patrolled the coast of California enforcing federal law during the gold rush. The Revenue Cutter Service, along with four other federal maritime agencies, was consolidated into the United States Coast Guard in 1915. Daddy helped with raising the sails and after we got out of the bay they were able to cut the engines and we sailed for over 3 hours. It was a gorgeous day, perfectly clear and a calm day out on the ocean. This was one of the things Daddy wanted to do in San Diego and I am so glad that he did - what a great, relaxing day!!
7. Sunday was our travel home day :( We had breakfast and then headed out to see a few more things before our flight. We went to Old Town which is a replica of what San Diego was like many years ago including a courthouse, home, stagecoaches, etc. as well as many shops and restaurants. Lastly we headed to the Gaslamp Quarter for lunch at Hard Rock Cafe before heading to the airport. Lunch was awesome - Peyton even found a pink guitar on the wall which she thought was pretty cool! We got to the airport with a little time to spare so we just relaxed and talked about what a great trip we had. Our trip to Salt Lake City was uneventful but that is when things started to go wrong...They warned us when we left Salt Lake that there was a possibility we couldn’t land in KC so they gave us extra fuel and de-iced the plane. Then we got to KC and we got the “we’re on our final decent” message so we were super excited. We circled the airport at least 3 times and that's when we started thinking something was wrong. First they told us we were going to be diverted to Wichita but then there wasn’t anyone there that could help the passengers so they diverted us to St. Louis. When we were about to land they told us that we might land, re-fuel and head back to KC or possibly back to Salt Lake – oh no!! We landed and instead of re-fueling they came on the plane to tell us they had chartered us two buses to take us back to KC. Ok - not great but at least we will get home and not have to sleep in the airport! We landed at 1:10 (already an hour and a half past our KC landing time). The buses were supposed to arrive at 2 – not bad, we thought we could change Garrison into his PJs, let Peyton potty and run around, etc., right? Well, the bus arrived after 3 AM. We drove through fog the whole way back to KC on the bus. Luckily the kids slept, Daddy & I just held them and since we were sitting up and holding kids we weren't able to sleep. At long last, we arrived at KCI at 7. Daddy went and got the car while I changed and fed the kids in the airport. We finally arrived back at our house at 8:30 Monday morning – UGH! What a mess! At least the kids were AWESOME through the entire thing – not a single fuss from either one of them. We were very thankful. We were the only ones traveling with little kids so I was nervous about how the other passengers would handle it if one had a meltdown but at least we didn’t have to find that out. We had several people compliment us on how well behaved the kids were and how well they (and us) were handling everything – always nice to hear as a parent! Here is a picture of Daddy with the kids in St. Louis' airport.
All in all we had an amazing family vacation, one full of lots of fun and great memories!
A few funny stories from the trip:
--Peyton LOVED pushing the elevator buttons and would be at the elevator waiting for us to meet her every time asking "up or down" and then "which number" When we would get to the floor with our room she would always run to the same room first (which wasn't our room...) and then she would ask which one was ours. We tried to have her read the numbers to us but being the stubborn little girl that she is when Daddy asked what number Mommy was pointing to she responded with, "that one." Silly girl!
--Ok - check back here as I have a few others written down that I can't remember at the moment! :)
1 comment:
A very memorable, wonderful vacation for you guys. So happy you had such a great time. Even the mishaps on the way home will prove to be treasured memories down the road.
Peyton loves to go on vacation!!!!
Post a Comment