San Diego and Oceanside

When the National Educational Computing Conference is in held in San Diego, we always plan a few extra days to enjoy southern California.

San Diego

Since we stayed off-site for the conference, we enjoyed walks around an older part of the city. We found some interesting walkways and historical areas such as the condo entrance below.

One of our favorite walks took us by the San Diego Public Library. Since Annette has just finished reading Dear Miss Breed, a nonfiction book for youth about the children's librarian at the SDPL and her relationship with children living in Japanese Internment Camps during World War II, she was excited about visiting the book's setting. Although the building had been replaced, she enjoyed an exhibit about the famous librarian.

We enjoyed going out to dinner each evening with friends.

Vacation Day 1

After the conference, we drove up the coast and sent a couple days in Oceanside. Our first day was spent visiting the Mission San Luis Rey. When we arrived at the Mission, we were excited to discover a local festival was taking place. We enjoyed the music of a Native American flutist, Wayra and bought his CDs. We also purchased an African basket and talked with a number of the artists. Their festival food was wonderful.

After a couple hours at the festival, we walked to the Mission. After a quick tour, we both photographed the beautiful historic site and Annette worked on some sketches.

The Mission was a really interesting place to photograph. There were beautiful contrasting colors such as the red brick and green vegetation against the white buildings.

On the way back to the hotel, we made a quick stop at Guajome County Park. At one time this seemed like a popular area, however like parts of the Mission grounds, it seemed neglected.

Larry enjoyed photographing the wildlife.

Ocean View

In the evening, we drove up the coast and stopped at a restaurant on the boat docks called The Jolly Roger. The food was great and we enjoyed a view of the ocean.

The restaurant was surrounding by trees filled with a wide variety of birds. As the sun set, we enjoyed watching the birds. The trees contained the nests of many large birds.

Vacation Day 2

The next day we stopped by a smaller mission. Although it didn't have the grandeur of San Luis Rey, the building had great features for photography.

We also stopped at a Home Show at the Pechanga Conference Center and Casino in Temecula. Although the show was smaller than we had hoped, we gather some useful materials and ideas. As evening approached we drove through the hills to Del Mar.