"I'm Ron Burgundy, you stay classy San Diego" Anchorman

Tuesday 11th April

Nice and easy if you know the film! Despite the short time in LA, we were looking forward to getting out of there and were up early to catch breakfast. When we checked out, we repeated the same metro/bus trip we'd undergone on our journey in. Only on the bus route, a very kind driver picked us up on a different bus and then dropped us right outside the greyhound station, despite her bus not stopping there. We gave her our huge thanks and headed in to tag our bags and wait for our bus. We'd time everything pretty well, which meant we only had a 20 minute wait before we could board. The trip south to San Diego was only due to take about 2 and a half hours, which we were pretty sceptical about when we moved at a snails pace through the LA traffic. True to the schedule though, we arrived at about 20 past 11, having departed just after 9, so it was even slightly faster. We shouldered our heavy bags and headed off into San Diego. Initially, we made a bit of a meal out of getting to our hostel, due to obstacles we hadn't realised were there when planning but once we got the hang of the lettered streets and numbered avenues, it was a piece of cake to navigate. As we made our way through the downtown area, we were incredibly relieved to notice how much cleaner it was than LA or Hollywood. There was an abundance of shops and restaurants, which were nonexistent in downtown LA or just downright seedy or tacky in Hollywood. We instantly liked San Diego. Our hostel was located above a bar in the historic Gaslamp quarter, which was formerly the dodgy part of town. We were able to check in immediately when we arrived, so we dressed our beds and decided on our next move. Naturally, at least with us, it was to head to the supermarket to see how little we could spend to feed ourselves. The bill only came to just over $15, which we reckoned was pretty good. By the time we got back to the hostel, it was gone 4 and we were only just eating lunch. In order to work up a hunger for dinner, we decided to go for a stroll round town and attempt to find a pin badge in the process. We'd been out the door a matter of minutes and had the pin badge wrapped up, so decided to continue wandering. The street our hostel was on, 5th street, seemed like the main drag, so we followed it all the way down until we went underneath a sign indicating the border of the Gaslamp quarter. We were hunting for a Mexican restaurant that was recommended as a cheap place to eat by our hostel. Seeing as San Diego is only about 15 miles away from the border with Mexico, Mexican food is pretty big around town. Our map seemed to be slightly different to the actual street layout but when we found the baseball stadium, it was pretty easy to work around that. We found the Mexican place and made a note of it for a future lunch stop. Whereas LA had been very warm, San Diego had a cool sea breeze blowing which, when out of the sun, actually made it pretty chilly. Rather than do anything late in the day, we strolled back to the hostel, freshened up and settled down to a basic dinner of rice and veg with a sauce. It may have been basic but it was significantly better than what we'd had the night before.

Wednesday 12th April

Being right on the main drag, the street was bustling most of the night, which meant we didn't get a particularly good sleep, but we were still up pretty sharpish around 7 to make the most of the free breakfast. It looked as though we were the 3rd lot of people to arrive, so it was easy to stock our plates up with bagels, fruit and coffee and grab a seat at the small upstairs seating area. Once we were full, we returned to the room to find the rest of the 4 beds awake and taking up as much of the floor space as they could with their suitcases. Despite initially thinking they were pommes (sorry, picked it up in New Zealand), we could hear that they were actually Aussie's. We'd booked some tickets to visit the world renowned San Diego zoo for the day and decide it would be a good idea to utilise the free shuttle that the hostel offered to get there. This meant that after our early rise, we had a couple of hours to kill until 10:30 when the shuttle would depart for the zoo. We just dossed around the room until it was time and it emerged that the Aussie's from our room were heading there too. We all bundled in to the shuttle just after half past 10 and were ready to head off. Only the vehicle itself wasn't ready  to go. When the driver turned the key, he was greeted by a clicking sound and the car made no attempt to start whatsoever. The 8 of us sat in the van for about 15 minutes whilst the driver and the hostels maintenance man, Steve, showered the neighbourhood for some jump leads in an attempt to get the van started. They eventually found some, only our numbers had greatly reduced by the time the van rumbles to life. The 2 Mexicans or Spaniards who had sat in front of us gave in first and either made different plans or disappeared to do something about else. The Aussie's lasted almost the whole way but booked an uber ride just before the other rider, an Englishman from Leicester, had managed to locate some jump leads. The Aussie girls got their ride to the zoo and at the same time, the van was started and ready to roll. We had been offered a ride with the uber booking but it didn't have enough room, which turned out to be a good thing, as we got the ride to the zoo for free. The zoo was only about a 10 minute drive away, so we probably could have walked there in the time it took everybody to get the car started. We were on our way though and had probably missed a bit of a queue considering the park had been open for 2 hours by the time we arrived. I won't bore you with a tedious description of what we did and saw whilst we were in the zoo but I'll list a few of the animals we managed to see. The giant pandas were a particular highlight considering their rarity. The San Diego zoo seem to run a successful breeding programme for the pandas and Charlotte and I both remember the recent birth of a panda within the zoo being featured on the news. The polar bears, tigers, flamingoes and giant tortoises were also a highlights. On the other hand, the grizzly bear was a slight disappointment, as they were nowhere to be seen. The local children must have been on holiday at the time, as there were hordes of families clogging up the rather narrow pathways around the zoo. We spent a good 4 hours seeing as much as we could and making the most of the rather high entrance fee but eventually called it a day and started heading back to downtown San Diego. On our way back, we walked through Balboa park, which was adjacent to the zoo and spent a few minutes approaching the greenery and the fountains. The crowds convinced us to move on though and we walked the 45 minutes or so back to the Gaslamp quarter. We paid a quick visit to the supermarket, where we stocked up on some more lunch for the following day and picked up a couple of locally brewed beers to have before dinner. Our thrilling evening consisted of playing some cards and having the same dinner as the night before.

Thursday 13th April

We got up at the same time as the day before, just to beat the rush to brekkie. Rather than crash out afterwards though, we headed straight out, as we had a bit of a walk ahead of us. We were heading to the old town of San Diego, which was an hour and a half stroll north of the downtown area that we were staying in. The walk was a pleasant one in the morning sun, although we did pick up the pace through a couple of dodgy looking neighbourhoods but the tramps on the highway overpass we crossed seemed pretty jolly and gave us a big smile and a wave. The latter part of the walk was a little bit of guesswork, as our compact map didn't quite cover the whole way to the old town. Eventually, we started to see a bit more life up ahead and after passing what was called “international restaurant row”, which included an American interpretation of an English pub, which we were sure the waiters would dress up as William Shakespeare and Henry VIII and use words like “ye”, we finally came across the old town. It was pretty busy with tourists, even at 10am, so we were pretty sure they had all cheated by catching buses, trolleys and coaches, instead of walking like us. We passed some tourist trap restaurants before crossing a road and entering the pedestrianised old town square. Despite the fairly early hour, it was already pretty warm, so we sat down on a shaded bench and had a cold drink. The square wasn't like the typical old town squares we found in Europe. It was pretty spread out and the buildings looked like they had been lifted straight out of a western movie. They weren't the buildings they once were though, like saloons, they were all occupied by arts and crafts stores that sold pottery, jewellery, pewter and even sweets. The staff were all well into the whole “old town” feel and were dressed up in costumes that looked more like a Quakers outfit than southern Californian/Mexican attire, which we could only assume would have been more the look back in the old days. We found out through information boards that the old town is where California was born, as it was the location of the first Spanish settlement in the area. The old town quickly changed from nice, relaxed square, to gift shops, restaurants and hawkers. We didn't frequent many of the shops but reckoned the one selling hand painted tiles was pretty good and then got our heads blown off (well, just mine as Charlotte doesn't like spice) at the awesome hot sauce shop. That's what it was called, not me reviewing it. I tried a few different sauces but balked at the one I was told would “burn for at least half an hour”. It was pushing midday by the time we were done, so decided to head back towards downtown and find somewhere to eat lunch. Rather than face the hour and a half walk in the midday sun, we hopped on a trolley and got off at the seaport village, which was a harbour side shopping area, which we had read was closing down. It was fairly busy but nowhere near as bustling as the Gaslamp quarter. We found a sunny bench along the prom and sat down to eat our lunch and watch the world go by. For the most part, there was a pleasant sea breeze that took the edge off the sun but when the breeze died, it was really hot, almost to a point where it was unbearable. Over in the harbour, we could see a number of white spikes rising from the water that we deduced were the gates for the Red Bull air race that was taking place in San Diego over the weekend. When we'd been planning what to do in San Diego, we had been disappointed to find out that we'd be missing it by a day. We were starting to get used to that though, as most sport the whole way round, we'd missed by a day here and a day there. We spent a few hours enjoying the warm afternoon, walking round the shops of seaport village and enjoying the pedestrianised promenade. We stopped off for a cold milkshake at a local shop before heading slowly back towards the hostel. We were both pretty tired by the time we got back, so treated ourselves to a quick nap but were quickly awakened by 3 returning Australian girls who were also staying in our room. Their entire conversations consisted of “what are you wearing tonight” and “oh that looks cute”, which after a while, started to melt the brain a little bit. To save ourselves from certain death, we headed out for some dinner. Having cooked everyday in America so far, we were looking forward to a night off and trying some of the local, albeit Mexican, cuisine. The place we went to, Lolita’s at the Park, was recommended by our hostel as a cheap eat, so it seemed a better option than visiting one of the sit down restaurants along 5th Street where we were staying. It was a bit of a walk down past the baseball stadium but it was a nice evening, so it wasn't really a problem. When we arrived we both ordered the Californian burrito, seeing as that was what was recommended specifically and sat down to await your order. Seeing as Lolita’s was just a fast food chain, we were​ served almost instantly with a humongous burrito, with refried beans and rice on the side. The burritos contained carne asada, which is grilled beef, chips, guacamole, sour cream and cheese and wasn't much shorter than my forearm. By the time I'd finished, I could hardly move and then made the mistake of agreeing to finish of the end of Charlotte's. The walk back turned out to be handy, as it gave us a chance to digest the gross amount of food we'd just consumed. When we got back to the hostel, we were in desperate need for a lie down and we didn't move much further for the remainder of the night.

Friday 14th April AM

It was time to leave San Diego but our transport wasn't scheduled until about 3pm, so we had a little bit of time to kill. We would have liked to get to a state park and a national monument, which were both in the same place, but the transport was just too long winded, we'd have never have made it there and back again in time. Instead we took breakfast at a gentle pace. We weren't hungry after our mammoth burrito but we weren't missing out on a free brekkie. Whilst we were having breakfast, the Aussie girls in our room departed, which gave us the room we needed to pack ourselves and then check out. We needed to pop to the shops to buy some supplies and then relaxed in the hostel lounge until it was time for lunch, for which we tried some sardines and pasta again. After lunch, it was time to head off and bid San Diego fair well.

We'd enjoyed San Diego, it had been infinitely better than Los Angeles but nowhere near the dizzy heights of San Francisco.

Seeing as there's been complaints over how hard the clues have been, I'll try to make it as easy as possible. It's only easy if you know though!

"Well it goes to St.Louis, down to Missouri, Oklahoma City looks oh so pretty, you'll see Amarillo, Gallop, New Mexico…"

James and Charlotte