Second Week San Diego

 

             

I’m sure it comes as no surprise that we continued our quest for the best beer in San Diego during our second week here at Mission Bay. We did slow it down a bit but only because we grew weary of the traffic. The good thing is many of the breweries do sell bottles so we picked up a few to enjoy at home.

One evening we did a repeat of Pizza Port with Hector and Brenda (check out his great moon shots on their latest post). Jim and Brenda were craving another Suavecito, but much to their disappointment they were out of it, which gave us a chance to try something new.

We’ve been doing a lot of biking to keep out of the traffic, but it’s challenging trying to avoid all the other bikers, walkers, skateboarders and inline skaters on some parts of the trails. Keeps you on your toes! On Sunday morning we decided to take a ride to the beaches of La Jolla. It was crowded but the coastline is just lovely along there, with all of the multimillion dollar homes along the bluffs. Mitt Romney has a house somewhere along here.

 

Another day we drove to Escondido for a 4 mile hike in the Elfin Forest Recreational Reserve. We had a good workout hiking the Way-Up Trail to a couple of overlooks. Elfin forest is the term for the vegetation that covers most of the mountains in the southern half of California. It is also known as coastal shrub or chaparral, but elfin forest certainly has a nice ring to it. The beginning of the trail crosses Escondido Creek, then starts climbing for some nice views.

 

 

It wasn’t the best trail we’ve ever hiked, but it just so happened to be 4 miles from Stone Brewing Company, so after our workout we stopped by for the tour and tasting. It was an informative and interesting tour, and we were surprisingly impressed with their beers. The Black IPA and Imperial Russian Stout were especially good.

Yesterday afternoon Brenda came along with us to the Ocean Beach Farmer’s Market, while Hector stayed home tackling some computer problems. Ocean Beach is a funky little beach community, and that vibe is reflected in the market. There was not a huge selection of produce, but there were all kinds of other things, including lots of prepared foods, much of it vegan, which came as a nice surprise to us.

We ended up taking home a couple of vegan tamales for dinner and they were quite tasty.

Brenda and I checking out the tamale stand. She decided to try some empanadas from another vendor.

Since we found a parking space right in front of Culture Brewing Company we had to give it a try. Jim and Brenda had the Milk Stout, which was good but not as good as some others we’ve tried. I had a 3 ounce taster glass of the 3X IPA, which was really good, but at 11% alcohol a little goes a long way.

It’s hard to believe we are halfway through our month-long stay in San Diego already. On Saturday we are being joined by several friends, so we look forward to more adventures, and probably a little more beer tasting.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention that our Panasonic camera finally completed its journey. We had been tracking its progress back to Texas from Yuma, and then on to San Diego, which took a couple weeks. It was scheduled for delivery Tuesday, and we saw the Fed Ex truck driving around the RV park but it didn’t stop at our site. A couple hours later we were heading off for a bike ride when the truck was coming back in. Jim stopped the driver and asked if they had a package for us. He said they found it in the back of the truck after they had already made their deliveries here, so it nearly escaped without being delivered to us once again. So we finally have it back and it seems to be working fine. Only time will tell.