We had a fab day yesterday visiting with my folks up in the Midlands - it was our early Christmas and it was a lovely day. I love them to bits and am so blessed to have them in my life. Pauline is -a nd always has been - my other Mom, and Sam is everything I could ever have wanted in a goddaughter. I am very very lucky.
I also have a new page to share made with
the Mystery Box that is free for the December Mojo Challenge at Pickleberrypop. Do check out the challenges over there this month - there are great perks
And I wrote my Christmas cards today (have scaled those right down as we are trying to save the environment and so doing e cards and visits where we can. Plus I think I finished my Christmas shopping. Phew.
Today I am thankful for
- my folks - love them to bits
- jobs completed
- the end of all the hard slog in sight
- good news from the vets - Fiki has to go today - she doesn't think it is kidneys so we are trying s special diet and probiotics. She said he looked incredible for an almst 17 year old cat!
Day 17 Blythe to San Diego
31st October 2019
Start miles 5879
Start time 7.30
End miles 6100
End time 5.30
The one with the disappointing room
Today was going to be an easy day as we were just going to drive to San Diego and then spend the day looking around as things took our fancy. After breakfast, which was in a very odd area as the hotel was being refurbished, we headed off for what turned out to be a beautiful drive through a part of California we had not visited. We were surprised to see cotton growing in the fields and then we hit the mountains.
The road was extremely bumpy as we climbed and climbed quite steadily up to 4000 feet, but it was beautiful scenery and we saw some very odd things. When you drive through parts of America where there is nothing around you begin to realise that the government could hide anything in this vast expanses of uninhabited land and no one would ever know. Heck , there really could be arcs built ready for any eventuality. We also saw an amazing area of sand dunes at the top of the mountains where people came to use sand buggies and were all you could see was this perfect fine sand. It was quite amazing and we had to pull off and take it all in.
More mountains and then we eventually began to drop down into San Diego. One of the first things we did because it was on our way into the city was calling to Hobby Lobby. I always think America is the land of great service but clearly the staff at this hobby lobby didn’t hold the same view. I took very little to the checkout… Some paintbrushes that were on offer and a few papers that were reduced. It is important to note that the papers were 4 for a dollar… That becomes key in the story. I went to the checkout and the young man serving wasn’t the friendliest from the outset. He pointed out that the brushes were not half price because the small print said they had to be over $4.99 to qualify… It was in the small print. That was fair enough but his attitude over the papers was not. I thought I had counted them carefully and had 20 papers, but obviously ,I can’t count well and only had 19. He told me quite briefly that I would have to pay full price of $.90 each for the three odd papers. I said can’t you just scan one of them twice and pretend I have 20 I don’t mind paying for one that I don’t have. He said no I could either go and get another sheet of paper or pay full price for three of them. It seemed totally pedantic to me but, holding up an entire line of people at the checkout, I schlepped across to the far back corner of the store and picked up one extra sheet of paper. I confess I wasn’t happy at this point. He rang through my order and when I said I was paying by credit card he said ‘oh that’s been acting up this morning but let’s try it.’ I put my card into the chip and pin reader and it didn’t work. He told me to try to gain and when that didn’t work suggested I try to 3rd time. After the third failed attempt he told me to swipe the card and I said that never works because I’m out of the country. He said try it so I did and it said the card was declined. He said I’m sorry, but your card is declined. I can’t do the transaction. I questioned the credit card terminal that wasn’t working and said can you try another card reader he said no. I asked if he could transfer my purchase to another check out he said no. I asked if I could try again with the Chip and pin and he sighed and said yes. Of course ,it failed again and I asked to speak to a manager. When the manager came over he said to her loudly, ‘This lady’s card has been declined twice.’ She only had part of the story and so she said,’ I’m sorry ma’am unless you have another means of payment we can’t serve you.’ This was in full view and hearing of everyone and she said again your card is declined you can’t buy this.’ I was furious because the reason my card was declined was their faulty machine and she had pretty much announced to the store that I had no money. I told her that the machine was faulty and she said no it’s not. I told her that the gentleman had told me it was faulty before I started my transaction. She did have the good grace to ask him if this was true and he said well it hasn’t been working very well. She suggested I try the next check out over which I did and it worked perfectly. She just shrugged which was when I finally lost my good grace. I told her that the gentleman had been offhand from the outset and that I had been humiliated in front of a lot of people with the implication that I did not have the funds to pay for my products and that the situation was my fault, and that having my card declined was embarrassing. I said that it was some of the worst customer service I had experienced because they knew there was an issue and allowed it to continue. Nigel was concerned as I was a long time in store, but by the time I had poured out my woes to him I had moved on. It wasn’t going to spoil my day!
Our first stop in San Diego after that was the old town that we had never visited before and looked interesting. We were very impressed that there was free parking all day and we toyed with the idea of taking a bus tour from there. In the end we decided that might be a bit limiting for us and so opted to do our own thing. It was definitely the right decision. We wandered around the market, which was very pretty and very much Mexican, and then we headed into the historic area which was wonderful.
The front part was like visiting a very small colonial Williamsburg and the back part was all decorated for Dia de Muertos, the Festival of the dead. I am not a huge Halloween fan, but I do like the Festival of the dead because honouring those loved ones you have lost seems such a good thing to celebrate. The area was beautifully decorated and very photogenic and we had a wonderful time. I was so pleased we were visiting on the 31st of October.
We decided to grab a quick ice cream at a sonic and then thought we would see if we could head over to Coronado to see the hotel that the Grand Floridian was based on. We hadn’t appreciated we would go across such an amazing bridge with great views to get there. Coronado was clearly a very affluent area and beautiful to drive around but we doubted we would be able to get anywhere near the hotel. We saw the hotel ahead and took a sidestreet where extensive roadworks were taking place, but there was one precious parking space, free of charge, right by the beach. We were so incredibly lucky to find a space just where we wanted to be. This was such a defining moment for us on our coast-to-coast tour as this was the other coast.
We walked across the sand and stepped into the Pacific Ocean, so much warmer than the Atlantic had been some three weeks ago. The Coronado Del mar was behind us, the sea was beautiful, the sand was soft and we felt such a sense of achievement. We had set out to drive across America and it had been a truly incredible journey and now we had fulfilled the second part of our promise to ourselves. We took loads and loads of photos and there was a couple sat on the sand watching us. As we finally pulled ourselves away from the water Nigel stopped tell them what we had been doing and why. I think both of us just felt the need for someone to know what we had achieved. It was a truly euphoric moment.
We cross back over the bridge and decided to go to Point Loma which we had read about and looked like it had great views. It was on a naval base and we drove past acres and acres of uniform white marked cemeteries which was quite sobering. On pulling up at the entrance gate we realised there was a fee to pay and we were not sure it would be worth our while as we didn’t plan a long visit just a quick look. We were debating the worthiness of this when Nigel said I think I can see a national park sign up there, get the park pass out in case. When we pulled up to the kiosk Nigel said can we use this and the man replied of course would you like a map. The park pass had saved us another $20.
The views up there were amazing looking back over San Diego and we also enjoyed seeing the monument and the Lighthouse which was in the distance.
We had done a great deal in San Diego and were ready for food, so headed to the Cheesecake Factory for a wonderful meal. I was quite keen to get to our hotel on Shelter Island before sunset as we had a room with a Marina view. It had been a hotel I was looking forward to and one of the more expensive, although cheap by San Diego standards. Sometimes when you really look forward to things they’re a bit of a letdown and this certainly fitted that category. The lobby of the hotel was beautiful, but our room was hidden round the back with hardly a view at all and it was the wrong side of the building for any view of the sunset. The room was tiny with the door just about missing the bed and it was dingy, dated and disappointing. We did go out the front of the hotel to see sunset over the bay, but it was kind of disappointing A Nigel stayed longer than I did. I was just glad we were only there for one night.
Sorry that your hotel room for the night was so disappointing. We have had a few of those on our trips. It doesn't make any difference how nice the webstie is or pictures of the hotels on the net, you just never know what you are going to get.
I can see you two were having a very hard time removing yourself from the ocean, and your faces definitely showed the feeling of success! :-)
I love the photos of the old town dressed up for Dia de los Muertos. They are so interesting and colorful.
I have never lived near a large community of Hispanics, so I have been quite intrigued by their celebration. For a few years, I attended a Catholic Church here in Rochester that had a strong population of Hispanic worshipers and they always made an ofrenda in the church's lobby each year. I finally decided to bring my camera one Saturday evening before their Dia de los Muertos celebration and take pictures of it for a layout I eventually made last year. I definitely learned a lot about it.
The sunset photos are so beautiful--especially the pinks and purples in the sky. Does that happen only over water? I never see those kinds of lovely colors in the midwest.
Posted by: Barb in AK | March 13, 2020 at 10:25 AM