Hop on - Hop off

Here's a kwik recap of our get-away. (I did that just to make Angie laugh, since I remember she said she would never misspell the name of a business, so I had to just for fun). Dennis took it upon himself to get out of Dodge with me, his lovely wife, and plan a trip to beautiful 70-degrees-year-round San Diego. It was sublime! We both love the "Hop-on-Hop-off" tours when we go places we've never been before (and, ahem, when we don't have a car). This trip we took tours three days in a row and on the third day as we were bouncing around on the seats, I decided, maybe two days is my max for the hoppers. But our favorite driver was BOXCAR, pictured above. He had just the right amount of humor, and played excellent music too! One of the other drivers, Susie, was like a substitute grammar school teacher who had lost control of the class! She spent the whole time "shushing" us, which of course miffed everyone. She wanted our undivided attention, whereas say, BOXCAR, just drove and joked and didn't give a second thought to what sort of chit chat was going on behind him. Four of Susie's passengers were French and were speaking to each other very loudly (it was actually kinda rude) and finally someone turned around and told them, not very nicely either, to please pipe down. They looked around so confused and said they didn't speak English! It was so awkward! I wanted "hop off" right then and there! Another funny thing with the hopping, you know how allergic I am to some perfumes and wouldn't you know it, a little man in the seat in front of us was wearing some version of Old Spice (tropical coconut?) that just about did me in! I was so happy when we hopped off in Coronado and I could breath deeply. We were standing at a crosswalk waiting for the light to change later that day, and I could smell the cologne all over again. I said to Dennis "it's like it's FOLLOWING me around!" and then I looked at the front of the crowd of people and there he was like 20 people in front of me! I have an amazing nose.

Boxcar told us to take a photo of the beautiful San Diego harbor, so I did.

Here is a photo of the 52-degree weather we left behind in South Jordan. Hilarious! We were planning on leaving behind 28-degree weather and snowstorms. But instead we left behind the warmest February on record.

My tulips are already up! Crazy! I wonder what they're going to do when they get snowed on for the next month? It will be an interesting horticultural experience to see!

Dennis really wanted to go see the USS Midway that is docked in the San Diego harbor. I shrugged and said, "okay" and he said don't you want to see it?  I told him I had no burning desire to see it, but I wanted to see it because HE wanted to see it! It was, big, and grey, and had airplanes in it! It was pretty cool actually, but mostly big. It's hard to believe it is a SHIP and not a football stadium.

They had these cockpits that you could pay to have a pretend dogfight in. So we stood in line and decided to spring for it. Livin' on the edge! I told Dennis he had to be the pilot and I would be the gunner because if I was the pilot we would spend the whole time up-side-down and crashing into the green ground below. Well it was the LAMEST thing. Seriously, I think the graphics were made in 1986 right before they invented Intellivision. There was a screen and up in the corner in a teeny tiny box was a little yellow "X" that was "us" the plane, and some little white X's that were supposedly the enemy planes we were shooting at. We never could figure out how to get next to the planes and I shot the shooter button continuously and anyway. I told Dennis I was kinda shocked to realize I wanted real battle, shooting, airplanes falling out of the sky - yikes, maybe I am a violent video girl somewhere inside! We did make the capsule go upsidedown once and gosh, that made us both really motion sick. Anyway, good times.

Dennis would have loved to be a pilot. He probably came "that close" to being one, if only he would have had a little nudge in the right direction at the right time in his life. Oh well, life!

And me, I love a man in uniform! (This one's not as cute as dad was in HIS motorcycle cop uniform, but still....I remember once when Grandma Ranquist was visiting and dad was a motor cop, he was standing in the doorway saying good-bye, in his shiny black boots, suntanned arms, cop moustach and Grandma Ranquist looked at me and said, "He's so handsome, I don't know how you can send him out the door."

Kinda cool statue, honoring, somebody, Bob Hope?

We had a seafood dinner on the harbor our first night. Funny moment of the trip for me, and something I'll always remember, happened while we were eating. I'm sure this wasn't on everyone's radar, but it just happened to be the day that was the trade deadline for the NBA and there had been rumors that the Jazz were going to trade a player named Enis Kanter. Dad didn't think they would end up doing it but I'd looked on my phone earlier in the day and saw that they had indeed traded Enis Kanter to OKC. So we're sitting there enjoying dinner and Dennis brought up the subject of the trade deadline. So I pulled up the article on my phone showing that Kanter had been traded, and handed the phone to dad. His eyes about popped out of his head and his mouth made a perfect little "o" - I've never ever seen him make that face before. It was classic. There's a picture of my soup too, called copapico or some such name, which means soup with lots of fish in it. I had it on the Oregon Coast last fall and let me tell you, it was THE BEST THING I EVER ATE. This one was disappointing, not an iota of flavor and ewwww, MUSCLES in it. EWWWWW! Now I kinda know how Cindy and Andrea feel about seafood.

Beautiful sunset on our way out of the restaurant that night.. . . and boy we were BEAT! We'd walked a lot and had a looong yike uphill back to our Hotel.

And right there in front of us parked by the curb was this little guy and his bicycle built for three, and so we looked at each other and smiled simultaneously and hailed our own human-powered cab. Man I felt sorry for this kid. He was skinny and pedaling for all his might. And dang, halfway home I realized we were in the regular car lane and you know my feelings about bikes in car lanes, and I was them! But I was so appreciative of the ride. I honestly don't know if I could have staggered all the way to the Hotel or not that night. We did fine the other nights, but oh what a relief it was to be kinda dragged up the streets without having to expend any energy. I asked the kid if he eats tons, and he said yeah, he can't believe how hungry he is all the time. He'd only been doing this for a month. I hope he can find some other line of work soon.

We got to our Hotel room, and with the hour earlier time change, well, we looked at the clock and it was ONLY 6:15!!! We were ready to call it a night! I read the entire "A Spool of Blue Thread" a new novel by Anne Tyler. It was good but I was kinda disappointed. I think my favorite thing was the dust jacket. Awfully pretty. Makes me want to quilt. Maybe Anne Tyler book #20 is one book too many for me? I also read a 20-year-old Mary Higgins Clarke novel and another book that I can't even remember the name of. I'm so weird. When I'm home I feel like I'm getting away with something if I read for a long time. So I have to wait until I'm on vacation and then I give myself permission to read for hours on end. Weird huh. I guess I don't want my real life to feel too much like a vacation. I think that's actually a line from an Anne Tyler book! Their family says they don't enjoy going on vacation that much because their life is one big vacation, or something along those lines.

Oh man we loved Coronado and the Del Coronado Hotel. Isn't it beautiful? We liked it so much we went back a second day and just sat in beach chairs and enjoyed the day.

It was interesting, the San Diego ocean wasn't all "ocean-ee" like the Oregon Coast or North Carolina beaches where you feel the salt on your skin and the sound of the gulls and the sea breeze and the earth move, and feel the eternal pull of the waves, you know? This is so serene and quiet.

It was actually on the cool side there, and we even had some rain showers on Sunday. One morning as we were waiting to catch our trolley I decided at the last minute that I wanted my sweatshirt so I "ran" as fast as I could about five blocks back to the Hotel to get it. I told my legs to run up and down, pick 'em up, put 'em down, and yet, I couldn't make myself go any faster than like a quick-step. I was pumping my arms a little and everything but nada. I passed a man on the sidewalk while on the run, and he broke into a big smile and he said "Slow down, you'll get there!'.

Coronado beach castle by a professional sand sculptor.

The Del Coronado Hotel. Karla told dad that grandma and grandpa Ranquist used to stay there. That would be awesome!

It was fun to see all of the ships in the background. Lots of Navy presence in San Diego.

Yes, it's not winter there. Grass is green, flowers in bloom, trees leafed out. Gorgeous!

We took tours of Old Town, China Town, Uptown, Downtown, Italian Town, Every town you can think of on our hop-on-hop-offs. These mansions were cool, and one was a tea party house. Isn't that cute?

Dad waiting for me while I check out the tea party house...................

We stopped at the Mormon Battalion building. It's really, really cool. It's a 45-minute presentation, done by darling sister missionaries in pioneer garb. You move about from room and sit on logs and watch videos that are so informative and interesting and make you feel like you're right there in the middle of the action.

This cute little boy was the only child on our tour. The missionaries dressed him up and told him what the battalion ate for dinner and asked him what HE eats for dinner. And he said "INSECTS!" It was hilarious.

On Sunday we went to Balboa Park and listened to an outdoor organ concert! Largest outdoor organ in the world (except recently someone else built one with more pipes over in Europe, so they're adding MORE to theirs so they can be the biggest again).

It was fun to listen to these world-class organists, and watch them battle the breeze trying to keep their pages from blowing away. The guy in the white jacket was the page turner and he had a ginormous baton that he would lay across the entire sheaf of music.

See the plane in this picture? The San Diego airport is right in the middle of everything and there is only one runway. A plane lands every 90 seconds (after three hop-on-hop-offs I can tell you more about San Diego than you want to hear). They told us that when they have outdoor theatre presentations sometimes they stop mid-song and wait for the planes to go overhead, then continue without missing a beat so to speak! For example:. "Oooooooh, klahoma, where the.... (plane going over, stop mid-sentence for the roar of jet engines to pass) then pick up singing and orchestra playing "....wind comes right behind the rain!" Crazy.

We also went to Balboa park which had 20 or so little cute houses with things from foreign countries. It was fun to taste all of their treats. We would just put a buck in their jar. They also have an orchestra! Everyone is a volunteer. Great fun!

It's always so nice to come around the corner after a trip, and see our little South Jordan red brick house is still standin! It looked so pretty when we came home I had to take a picture! Trips - they're double great - glad to leave, and glad to return home!

And finally, we've loved watching Lauren and Reagan and Eli and Jane play basketball. Lauren's games were nail-biters because it was High School basketball and yikes, my heart! I can't find my pictures of Lauren or Reagan's games though. Just know they looked adorable and the pictures were blurry!

(Update, I just added this blurry picture of Lauren - she's #23 in red and black guarding the girl with the ball in white).

Love you all, thanks for all of the photos and instragrams and emails and blogs and ways you use to keep us connected to all of the many goings on in your busy, wonderful lives. You are the best.XO
Mom