Balboa Park
After
Sally and I arrived in San Diego we checked into our hotel but Ken and
Nancy arrived yet so Sally and I decided to go to Balboa
Park and Walk around. When my parents lived in San Marcos they used
to go walking in Balboa Park once a week. The park is very pretty. There
is a lovely rose garden at one end of the park and a halfway decent cactus
garden near it.
Wild Animal Park
The
San Diego Wild
Animal Park started out as a breeding area which supplied zoos around
the world with animals. At first visitors were not allowed in the park
but as word spread about the existence of the park people started showing
up at the fences to get a glimpse of the animals. Soon the managers of
the park decided that they could help offset the costs of the park by
charging admission to see the animals. Since many animals do not breed
well in captivity the park tries to reduce the sense of captivity by providing
the animals with a large amount of space. This is very successful, but
it also means that often the animals are quite far away from the people
who want to look at them. On the positive side it is nice to see the animals
in a setting that looks more natural and one doesn't feel cruel for confining
the animals in tiny cages
Photo Safari
The
animals in the Wild Animal park are in very large open spaces and the
people are confined to small pathways through the park. This means that
the people are often far away from the animals. The picture above of the
lions was taken with a 300mm zoom lens and they still appeared very small
in the frame. For an extra cost (about $100) we decided to go on the Photo
Caravan. This is where a guide takes a small group of people in an open
truck through the park so you can get close to the animals. The Photo
Caravan does not go into any of the areas were the carnivores are so you
still can't get close to the lions or tigers. Ken, Nancy, Sally and I
all went on the Photo Caravan. Even though it was expensive we enjoyed
it quite a bit. They allowed us to feed the giraffes and rhinos and we
got to see quite a few animals. Almost all of the animals in the area
that you go through are herd animals so the truck would stop at each
group and the guide would tell us about the animals that we were seeing
and they tried to make sure that everyone was able to get some decent
photos of the animals
Birch Aquarium
After
Sally and I left our hotel to head back to Los Angeles we decided that
we had enough time to stop in at the Birch
Aquarium. While not as large as the Pacific Aquarium in Long Beach
it was similar in content and worth the trip in you are in the area. The
Aquarium wasn't very expensive and even on a holiday weekend it wasn't
crowded so it might be a good place to take the kids if you want to get
away from the crowds.