Southern California so much fun!
As a long-overdue Girl’s Week Out this past January/February my Mom and I vacationed in Southern California, seeking sun, sand and surf. We were hoping for pure fun and boy, did we find it. Not ones to lie on the beach all day, we packed our trip with all the stereotypical tourist haunts, beginning in San Diego.
There we took in the exotic San Diego Wild Animal Park; admired the stunning views (and gale force winds) from Cabrillo Point, where Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo discovered San Diego in 1542; saw hunky lifeguards, low-flying military planes and the famous Hotel Del Coranado; and shopped for souvenirs in the tourist-oriented Seaport Village.
From there we drove up the Pacific Coast Highway to Anaheim. As a Christmas gift I had given Mom a Beach Boys CD, thinking that it would put us in the sunny California mindset. No one could have guessed how perfect it turned out to be. With songs such as “Surfin’ USA” and “Surfin’ Safari” we were driving through places such as La Jolla, Huntington and Redondo Beach when they were mentioned in the songs!
Our final destination was, of course, Disneyland and it’s sister park, the California Adventure. We couldn’t travel all that way without spending some time with the Mouse.
Undoubtedly, the winter is the best time to visit the parks, with lineups so nonexistent that you could finish one ride, walk back around to the beginning and get right back on it again. And the best part was that there weren’t millions of kids there. Sure, there were plenty of toddlers and some older ones (those that we met hailing mainly from Australia on their summer vacation), but there were tons of child-free adults, too.
We’d thought that we’d stick out, being two adults who couldn’t claim that “we’re only here for our kids”, but we were far from alone. Couples, honeymooners and groups ranging from their 20’s to their 80’s were running from ride to ride, just as eagerly as the preschoolers. How can you not be happy in a place where everyone – staff and guests- have permanent joyful grins on their faces?
Our trip was exhausting, busy and full of all the tacky tourist stuff: absolutely perfect. The people were all unbelievably nice and happy to talk or take a picture, and the sky was endless blue. Coming home was hard, and both of us would go back in a heartbeat.
- As originally published in the Vancouver Province
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