The cost of the room at The Granger Hotel included breakfast. My previous experience of free breakfasts at US hotels has not endeared me to the concept. However today surprised me that the establishment provided a good start to the day.
I began with plain yogurt with fruit and a few nuts and followed this with scrambled eggs on toast. To finish I had toast and jam. The meal set me up for the day.
Balboa Park
All the guide books recommended a visit to Balboa Park. We decided to walk despite the receptionist warming us that the journey would take us up quite a steep hill. From our hotel the route was consistently upwards, but of more concern to us was the presence of homeless people along the way.
The sun shone and made for a very pleasant climb once we had passed through the trouble spots. We arrived at the park after about 40 minutes. Maggi spotted a sign for a free tram service to explore the park. We headed to the stop and waited a few minutes. The friendly driver said he woul wait a couple of minutes for the man crossing the car park. “That man knows all about Balboa Park” the driver declared.
Not only did he know a lot but he chatted a lot as well. He soon mentioned that he runs a daily tour about the park’s history. We decided to tag along. Essentially Wikipedia tells a good story about the park.
We didn’t stay for Kat’s full 2 hours but left after 1 ¼ hours which was enough. After stopping in the supposed Japanese Tea Garden, which was short of any Japanese Tea, to quench us with a melon drink, we headed to the San Diego Museum of Art
San Diego Museum of Art
We could have chosen any number of museums on the site of the park. A sort of South Kensington area except 150 years later and nothing like the size of the UK museums.
The art museum had a few interesting works, but I felt that the staff suspected everyone of trying to steal or damage the paintings. I was followed into a quieter area and the man stood on guard until I left. Another xxxx told Maggi off for standing too close to the art.
Below are some of the works I responded too.
Return to downtown
The two tours meant we’d had enough of Balboa Park so we decided to go back to the hotel and sit down for an hour. We walked to the nearest bus and waited 35 minutes for the bus to arrive. I’m sure we could have walked the downhill route in that time.
The booklet we’d read about San Diego recommended a visit to East Village, described as lively, cafe culture with a vibrant atmosphere. We used Google maps to direct us. On the way we had to pass through another homeless centre On a arrival at what Google claimed as the centre of East Village we found a very boring crossroads with no sign of anything resembling the description.
We walked back to our hotel a slightly different route and found a bar, had a drink and returned to the hotel. En route we stopped at a Japanese Restaurant called Noir Sushi Lounge to book a table for the evening.
Noir
We arrived at 7:15 for our Japanese meal and sat at the bar/counter and were handed our menus. The manager then came over with an assistant and introduced himself. I immediately took a dislike to his ultra smooth bulkshit. Despite that we managed to have a very pleasant meal. In fact the best we have eaten out since we arrived in the US.