San Diego our top favorites

When you say San Diego, people think about Sea World or the famous San Diego Zoo.   Our family opted to be more riskier and felt to be on a full on tourist-mode for a day or two.

The best way you can enjoy and plan your trip to San Diego is to go to Old Town San Diego and do the Trolley Tours. We highly recommend this to anyone new in San Diego. It will give you a chance to hop on and hop off on sites where you would want to stay and explore.

While on this trip and if you have children, the best place to hang out would be: "The New Children's Museum" situated near one of the drop offs of the Trolley Tours.  What we like about this museum is that the kids are allowed to tinker, play and paint all day long. It is an interactive museum that any kids from 9 months and up would totally enjoy. It is definitely kid-friendly place.

For historic landmark in San Diego, we picked the USS Midway museum, it is definitely a must see!! and you can truly appreciate the different war planes and somehow experience how it feels like to be in an aircraft carrier.

Lastly, both my kids love animals, and the best one so far that we were truly amazed by is the remarkable San Diego Zoo Safari Park. You can definitely ride on a safari ride and enjoy seeing animals run around the park.  We recommend sleeping and camping in the park if you want to splurge a little, but that takes an extra night and a sleeping bag.

Here are the links to these great places:

San Diego Zoo  Safari Park

 USS Midway 

Old Town San Diego Trolley Tours

The New Children's Museum

For lodging, we recommend the following:
Wyndham WorldMark Balboa Park San Diego, CA

For something in between Legoland and San Diego, we love the:
Grand Pacific Palisades

FALL weekender

For a weekender we picked the Big Trees Calaveras and the
Mercer Caverns as a family friendly place.   We love it
because of the adventure and the quaint town that takes you back during the gold rush era.   It is a best place and safe place to take your children for a quick hike and tour.
Our suggestion is to purchase a year long parking with the California Department of Parks and Recreations to get a great discounts.  If you have a 4th grader, your 4th grader is FREE of charge for the entire year.  Don't forget to pack your own refillable water container because you will need to hydrate.
My family enjoyed trekking under the caverns with a tour guide, trying out some gold panning, and the walk through the GIANTS (Calaveras Big Trees).   Total time spent- just one weekend short but very memorable trip.

MERCER CAVERNS


Suggestion for Lodging:
Worldmark Angels Camp

CALAVERAS BIG TREES

FALL!!!  Oh our favorite time of the year....  Fall is when the leaves change in colors,  the season is much cooler.  Personally, my family loves fall. Two of our favorite holidays that we truly enjoy are during the Fall season: Halloween and Thanksgiving. Busy as we may be, we still need some quick day trip during this season to unwind and make memories with our family.  Traditionally, my family and I love visiting some of the local farms, pumpkin patches  and get pumpkins to carve.   There is just something with the cool air and the smell of pumpkin, pumpkin pie, pumpkin spice, apples and apple pies that triggers you to just pause and look at the changing leaves.  My 6 year old loves the hay ride and I enjoy seeing my children pick their favorite pumpkins.  It's a tradition that we look forward to every October- November.
Some of our past favorite places that we visited to get our pumpkin fix:

Tanaka Farms  www.TanakaFarms.com
Live Oak Canyon Pumpkin Patch and Christmas Tree Farm www.thepumpkinfactory.com
Pumpkin Festival at Cal Poly https://www.cpp.edu/~pumpkinfestival/
La Verne Heritage Foundation La Verne California
Oak Glen, CA

Day Trip Weekend Carlsbad, Torrey Pines, Cabrillo and Old Point Loma Lighthouse

Our weekend mini getaway Carlsbad to Cabrillo- Point Loma Lighthouse

  We admit most of us are "weekend warriors".  We work hard to provide for our family, and we always look forward to spending quality time with them. But, most of us are tight on the budget.   My family and I are always on a look out for a great deal. San Diego area takes about a week to really fully enjoy, and there are so much to see; but sometimes, a two-day or a weekend get-away is all we need.

  

 Legoland is our go-to place when visiting Carlsbad, but the fees can be high if you don't plan ahead.  This past summer, I saw a coupon from McDonald's that says free one child admission for every 1 adult entry.  We immediately saved up for this trip, since it was such a great deal it was definitely hard to pass up.  My 6-year-old son loves Legoland so much, and around the Fall season is always the best time to go. We used our coupon that we kept around the first week of October, and the weather was perfect; it was breezy and cool.  Lines were not that bad at all and we were not frying under the heat of the sun. The food in Lego land was surprisingly great quality, and my kids can't get enough of the Granny's Apple Fries. For more information and other promotional discounts, please visit Legoland.

 

 Legoland

 

Newest Ride- the Submarine at Legoland

But if your family loves to hike; we recommend the Torrey Pines and the Cabrillo National Monument.   Torrey Pines has a great beach with tons of beautiful colorful rocks.  There are options of hiking the trail or just soak up the sun on the beach. The best part, if you come early in the morning,  parking is free along the roadside.  Here's the quick link for more information on Torrey Pines  Click: Torrey Pines.

 

 One of the best places in San Diego area that our family love to visit is the Cabrillo National Monument and the Point Loma Light house. The cost is only $15 for the parking fee. There are no food sold in the park, so bring some water and some snacks during your trip.  Cabrillo has a wonderful view of the city of San Diego and the Pacific Ocean.  When you get lucky, you can see some gray whale migration.  The best part of this park is getting inside the Point Loma Light house. Personally, my family and I love to walk down to the tide pools area, and we also hike at the bay side trail about 2 1/2 miles round trip. The sandstone cliffs are very dangerous to hike down, so be careful when stepping on the sand stones and tide pools. The tide pools area can be very slippery and dangerous.  We recommend for adults and children to wear good fitting non-skid shoes; and for safety always ask the park ranger or ask the visitor center for weather and other precautions. For more information, visit: Cabrillo and Point Loma lighthouse

  

   Here's the link to:

 Cabrillo National Monument and Point Loma Lighthouse

For the one night stay, we booked at the Hampton Inn Delmar/San Diego close to Torrey Pines. We use the Hilton Honors for points and special discounts. We love it because the hot breakfast is free. Here's the link for more information: Hampton Inn