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Reviews you can use: The San Diego Zoo is NOT San Quentin

Reviews you can use: San Diego Zoo

I have this thing about zoos. Ever since I was a little girl and I'd go to our small town zoo to stare at the big bears in their concrete (literally a concrete) jungle. They had a small patch of grass but that was it (The otters were always fun too, round and round they swam and slid, but again, so small, so concrete). It was just so, sad.

Needless to say I moved to San Diego and the zoo wasn't actually on the top of my list. "Go to the zoo" people told me. "It's the freaking San Diego Zoo, it's different."

The San Diego Zoo has a reputation for it's research facility and its love of animals. They tout their care and loving approach to the animals they house. They list their facilities, their breeding programs and their preservation of wildlife.

I was still skeptical.

But I finally dragged myself there (with Lori) and set out for the day, giving it the benefit of the doubt.

First off, there are many things about the SD Zoo that make it different. The animal areas are larger, the pathways are cleaner and the vegetation throughout the park is well taken care of. And the zookeepers are happier to be there. We watched one visiting with the animal he was feeding, petting him, laughing and enjoying his company. Obviously they believe in what they are doing there and that every animal is a special addition to a "family."

And the rest. It was kind of zoo like. There may not be cages but the animals sit behind their glass and turn their backs to the curious audience. The food is expensive, the lines are long and it seems like there are some forgotten animals on some back roads with less traffic. I kept thinking "nice try."

My own zoo issues aside (I'll get over it someday) the San Diego Zoo has everything a zoo can have to make it more of an experience and less of a "visit." And it will ruin you for other zoos. Plus there are rides and lots of fun gift shops. Life would be swell if we could all afford the 20.00 stuffed pandas.

Take: the bus tour first. It will let you see the WHOLE zoo, via bus, give you a ton of information and put less pressure to run around at the last minute to see what you missed.

Buy: The endangered species candy bars, chocolate and white chocolate mixed together (the panda mix), yum.

Go: IN OCTOBER when kids 3-11 are FREE.

Find your heart, brain, courage (and beat an analogy to death) on The San Diego Old Town Trolley Tours

As I am currently in exile from my beloved San Diego I often spend evenings on the phone with people telling them what a perfect, beautiful, wonderful city it is and they often remind me to "be realistic." San Diego has a seedy underbelly, so I've been told. I've also been told not to forget about the crazy traffic, how badly people tailgate, how long it takes to get out of PB and how hard it is to find parking.

Maybe as the editor of this site and *wannabe*, scratch that *soon to be once again* San Diegan I view the city as the Emerald City that it is. I've been following the yellow brick road for so long, I don't CARE if it's run by some strange little man and his strange little hair dressers and horses that change color, it's still the freaking Emerald City dude, EMERALD CITY. (Did I beat that analogy to death enough yet?)

Gerry Braun of The Union Tribune lives in The Emerald City and has been feeling a little overworked and under the thumb of the Wizard (still beating, wait I got more).

Face it, last week felt awful, as though our entire city had a lightning rod attached to it. First the Padres collapsed, then the hillside on Mount Soledad came down. We hardly had time to say, “Gee, I hope it wasn't the water pipes,” when three water pipes blew near SeaWorld, flooding parts of Pacific Beach. All the while, the specter of a water shortage looms.

So The Wizard sent him on his own journey (on a San Diego tour bus no less)... to find his heart, which he turned out to have all the time, right there in San Diego.

The Santa Ana winds had swept every cloud from the sky, and as Conductor Jeff played Barbra Streisand's “On a Clear Day, You Can See Forever,” I lost track of what I was doing and forgot to check the eastern horizon for smoke.

Read the entire piece here. And book your adventure here.

Take your kids to the Zoo: October is FREE

Well, not for you (people over 11) but for the kiddies.

October is kids free month at the San Diego Zoo

Kids 3-11 get in free.

Parents who act 3-11 do not.

I will post my review and experience at the San Diego Zoo end of this week, I was a member (a member!)... (anyone can be a member but I pretend it's super exclusive).

Here's a video of The Wavehouse

Now me, I've only observed people getting busy at the Wavehouse (on the flowrider people, sheesh, keep yourself focused) and it looks HARD. Nobody is out there very long before biffing it big time (some pretty spectacular) and so I wonder, what's the big draw? Come and try to look like you're surfing, kind of, but you're not, and then you fall.

Did have a nice time sitting at the sandy bar, watching people biff it and wonder if I'd ever, in the span of time, get the guts up to even TRY it. Probably not... but we'll see. Maybe I'll put someone else on trying and writing about it... Editing prowess...

Did you know that San Diego was voted the second best city to run in by Runners World Magazine?

ANOTHER RECOUNT SAYS I! Who could have possibly been the first? Cause it looks like they’re going with Salt Lake City which FYI it SNOWS there and it’s in UTAH. COME ON!

Oh, and City Running Tours has opened in SD.

City Running Tours – San Diego involves running side-by-side with a guide who, along the way, points out sites and conveys the history of that particular site as well as little-known facts.

"Ladies sea men straight ahead!"

Fleet Week in San Diego begins today (It's actually a month long thing).

Ladies (and/or Gentlemen) claim your sailors.

Part III: Everything Turquoise AGAIN

Bars & Nightlife

Best Beach Bar : The Turquoise (it’s NEAR the beach, sheesh)

Best College Bar : Man, when was the last time I went to a college bar. I guess PB Bar and Grill, there seems to be a lot of college goers there.

Best Dance Club : Actually, I quite like The 5th Quarter, which I think is now called Whiskey Girl? Something like that. They have a good stage to lounge and dance on, yeah, this one time… (well anyway, they also play Bon Jovi sometimes, COME ON! Who could ask for anything more?)

Best Neighborhood Bar: The Turquoise (AKA Café Bar Europa). It single handedly MAKES North PB THE neighborhood to live in.

Best Downtown Bar : Pretty soon there’ll be a Turquoise down there (so I’ve heard). I won’t go there, but still.

Best Gay/Lesbian Bar : I’ve only ever been to The Brass Rail… latin night… loved it…

Best Happy Hour: (Well the hour I had with your Mom last… stop it, just stop it) Man I gotta call my friend Vanessa, she would totally know the answer to this one.

Best North County Bar : And she’d know the answer to this one too.

Best Brewery : And probably this one too

Best Pub : The Blarneystone, Clairemont Shopping Center (next to Vons). Seriously, a pub in a shopping center and it’s actually REALLY fun (especially when they start peer pressuring you to down your drink).

Best Pick-up spot : The West End, tail end of Turquoise Street. Trust me. Ripe, for, the picking…

Best Upscale Bar: The Turquoise… it’s every kind of bar.

Best Wine Bar

Best Sports Bar

Best Cocktails: The Turquoise has this one martini called The Turquoise.. RULES.

Best Dive Bar: The West End (it’s DIVE man… but worth it)

Part 1: (Yes, there's parts!) Everything Turquoise...

Man that took a while. But as I’m sure you’ve been on the edge of your seat wondering WHEN I was going to tell you my picks for the Union Tribune’s Reader’s Poll: Best of San Diego… here goes.

RESTAURANTS

Best Romantic : The Coronado one my now husband took me to on our first date. It over looks downtown San Diego and makes chocolate lava cake that puts you into such a chocolate fantasy haze you go out and marry the guy four months later. Alright, one Google search and confirmation with my husband later: Peohe’s
Best Italian : Rafaela’s (and we will soon feature Rafaela’s all on its own).
Best Chinese : Panda Country Restaurant on Clairemont Mesa Blvd. (Go North Clairemont!) It got to the point that I’d go in there during lunch and the owner lady would go “orange chicken?” Yeah lady, orange chicken.
Best Mexican : Jesus Christ it’s San Diego, it’s all good Mexican Food. The best is Cotixan’s on Genesee.
Best Seafood :
Best Thai : There’s this one place, it’s on Convoy street. I think it’s called Thai Palace. But you really can’t go wrong heading to Convoy Street for the good Asian eats. Like they have this one spicy Chinese restaurant, which by the way, is SPICY (so warned).
Best Pizza : Pizza Chicago Pacific Beach and not just because we sat out on the deck, drank a gallon of beer and ended up passing out on the beach for two hours after that.
Best Vegetarian Menu : That would be, Spread? Is that the name of it??? Lori and I went there once and if that actually IS the name of it I totally missed an opportunity to make very lewd jokes while at dinner.
Best Steaks: Lori doesn’t eat red meat and the rest of the time I lived in SD I was on a writer’s salary.
Best Brunch Lips, Gospel Brunch… not the food but the all you can drink mimosa’s and hot Drag Queens…
Best Budget Dining : The Café Bar Europa
Best Late-night Dining : The Café Bar Europa
Best Family Dining : at your mom’s house. I’m sorry, the joke was bound to work its way in there at some point and gimme some credit this is TAME by industry standards (the industry of bad your mom jokes that is). Perhaps the family dining at your Mom’s house really is the best… I know your Mom was last night (sorry I did it again, forgive me).
Best Hotel Restaurant : The Marriott in Coronado has a good restaurant buffet that’s outdoors and everything. Great views of downtown San Diego too.
Best Coffee Shop Café 976 on Cass Street. Take dates there, you know the ones that insist on the “I want to have coffee and see if you’re worth a real date” dates, because it’s pretty there and because then you can make them buy you nicely priced good food… so there we’re actually on a REAL DATE any way! (And girls, tip, don’t keep dating that guy. Find the guy that really DATES you… it does happen.)
Best Fine Dining : WRITERS salary
Best Dessert : That could quite possibly be the chocolate lava cake I mentioned before. However, Extraordinary Desserts in Little Italy and Hillcrest, that’s an experience. Though it kind of looks like Ikea sponsored the one downtown… man… is that some good cake.
Best Catering : The last party I had catered was done by Vanessa, she’s excellent. You should hire her for sure (except she’s mine!)
Best French: The French Gourmet, also best croissants, best chocolate croissants, best am and cheese croissants, best shortbread cookies (they also made my wedding cake which was the best). Man I miss San Diego eating.
Best Japanese/Sushi Surprisingly there is a Sushi place in this little shopping center across the street from the original Rubio’s on Mission Bay Drive, however I DO NOT know the name. I typed it in to Google and came up with Sushi Ota. A beautiful Japanese gal (my technical step mother in law) took me there. So it got that stamp of approval. You really can’t judge a book by its cover as it is located right next to a 7-11 and across the street from my old gynecologists office (seriously!). When my husband and I showed up he immediately said something like “what is my Dad thinking?! We can go get something else after this if you want.” But, ya burnt Husband! as the sushi was very good.
Best New Restaurant : I haven’t been back in a year… oh god I’m gonna cry.
Best Buffet : Writer’s Salary so I never had the chance to experience the buffet at the Hotel Del, but I’ve heard rumblings that it’s pretty darn good.
Best Tapas That would be Café Bar Europa or “The Turquoise.” (Look, we used to hang there all the time. The bartenders are hilarious and low key, the chef is friendly and likes to experiment with this choices for the menu, the menu is reasonably priced, the atmosphere is excellent, the live music rocks, and the owner is hilarious. I took first dates there, had birthday parties there (they provided pink balloons!), celebrated holidays (really important ones like Mardi Gras), did my engagement dinner and wedding reception there… I’m not trying to give away the secret to a good time in San Diego (because at one point word of mouth got around and the place got SO popular on Friday and Saturday night, I stopped going for fear of being rubbed down by one of the many sweaty bar guys you usually only find in downtown PB. This bar/ restaurant/ café RULES).
Best Indian That would be Café Bar… okay just kidding. Never really did the Indian food thing.
Best Greek A big fat question mark from yours truly.
Best Breakfast The Mission in Mission Beach. Rosemary Potatoes…

End of part I. Will work on the next segment. Sheesh, Sign on San Diego sure does expect a lot from their readers!

You can stop holding your breath now... there you go... let it all out

It's a girl!