08 Oct - Lounging around San Diego Yacht Club - Today was a quiet day for us as we hung around the yacht club and starting preparing for our move to Mexico. Now we were going to spend more time in Mexico we visited Sea Breeze, a great book shop, and purchased another guide for our travels.  Then it was back to the club and into the bar for drinks and appies as we caught up with our friends from Victoria and the kids.  Lastly we couldn't resist another late night hot tub and then back to bed for another really good night's sleep.

09 Oct - Today we had to move to an anchorage further into San Diego bay.  After leaving the club around 11:00 we stopped off at the police dock at shelter bay to get the boat inspected (a requirement if you are going to use the anchorage).  On arrival we couldn't find anyone to inspect us (even though they claim the station is manned 24/7!) and so we waited around until some officers showed up.  They were very pleasant and easy going as they checked out the boat, making sure we had a holding tank  and locked off our ability to dump into the sea.  Once the inspection was completed we headed around to the anchorage. We were told that we should check in with the mooring office before anchoring but no one was answering their phone so we dropped the hook opposite the Coast guard station, had lunch and then once we were happy we were well anchored, dropped the dinghy and went for a walk and explore along the waterfront.  

San Diego has a fantastic sea front which includes both their Maritime Museum, including the last remaining Tea Clipper and the ship they filmed the Pirates of Caribbean on,  and USS Midway - a carrier museum.  After gawking at the stunning ships we headed back to the boat.  As we were settling in for the evening, and after enjoying our sundowners as the sun set, someone from the coast guard started shouting for us to move.  Apparently we were too far to the east of the designated mooring field so in failing light, we had to pick up the anchor and move!

Sunset at the anchorage - and then we had to move!

10 Oct - We still had quite a bit of admin to do today - mainly picking up stuff we had ordered in advance and so we decided to spend the day getting that done.  We were up early, in no small part due to the fact that the anchorage is at the end of the main airport runway so had the jets revving up right at us!  By 09:00 we were heading for shore.  Our first task was to get the necessary paperwork to leave the US.  Luckily the office for this was at the airport within walking distance so we headed over there and managed to find the customs office which issued us with a form 1300 (the US version of a Zarpe).  With this complete the next stop was South Coast yachts, the San Diego Beneteau dealer, that had a cutlass bearing for our boat.  We met Stephanie and Cindy and they were incredibly helpful letting us root through their other spares as well as working with us to order a rudder bearing that we decided would be good to replace whilst we were hauled out. 

Lunch and a Rainbow over the city

Once this was completed we headed back to the boat for lunch then it was off on an explore to the other side of San Diego to get our water maker membrane that we had been trying to source for over six months.  We caught a bus out to the shipyards were the Oil Filters Service Inc team, who we had been in regular contact with, knew me immediately from my accent and were incredibly helpful explaining how the membrane should be installed.  We also bought more fuel and oil filters which should now see us stocked up for at least 1000 engine hours (5000NM of motoring - which 'should' get us to Europe hopefully!)  On the way back we used the trams as a change of transport which got us back downtown very efficiently.

San Diego by night from the boat

11 Oct - Touristing in San Diego - Today was another glorious day in San Diego with bright sunshine.  With all our jobs complete we decided that today we should explore San Diego a bit more.  It being a Saturday the city was packed with locals and tourists.  We were up and away fairly early and decided that this should also double as Heidi's birthday treat so, instead of walking and using the transit system we indulged in buying tickets on the trolleybus tours along with the rest of the 'gringoes'. 

Charlie and Heidi out touristing!

The tour proved great value though as it took us the length and breadth of San Diego showing us all the highlights.  We started off meandering through the districts we had already ventured into but then the bus took us over to Coronado Island.  Heidi had been there before and was keen to show me the beautiful beaches and amazing Hotel de Coronado where the movie 'Some Like it Hot' was filmed .We stepped off the trolley bus and had a lovely walk around the beaches and clean, expensive town (apparently average house prices on the island are around $4M!). 

Views of Hotel Del Coronado - The ballroom - nice spot for a wedding!

The courtyard

Looking back at the hotel from the beach

Once we had our fill of Coronado we jumped back on the trolleybus which then took us through Balboa Park and dropped us at little Italy were we had a wonderful pizza lunch and bottle of wine at a very authentic Trattoria and then wondered through the Saturday farmers market. 

Cute stalls at the Saturday market

Back on the bus we completed the tour via Old town, an attraction similar to Calgary's Heritage park with many original 1860's buildings.  After spending time wondering around the old town we then jumped back on the bus and headed back to our starting point and the boat.  That evening we had Heidi's Birthday dinner after glorious sundowners on the back deck. 

After seeing what San Diego had to offer we realized that we could easily spend a couple of weeks exploring this great city and we agreed that we should plan on heading down here again in our later years to experience what had been the nicest city we had visited in the US.