Day Three: USS Midway & Coronado Island
We wanted a break from the parks and to have more "free time", so we slept in a little bit and made our way to the USS Midway at the San Diego Harbor.  They have a Navy base there and a ship people can tour.  Mike's dad was actually in the Navy and stationed in San Diego during WWII.  It was really interesting, I'm so glad we went.  It was one of the best things of the trip. The naval ship was in use for 47 years and one time could hold up to 2,500 sailors.  We got to go on the flight deck and inside of the ship, it was over 9 stories!  For someone that doesn't like small spaces though, the inside decks were tricky for me, but so interesting to see all the places.  The aircraft on the flight decks were really impressive and they were open to go inside of.  We then drove to Seaside Village in the hopes of finding lunch and some fun souvenirs (again buying stuff inside the park is a rip-off!  Taylor and Hannah used all their allowance at Sea World.)  We ate seafood (yay for me) at a great restaurant with an ocean view and did some shopping.  Then we drove to the beautiful Coronado Island, home of the Corondo Hotel built in 1888 and home of Mootime Creamery-the best ice cream ever.  It was so good but so rich, I couldn't eat all mine.  We found a beach and enjoyed the waves and then went back to the hotel for some more swimming and dinner. The kids slept like rocks, we did a good job tiring them out!

Hannah in the bunker-I would hate to sleep on the bottom

Day Four: San Diego Safari Park
This might have been my favorite thing.  I really debated on buying tickets to Legoland after reading reviews (many said it was for smaller kids), but if I could do it again I would have forgone the zoo and done Legoland and the Safari park. Oh well, live and learn.
Originally built for breeding animals for the SD Zoo, this 1800 acre facility was made into a park for visitors and it's amazing.  The animals have tons more room to roam and it's like a safari.  We took a 30 minute tram ride through it and got to see the animals really close up.  The grounds and landscaping were amazing.  I wanted to stay to see the Cheetah Run, where a Cheetah is unleashed and allowed to run free, but my troop was tired by 3:00 and so we left to go back to the hotel and swim.  Bummer.  It was really awesome.  We did get to see the lions wake up and I got some great pics.

Day Five-we drove to Carson City and stayed the night, then drove home.  So good to be home, but that's a long time in the car.  Between Spokane and San Diego in 10 days, I logged over 2,600 miles in the car.  The drive from Boise to Spokane might have been the best for scenery though.

This is one of 8 black rhinos in the world-they are extremely endangered-her name is Lola