Today is moving day, we go from Newport Beach to San Diego, which will be our last coastal city in California. After San Diego, we start heading east and leave California after Death Valley National Park.
It was a beautiful morning outside again, but a bit cold. The forecast for today was that it would be nice and warm, so hoping we could get to San Diego quick and maybe still enjoy the day.
I did my usual thing, woke up, made coffee, sat down to write posts and catch up online. I started making noise around 8:30, so everyone would be up and going by 9. Then, we did our normal routine for a Sunday move. Girls changed and ate breakfast, Carol got the inside cleaned up and ready for the trip, and I got the outside packed and disconnected. And again, we have this down pretty good, and were all done and out of our spot just before 11am.
We had a nice drive to San Diego, pretty much all nice highway miles, and easy driving, large highways, etc. Some traffic in certain areas but all flowing very well. Our total drive time was less than 2 hours. We did make a stop within the first hour, for restroom and lunch. We stopped at the rest stop right next to Camp Pendleton. As we stopped, I unlocked the trailer door for Carol and the girls, and walked around to take some pictures. When I got back, Carol was cleaning the kitchen area and there was stuff splashed everywhere. The container with balsamic vinegar tipped over and there was balsamic everywhere. Walls, shoes, counters, hahahaha… all splashed. What a pain to clean that, as it is a bit sticky as well. It took Carol a good 15 minutes to wipe everything down enough so there was nothing running down anymore, but there’s some more proper cleaning for later. We all ate something, sandwiches or what not, and then kept driving again. There were plenty of nice views on this drive as well. Our campground is the San Diego Metro KOA, which is actually in Chula Vista, just a bit west of San Diego proper. It is right off the highway, and very well located with shops and such close by. There is a Walmart within 1 mile, and a nice 20 plus mile long trail next to it as well.
At check in, I was still anxious about what kind of trouble we’d get due to the stay at home restrictions, but… nothing. Normal check in, no questions asked. The confirmation email from the night before just had some reference to the rules. We were assigned our spot, and the lady said if we didn’t like it to go back and change it. That was a bit off, but I asked her where she’d recommend and she said that area is nice, so we went with it. We have a back in spot here, and there was a trailer next door, so I had a bit of a tight spot to maneuver. We took the weight distribution bars out and I started maneuvering. I was able to go forward into the grass and had just enough room to back in and turn, without hitting the trees that were right there. I had to go back and forth twice to line up the wheels just right, but then got it lined up and backed in exactly where we wanted it. We try to park as close to the electrical box as we can, so we have more room in the front of the trailer, and we were able to park just perfectly. As we parked, the girls got out and went to play around, and as usual, grabbing leaves and playing with dirt. Our site is level, so we didn’t have to do any extra leveling and were parked and unhitched pretty quick. Carol took the girls to check out the pool, which looked nice and big, while I continued setup. Setup was as usual, the connections here are pretty good, they have cable with almost 50 channels and their wifi is pretty good. The campground is very nice, so we already talked about maybe extending our stay here and replacing the next San Diego one, which is a Thousand Trails site, with this one and just staying here for our entire San Diego time, which is until next Sunday. I’ll have to work on that tomorrow.
As we finished setting up, Bia was ready to go to the pool, so Carol took her. Bella stayed with me, she was still playing with leaves and got me to play with her. We played for some time and she eventually decided to go to the pool as well, so her and I joined Bia and Carol. Carol was reading a book and Bia was in the water, so we all hung out there for a good hour at least. As the sun set, it started getting a little cold, so we went back. We decided to have burgers for dinner, so Carol went to Walmart and I stayed with the girls. Bia took a shower right away, and Bella and I were playing frisbee outside, then Bia joined and we played frisbee for a while together. We had a lot of fun. It was getting dark, so we decided to sit outside and tell scary stories with flashlights. I got the heater going, and the girls started their stories. It’s fun to listen to their imagination just going hahahaha…
After Carol got back, I got the grill going and we made the burgers. We all ate outside and talked, and decided we’d watch some TV outside as well, by the heater. We just put something on while Bella showered, then when she came back we watched a few episodes of Kobra Kai. We are all into that show, and even though it has enough foul language and some “violence” we are watching it together and enjoying it. We probably watched 2 episodes outside, then decided it was way too cold to be outside, so we went back inside and watched two more. In between the girls got ready for bed as well, and we put them to bed by 8:30. Carol and I just read some stuff after that, Facebook and what not, and I fell asleep, not sure what time, but it was not too much after I laid down. hahahaha.
We had a nice first day here in San Diego, and I’m hoping we can extend our stay at this campground.