Sandy Eggo - Part IV - The Final Day: San Diego Safari Park

On our final day in San Diego, we went to the San Diego Safari Park. Before we headed out to the park we wanted to get breakfast. Rachel's sister had told us about this place called Hash House A-Go-Go, a restaurant that was featured on Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives on the Food Network. We decided to go check it out. It wasn't too far from the hotel but when we got there there was a huge line that was out the front door and around the building. We both agreed that we didn't wanna have to wait to go eat, so I suggested we just get on the road and get something on the way there.

We decided to take the Hotel Circle exit and figured there had to be places off the exit to eat since it was near a bunch of hotels. Much to our dismay the only restaurant we found was a steak house which wasn't something we really in the mood for. By this time, we were starting to get a little irritable. When we get hungry and can't agree on a place to eat we tend to get into arguments, this was no exception. After some words were exchanged, we got back on to the freeway and finally decided to just go back to the Denny's by our hotel since we were still relatively close we knew where it was. After breakfast and getting the same exact thing we did the first day, we finally headed toward the Park. On the way off one of the freeway exits, we saw a Denny's that would have been a more practical to stop at since it was closer to the park and was on the way which we thought was pretty funny. When we finally exited the freeway and were about a mile or two from the park we saw something even funnier than that. There were a lot of ostrich farms along the way and in one of the last ostrich pens along the way there were some birds about to get freaky. My weird perverted instinct couldn't resist the temptation and I had to pull over to get a better look. The male spread his wings and started running in place as he tried to mount the female. It looked so funny but unfortunately we weren't able to get a camera out in time. We were busting up though...he was so excited!!! (Sorry no pics)

We finally made it to the Park and the first exhibit we saw had all these pretty and exotic birds. These ones were really unique and pretty :

Pretty Birds

After that our main priority was getting to the main attraction: the tram ride. I was kind of confused because it didn't seem like they had many attractions. Just a bunch of restaurants spread out, little pond areas with birds and just a bunch of signs pointy to the supposed tram ride. We walked for what seemed like almost an hour to get to the main attraction part of the Park. There was a pretty cool lookout point with elevators that led down to the entrance to the tram ride. This big ugly creature got in the way as I tried to get a shot:

Viewpoint overlooking the Park

We got in the elevator and the first thing we saw a lion exhibit. Like many zoo exhibits, the animals were sleeping. It was still cool to see the lion so close to where we were.

Simba sleeping on his car

We continued on the path and arrived at the entrance to the tram ride. It was very packed and we had to wait in the line for about an hour which was okay. There were a lot of interesting people in the line including a moment when a mom lost her child and the kid came running back to kinda where we were. At first she didn't notice anything and the people around us were all concerned and wondering who this kid was. Then his mom finally called for her and from the looks of it she looked like she had 5 other children. It was weird. By the time we got to the front of the line we were kind of both kind of cranky and annoyed. We were kind of over the park and wanted to go home already. We went on the tram ride but left afterwards. Here's some of the shots we got on the tram:

Curious Cheetah



A "Rhyme" noceros



Random antelopes or gazelle type creatures (Made up about 80% of the tour)



This guy was actually not at the park but was grazing in the grasslands that surround the park.



Giraffes eating the trees

After the Park, we went to Belmont Park to watch the sunset. We bumped into this older couple on vacation from Tennessee on the beach. They wanted us to take there picture because they weren't sure when they'd ever be out this way again or get to see the beach. Growing up in California my whole life it's weird to think that there's people in the world have never been to the beach. I wonder what that feels like because its something I've always known and taken for granted. Enough with my deep thoughts here are a couple shots from the beach:

Sunset in San Diego



Artsy shot Rachel took that I thought looked cool.

We came home to Anaheim the next day to come back to reality. It was a very nice trip and we had a lot of fun. It seemed like it went by really fast but that's how all vacations seem to me. Next month we go to Washington to see Rachel's brother's new baby girl. That should be fun because I never been to that state before. The only thing I'm sad about is that Rachel won't let me live out my weird fantasy of  going the fish market in Seattle and having a worker toss me a fish that I would catch with a newspaper.I'm determined to find a way to get that done. It's not like I want to take it home and keep it. .I just wanna catch it, have a video/photo taken of the event, and then put the fish back and go on with my day. Rachel is concerned that I'll just smell fishy all day because apparently she is unaware of the invention of the shower. I'll guess I'll just have to wait and see.