San Diego

Last week I found myself in Southern California en route to San Diego. A close friend of mine had moved there to complete a PhD at UCSD and I decided to take advantage of having a "local" take me on a tour of the city. After fighting through Los Angeles traffic I finally made it into town.

One of my first stops was La Jolla Cove to see adorable baby seals (who wouldn't?!). The cove is home to Children's Pool Beach, a beach sheltered from Pacific waves by a sea wall. Originally intended as a safe place for families to go to the beach with kids, the beach quickly became a favourite nesting spot of the local seal population.

Throughout the drive south it occurred to me that the landscape looked oddly familiar, feeling like deja vu. It wasn't until visiting the cove at La Jolla that I realized what it was. I felt like I was in a Dr. Seuss book! The trees were freakishly similar, all they needed was brightly coloured leaves and they could have come directly from the pages of "The Lorax".

Palms of La Jolla

Turns out I wasn't going insane, Seuss had actually been born in La Jolla. According to my friend, the natural landscape of the area is renowned for having served as inspiration to his many landscapes illustrations.


The best part of the trip was when I was able to visit the San Diego Zoo. "Lions and tigers and bears, oh my" is right!! Among the many attractions was a one year old orangutang baby, zebras playing tag, and a tiger prancing around waiting for his handler to feed him meat kabobs through a gate.

Founded in 1916, the San Diego Zoo is a not-for-profit organization that is renowned for its global efforts to save endangered species. Specializing in conservation science and animal care, the Zoo has created a wildlife sanctuary that cares for more than 2,600 animals and over 1.5 million plant specimens including over 700,000 exotic plants.

Built into the natural rock formations of Balboa Park, the San Diego Zoo is extremely hilly, as my calves can well tell you, providing an excellent natural enclosure for its inhabitants.

By far my favourite exhibit was that of the Giant Panda. In 1996 the Zoo worked out an agreement with China which allowed them to take permanent possession of two giant pandas and their young offspring. The terms of this agreement stated that any further offspring of the pandas would be sent back to China to help in the re-population efforts. Since then the Zoo has developed an extremely successful breeding program for the giant panda. Since her arrival in 1996, panda Bai Yun has had six offspring that survived into adulthood, the most recorded anywhere in the world outside of China.

 Want to experience San Diego Zoo for yourself? Check out their Live Feed Animal Cams!

 Why is a tiger striped? Because he doesn't want to be SPOTTED!

Projects, Pictures, Paperbacks and Planes

When I was assigned a blogging project for school, my first thought was, "Damn, I have nothing interesting to share in my life." But after thinking about it some more, and realizing that if I didn't complete this assignment I'd likely fail the course, I realized that I did have something to share: travel.

I have always been an avid reader and since reading about far off lands and mystical new places as a child, I developed a dream to see their "Earth-spirations". From Ireland to New Zealand, California to France I have so far managed to realize those dreams by visiting the worlds of Tolkien, Frank McCourt, Disney and Victor Hugo.

There is no greater feeling than being able to jump on a plane and in a few short hours find yourself in a place that you've never set foot in before but feel like you already know. So for those of you that have not yet had the chance in their lives to do so, or those of you that have and want to re-visit your journeys, I bring to you Notes From a Travel Nerd.