It's early Friday morning, just before 7am, when, in my sleep, I subconsciously detect a change in motion of our ship. Gone is the ever so slow heaving and falling of the bow of the vessel as we had made our way down the California coast overnight. That motion had put me to sleep and its absence now awakens me in the early dawn. Looking out the window, I see we're entering the harbor and preparing to dock.

San Diego is a city on the Pacific coast of California known for its beaches, parks and warm climate. Immense Balboa Park is the site of the world-famous San Diego Zoo, as well as numerous art galleries, artist studios, museums and gardens. A deep harbor is home to a large active naval fleet, with the USS Midway, an aircraft-carrier-turned-museum, open to the public.

Cruises from San Diego depart year-round, including those from Holland America Line. This city is approximately two hours south of Los Angeles. San Diego is known for its 70 miles of coastline and San Diego Bay. Some things to do include shopping in Seaport Village, visiting the Maritime Museum, SeaWorld, the San Diego Zoo or taking an Old Town Trolley Tour to one or more of San Diego's historic districts like the Gaslamp Quarter or Old Town San Diego. Today it's 78F. We had no idea what we wanted to do so we contracted Queenie's Tours who promised a full day of fun and excitement.

With breakfast aboard ship complete, we await our tour guide out on the street in front of the pier. Norwegien Cruise Line has a ship in port today along side us so there is a lot of people disembarking, with porters and cabs scurrying about. Queenie and Jonathan arrive promptly a half hour late. Calmly sipping her latte, she tells us our first stop is just down the street, a statue of the famous "Sailor Kissing Nurse" created from the photo taken at the end of WWII. After some quick pics, we tour the Gaslamp Quarter then head out to a lighthouse located above the harbor in a National Park. We climbed up inside, checked out the view of San Diego Harbor from the bluff and documented the entire event with more photos. Now we leave here on the way to Seaport Village while Queenie points out different landmarks familiar to her, texts on her phone and attempts to drives her car. An exciting experience punctuated occasionally by Mom yelling, "Red light, red light!"  "One Way Only" and "No Left Turn" signs don't apply to Queenie.

We park at the Village and look for a restaurant right on the water for lunch. I pick one with outdoor seating and Queenie suggests a "house" as she calls it, on the pier. She's eaten there before. OK, since she's the expert. Mom and I order clam chowder while Scarlett gets a burger and fries, the kid Mac & Cheese. The chowder is canned and the burger sucks. She replaces it with chowder which she doesn't like either. After we leave, she remembers that, while she did eat there before, it hadn't been very good then either. Thank you very much for the belated information.

We walked around the stores a little longer but Mom restrains herself from making any purchases. Scarlett buys Jonathon some gun that makes a bunch of noise whenever he shoots. And he shoots, again and again. We need to return to the ship by 4pm and, while we're only 5 minutes away, Karen is nervous and so we all finally give up and call it a day. We say our goodbyes and board with a half hour to spare. With the folks from San Diego on board, the ship is now full and everyone is headed upstairs for the "Sail Away Party" aft on deck 8. This time they're offering free wine and champagne along with Hors d'oeuvres and music. We steal some wine glasses to use later with our own illegal wine stash. I check on the status of my $250 stockholder benefit and they tell me that tomorrow they should hear from the main office. It's back to the buffet for dinner since our time is limited. I work on today's blog while listening to a guitar player and even while I'm in the theater. Hey, it needs to be done and so I sit in the back row. There's no show tonight, just Gene, the cruise director, introducing the ship's entertainers. 

Now, with six sea days coming, I should have enough time to get caught up. More on that later. Now let's get to Hawaii. That should take 6 full days at sea.