Tijuana Estuary and Border State Park

The Tijuana River National Estuarine Research Reserve is a free state park, which is an estuary, or marshland. It's a good place to go birdwatching. I went on a 3rd Saturday so that I could go on the guided nature walk (1st and 3rd Saturdays at 11am), which was great. They also have birdwatching walks, on 2nd and 4th Sundays. They loan out free binoculars, which is pretty nice, and the visitor's center is pretty cool too. There's some hiking, but it's really not that nice, in my opinion. The Border State Park is fine; it's probably nicer for horseback riding, because apparently it's the only place that you can ride horses along the beach. It's also fun to see the Mexican border. Overall, I wasn't very impressed with either park. They were fine, and they were free, but it was just kind of boring. The visitor's center was the best part.

Sea World's Christmas Celebration: Snow World

Every year around Christmas, Sea World does Christmasy things (they also do Halloween things around Halloween- that one's fun because they give out free candy!). The part that I liked best was Snow World, because of course kids in San Diego don't generally get much of a chance to play in the snow. There was sledding, a snowball shooting gallery, and a snowy area where you could just play. There are also Christmas shows, reindeer, and Santa, plus cookie decorating, flavor-your-own-snowcone, and hot chocolate.

There are also special Christmas shows! They have the animals do all the same tricks, but they use Christmasy names and have Christmasy props and costumes. Note: the photos are out of order. I don't know what happened, but the blog keeps moving them, and won't let me move them back. Whatever.

Snow World didn't open until noon, so I rode Manta a few times, and I petted some dolphins and some bat rays, plus I saw a show. 

Sledding- the best part! You're only allowed to do this if you are between 37 and 61 inches. Fortunately I'm only 5 feet tall, so I got in no problem. This was by far the best part, and it was the whole reason I went to SeaWorld. The line gets really long, though. 

I am totally a sucker for getting shots of jumping animals. As much as I tell myself, "this time, just enjoy it!", as soon as they start jumping, I get the camera out.  

If you hit any of the plastic windows, it makes a sound. It was pretty fun, but I wish I had brought my gloves, because my hands got too cold after only 10 minutes.

This part was a bit too silly for me. These actors are pretty amazing. 

Julian Hiking and Pie

My friends and I went to Julian with the intent to hike and then have pie.There was this waterfall hike that I really wanted to do, but it was a bit too long for some people, so we decided to do a shorter, easier hike. However, I still wanted to do the waterfall hike (even though I knew there wouldn't be much of a waterfall in November), so I found a couple of guys to go with me, and the three of us did 2 hikes. Then we all had pie! Unfortunately, no one got any photos of the pie, because we ate it too fast.

Lots of people like to jump into the pool, though you're not allowed to. You're allowed to swim, though. No one was swimming today, though, because the water was a bit murky, having been stagnant for awhile. 

Reflection

Trees actually change color in Julian!

There's a waterfall here, too, in the spring

Our group- minus my friend who was taking the photo (she's in other ones further down)

Volcan (not Vulcan) Mountain

Fancy trailhead

At the top!

The hikes we did were called the Cedar Creek Falls trail (the Julian trailhead), which was about 5 miles, and the Five Oaks trail, which was about 3 miles. We then ate pie at the Julian Pie Company, and walked around downtown Julian a bit. There's a fun tea shop, and a candy store, and several different pie places. 

Mission Trails Regional Park and Cowles Mountain

I think I already have a post about Mission Trails Regional Park, but I went back, with the intent of exploring more of it. I went on a guided nature walk, then I hiked around a bit, and then I went to Cowles Mountain and hiked that. The visitor's center is one of the nicest I've ever seen. I can see why so many people like Cowles Mountain, because you can see panoramic views of San Diego, all the way to the ocean. 

A Praying Mantis

This is the trailhead that I took- it's not the most popular trail, but it was really nice, and it was the same distance, and parking was easy and the trail was not very crowded.