day one: touchdown and the san diego zoo

we left seattle early monday morning amidst chill and rain showers and arrived not too long afterwards in the land of sunshine and shorts. i walked outside the airport, put on my sunglasses, and didn’t take them off for three days.

first stop: in-n-out burger. and while we wish we were cool enough to order “off” the menu, we just aren’t. in fact, i made a classic “i’m a tourist” blunder of ordering medium shakes. apparently, their shakes only come in one size (duh!).

next stop: the so-called “world famous” san diego zoo. an unfortunate disappointment. we should have been tipped off that something was amiss when we discovered they offered bus tours of the zoo. now, both bryan and i have visited quite a few zoos around the world, and we can’t recall any offhand that have bus tours available. so why this zoo?

1) the terrain. up, up, up. you must spend half the time you’re there hiking up. which, as a pregnant lady pushing a stroller and melting in the sun (didn’t we come to california for the sun?), did not make me a happy camper.

 

2) the signage. there are very few signs at this zoo, and those that are posted are difficult to interpret. we utilized a great deal of precious energy walking in circles (up…up…up) looking for particular exhibits.

neither bryan’s experience as an eagle scout nor the three and a half college/graduate degrees between us proved valuable in our battle against the zoo. we were defeated.

day one review: our feet hurt, we’re tired, we’re dehydrated, and it’s become an obvious pain to keep summer in her stroller AND to let her out. was the jump from lounging around in the cloudy northwest to mountaineering in the southern pacific sun too much for the wheelers?

find out in our next installment.

 

summer learns to dip french fries.

 

 

how emily spent most of the afternoon.
a cheery lass, no?

 

the petting zoo.

top left: summer shows us her true feelings about animals.

bottom left : summer's favorite part of the day was washing her hands