San Diego 9/11: SEAL Tour, Jail

SEAL Tour - Monday, September 11th
We thought it would be appropriate to start out the week of our time together with an orientation tour. We picked the SEAL Tour ... SEA for "sea" and L for "land" to give an overview of the city and harbor of San Diego.

On our Uber rider to the departure point at Seaport Village we needed to cross railroad tracks. To Frank's delight, we had to wait for the passage of not one, but four, trains. We waited as they passed and then, when it was clear, we saw our first glimpse of the harbor ahead. When, finally, the crossing gate bar raised, we were treated to a view of the bow of the magnificent sailing ship the Star of India, which we would board later in the week.

We arrived at our tour departure point at Seaport Village, a cluster of little shops and restaurants. We learned later that those buildings had been designed by Disney Imagineers to give a beach cottage feel to the area. 

We picked up our tickets and stickers and waited to board our amphibious vehicle.

  

It arrived and we climbed aboard. We perused the map observing what we would pass on our way to the water. The 100 minute tour was about 40% land and 60% sea.

1   Seaport Village - visited on Monday September 9th

2   US Midway Museum - to visit Tuesday, September 11th

3   San Diego Visitor Info Center

4   Star of India - to visit Thursday September 14th

5   San Diego County Administration Building

6   US Coast Guard Station

7   San Diego Airport - there upon arrival 9/8 and departure 9/15

8   USS Neversail Ship

9   Splash - visited as initial SEA part of SEA & Land tour

One of the first land sights pointed out was the Kansas City Barbecue across the intersection from the SEAL Tours headquarters, where the 1986 movie Top Gun with Tom Cruise was filmed and Goose sings Great Balls of Fire. Then we drove along the shoreline passing sites 2 through 8 before splashing in to the water at site 9. One of our first sites once in the San Diego Big Bay was another SEAL tour passing us in the opposite direction so we could see what we looked like.

Frank and I got mildly wind-blown and wind-burned as we cruised pretty quickly along. We saw large tankers, a myriad of marine wildlife, radar set ups, and shoreline city complexes. We were fortunate enough to even see some dolphins and some sea lions being trained by the Navy. The speaking portion of the tour was further enhanced with some tongue-in-cheek musical accompaniment and some large laminated posters held up so we know what we were looking for or at.

Per the Wikipedia article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Navy_Marine_Mammal_Program

The U.S. Navy Marine Mammal Program (NMMP) is a program administered by the U.S. Navy which studies the military use of marine mammals - principally bottlenose dolphins and California sea lions - and trains animals to perform tasks such as ship and harbor protection, mine detection and clearance, and equipment recovery. The program is based in San Diego, California, where animals are housed and trained on an ongoing basis.

On returning back to land we saw impressive government buildings dotting the shoreline. Once back on land, we saw the wave-shaped sculpture called Pacific Portal by James T. Hubbel located at the entrance to the San Diego Bay channel. Per coolsandiegosights.com, Pacific Portal is a sculptural gazebo made of sprayed, reinforced concrete. It was erected in 2006, replacing an old, more traditional Rotary Club pavilion. Per Hubbel & Hubbell Architects, James Hubbell’s gazebo "design echoes the forms of ocean waves and billowing sails". 

Jail Cells
The SEAL tour returned us to our starting point at Seaport Village, dropping us off at the Bay Company at the bottom of the following map. Near the top of the map is the Kansas City Barbecue of Top Gun fame and the Cheesecake Factory where we ate lunch. John & Sue headed back on their walk home. Frank, Margaret, and I lingered behind to check out the Jail Cells and Police Exhibit, mid-height on the map.

We only spent about ten minutes at the jail but it was interesting. Frank and Margaret posed for mug shots, attempting to appear suitably criminal.

We saw the set up of the jail cells. The authenticated signs from the jails gave pause for thought of what imprisoned life was like.

Posed photos in front proved we were really there.

After lunch and the jail cells, we were tired enough to shorten our stroll through Seaport Village; but we did visit Geppetto's for long enough to buy the 1000 puzzle The Beach Hut.

We took an Uber home and relaxed a bit before venturing out for dinner. Tired of pasta meals, we had dinner at an Aussie restaurant called Queenstown Public House situated in a quaint house. The place was not air conditioned but we were tucked away in this little bay area with open windows and fans; it was quite pleasant. All I remember from the menu is that Frank & I had Fish & Chips, and Margaret had Lamb Skewers. Some of us had "Fatty Fries", some of us had "Skinny Fries" and some of us had "Sweet Potato Fries".

That evening at home we played the game Azul 5211. This is a new game for Frank and me that we recently played with our every other week game partners and they loved it. After several rounds, Margaret honestly and bluntly proclaimed, "I do not like this game!" We laughed and switched off to Sequence, a tried and proved success for this group.