Memorial Weekend Vacation

This past weekend was awesome! Ritchell and I took off on Friday and drove from Provo down through Vegas, across the Mojave Desert, and into Oceanside, California. This trip was a first for both of us. Neither of us had been to St. George, Las Vegas, or California (except the airports). The drive for the most part was boring. There wasn't much to see, except near St. George...where all of the surrounding landscape is red rocks.

When we got to Vegas, we took a slight detour just to drive the strip. I didn't really find Vegas to be all that enticing. In fact, I don't really want to go back there for any particular reason. I don't think I've ever seen more homeless people in the streets walking with their shopping carts in my life. You can really see the effects that gambling has there.

The drive from Vegas to Oceanside was mostly boring. The desert was not really a pretty sight. The interesting thing was the traffic on the other side of the freeway. It seemed like everyone in California was trying to get to Vegas for the weekend. The traffic was packed the whole way. Luckily for us, it wasn't too bad...until we got to San Bernarndino. We got stuck in traffic for an hour or so there. We took another slight detour on a 2 lane highway that cut up through the mountains just before getting to Oceanside. It was amazingly beautiful. The mountains were so green and we ended up winding up and around a beautiful lake. I'm not sure what the name of the lake was, but the view was amazing. Ritchell wasn't feeling so well at this point because we were already an hour or two behind schedule.

We finally made it into Oceanside around 8pm on Friday. We checked into our condo. The condo had a nice view of the ocean. The cool thing was that we had a kitchen there. The resort also had a spa, swimming pool, tennis courts, basketball courts, and a nice patio where they served breakfast and lunch.

We were too exhausted on Friday night to go out and do anything when we got to the condo. We ended up ordering Chinese food and staying in the condo that night. The food was great. They gave us enough food to last us the rest of the weekend.

Saturday was the highlight of our vacation. In the morning, we drove down to the San Diego temple. I think it is by far the most beautiful temple there is. Ritchell and I took some pictures on the grounds and then went through an endowment session. It was a good experience.

After the temple, we drove a few more miles south to SeaWorld. I must say that SeaWorld is the coolest park that Ritchell and I have ever gone to! We thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. We spent from about 3pm to 11pm in the park going to all the shows that they have there.

The first show that we went to was the dolphin show. I was impressed with all of the tricks that the dolphins could do. There were also a few small whales with the dolphins in this show. The show was really entertaining.

The next show we went to was the "Pet's Rule" show. I can't believe that they had trained cats, dogs, pigs, and squirrels. It was also very entertaining.

The next show we went to was my favorite. It was called "Believe." It was the one with killer whales. The main star whale is named Shamu. Anyway... I still am amazed that these animals are so well trained and will do anything that the trainers there tell them to do. I got a lot of really cool pictures of the whales flying through the air. They splashed the crowd many times. They would jump through the air to the beat of the music playing in the stadium. It was very impressive.

After this show, we went around to the many exhibits and aquariums that they had there. We saw some sharks, and other fish. We eventually made our way to our next show.

This show was the sea lion show. It was also a fun show. The sea lions seemed to be better trained than most the other animals we saw there. They also had a trained otter and manatee.

There was a new show at SeaWorld that just opened the night we were there. It was called "Shamu Rocks." It was at night. The whales jumped around again to music and there was also a cool light show. The stadium there has four huge monitors that move around and rotate together. It was an amazing show. I definitely recommend a visit to SeaWorld if you haven't been.

After Shamu Rocks, we went to the entrance of the park where they had a music and dance show. This show was also amazing. There were lots of dancers on a tiered stage. They also had a group of drummers that were very talented. Again...I thought this show was impressive.

Saturday was full of fun for Ritchell and I. After the last show, we headed back to the condo and crashed for the night.

On Sunday, we had a BBQ on our balcony. We also went down to the pool for a swim and spent a little time relaxing in the spa. After that, we went down to the beach for a walk. We also checked out some of the souvinir shops that they had there. It was beautiful on the beach.

Before our trip, I had only heard rumors about southern California and the people there. Now I know why there are SO many people down there. The area is amazingly beautiful. The mountains along the coast were a cool sight. The other thing that I really liked was the weather. The entire time we were there on the coast, it never got above 72 degrees. There were times where it was actually quite chilly. The only complaints that I might have about California are the driving and the traffic. There are just way too many people there and they all seemed to drive crazier than the people here in Utah.

Monday was spent on the road returning to Utah. It was a long trip. We got stuck in some construction traffic just south of Payson Utah. We returned home around 9pm.

I think the real reason why I loved our trip so much was that the area really reminded me of the Philippines. The tropical plants, the mountains...the ocean. All of this reminded me of the Philippines. There were also a lot of Filipinos down there.

This brings me to my next bit of news. Ritchell and I bought tickets to go home to the Philippines! We will be leaving the day after Christmas and returning January 16th. We are very excited to finally be going home. It will be an interesting trip with 6-month old AnaBelle. :)

As I type right now, our new carpet is being installed.... FINALLY. :) I'm excited to see what it will look like. I will be spending most of the day putting furniture back together and also putting AnaBelle's room together with the new crib. I will post many pics later today when it's all done.

I think that concludes the news for now. Life is still good. :)