DVC Concierge Collection Trip - San Diego

Wardrobe!

You all know that I'm a packing maniac! This trip is no different, especially because I need to have a "neat yet casual" presentation. This is a weird sort of business trip where jeans and t-shirts are the norm, but that's not quite the impression I want to leave so I'm going with a resort casual capsule wardrobe. You'll notice that I used the same type of spreadsheet that I do for my Disney trips to organize. Why change what works? Here's how I did it!

I'm mostly packed, yes I know - I'm a dork.

The clothes in the pictures below aren't the exact same as mine, but it gives you a pretty close idea of what's in my bag. It shows the same shape and colors of what I have. Because I can never seem to stick with just what I need, there are two other dresses thrown in for good measure. I mean really - those Hollywood girls aren't going to be in the same dress twice so I'd better at least make an effort. May I just say - the idea of being out there with a "jet set" crowd has me scared to death, I'm a frumpy mom from Illinois, come on! I'm going to go get my hair cut and colored the week before the trip, I'm really looking forward to that and I hope it will give me a fighting edge in networking.

It's going to be quite the whirlwind, but I'm hoping totally worth it.

I've been to the Zoo and it is indeed amazing! I actually lived in San Diego twenty odd years ago. I haven't been there since we moved away so I'm REALLY excited to see how the downtown area has grown and just get to be all touristy.

I'll take lots of pictures for you CJ!

I really booked this trip on the spur of the moment. They "needed me" there for work but not enough to pay my bill, and I had enough points in my DVC account so I just said what they hey and went for it!

I am *SO* excited!! Just four more sleeps before I leave and this morning the company I was working for there just excused me from all official duties. They thanked me for all my hard work and told me I'm awesome and to enjoy myself on a well earned vacation.

I don't have to play nice with the difficult clients, I don't have to network my tooshie off, I don't have to stay up until all hours meeting deadlines, If I don't want to go to an event I don't have to. I just have to enjoy myself.
OMG - best work present EVER.

- Day 0 - Wednesday, July 23rd

Today's the day! My last 24 hours has been so cr**py, I can not wait to get on the bus this afternoon. I wish that I didn't have to wait - on the up side - I think this is the first time I've wanted to run away from home and been able to hop on a plane and go. LOL! Even if I have to come back at least I know that I've got a week away from it all. My first leg is pretty easy, I'll hop on a bus to Chicago where I'll spend my first night at Becks' house. I'm mostly packed, just finished printing off all of my travel documents, I've got about 6 hours of chomping at the bit until it's time to go.

I'll pop in with updates as I can, but if you would like to follow live

You can follow along on Twitter at ---------- and You can follow along on Instagram at
https://twitter.com/momatthecon ----- http://instagram.com/kristenannkirk

I'm home! Trying to catch up on a ton of work. I'll try and hop on the boards tomorrow to start some sort of trip report!
Pics are up on my flickr account here https://www.flickr.com/photos/thedvcmom/sets/72157646069153303/

I'm having a really difficult time putting a trip report together for this vacation. It became sort of an interesting hodge-podge of events and activities. I'll give this a shot, but apologies of if it's a little disjointed as that's how it is in my memory.

The Travel

This was my first time in about 30 years to fly out of Chicago's Midway airport and on a Southwest flight. Becks does it all the time, and she assured me that all would be well. If you hadn't guessed yet, Becks is the aforementioned "lovely assistant" that was coming along with me on vacation! We caught a cab from her house to the airport.

I found Midway to be a very nice little airport, the only really down point to it is that it's 3 hours away from my house. I had been worried about flying Southwest because they don't have pre-assigned seats. In my head the clamoring passengers would have a mini-hunger games trying to get the best ones. It wasn't like that at all though and the process was very orderly. I did add the "early-bird" check-in to my tickets which meant that I would board with the "A" group. A definite must if I ever fly Southwest again. Becks upgraded her ticket so that we could board together and we made our way onto the plane.

The travel gods were smiling upon us that day, because on what we had been told was a sold out flight, Becks and I ended up with the middle seat between us being empty! That made for a super awesome and comfortable flight out to California, and with the extra leg room to stretch out I walked off the plane nearly pain free. That was an unexpected pleasure.

As soon as we hit the airport my nose picked up the smell of fresh cilantro (from the restaurant at out gate) and salt air. It made me smile as we headed towards baggage claim. While waiting for the bags I suddenly became aware that everyone, and I mean everyone walking around was crazy TAN! Oh my gosh I felt like a ghost. I mean, I know that I'm pale and freckled, but these people were tan tan tan. It was weird. After we got our bags we went up escalators that welcomed travelers to the city for Comic-Con and promised us that the time would be Legendary. At the top of the escalator we walked outside and we were greeted with clear blue skies and lots of palm trees. We quickly located our super shuttle and were off to the hotel.

The Hotel del Coronado

This may be one of the most beautiful and luxurious resorts I have ever stayed in outside of Walt Disney World. The historic lady has not lost an ounce of her charm. Our room was not in the Victorian building (so no ghosts) but instead was in a newer section. At first I was disappointed - but as we were lead down the hall by a bellman I had to chuckle inside that I felt just like I was walking through the halls at the Grand Floridian, only in yellow. When we walked into our room all disappointment faded away, it was spacious and absolutely lovely.

Stepping out onto the balcony it became apparent that we had a great view of the main pool, turret building, and the ocean in the distance. How could you not be happy with that? Plus PALM TREES! The grounds were an absolute plethora of palm trees. So many different types! I miss palm tress so much when I'm at home, and I never really realize it until I arrive some place that has them. I don't think Becks knew quite how obsessed with palm trees I actually am. I will note that the pool was really loud during the day, but was locked up at 10pm each night.

After unpacking our bags and settling in a bit we decided to go find some dinner at the hotel. Becks wasn't feeling like Pizza (the restaurant that I was hoping to eat at) so we decided to see what was being served up at the other hotel eateries. Being that it was only about 4:30 the restaurants weren't quite open for dinner - we ended up at the Sun Deck Bar & Grill and it turned out to be one of my best memories of the whole vacation.

The Sun Deck is located super close to our room, in fact if you look at the picture above it's the second story of that small building on the other side of the pool. All of those upper level umbrellas are shading the Sun Deck's tables. On the other side of that deck is the Pacific Ocean. We found a shaded table and sat down with a magnificent view of the ocean with a shipping lane far off in the distance, and several military helicopters running exercises just off shore. It was honestly pretty dern cool - even for this jaded Navy Veteran.

The food was simple, but delicious - and the view could absolutely not be beat. Becks had a sandwich and I ordered a salad. I think both of us could have been perfectly happy just sitting there for hours. The sun was shining but we were protected by the umbrellas. It was warm, but the perfect ocean breeze kept blowing to keep us cool. I also had a lemonade cocktail that was yummy.

Sadly I didn't feel well after eating and had to run back to the room for a few minutes while Becks relaxed at the table. While I was gone she saw a hawk (perhaps a Harris Hawk) with jesses on his legs flying about. I think he was probably "working" to scare away seagulls, but I never did ask anyone. He landed on a railing across the pool and we were able to sort of get a picture of him. He's sitting on the railing just below the small palm tree in the middle. I know, it's pretty hard to see, but he's there I swear!

It wasn't long before I was able to rejoin her, and we then started to take a walk around the hotel and down to the shuttle bus that would take us to the Coronado Ferry. Along the way we saw people setting up for a wedding, the del's Kitchen herb gardens, and

As we were walking through the grounds we noticed this up in the sky!

After quickly looking up the hastag we discovered that it was a Comic-Con promotion for a scavenger hunt that was taking place to promote a new show on that will be on the USA Network this fall called Dig.

While waiting for our shuttle bus we saw many people out on rental bikes and one very adventurous family driving a surrey bike down the sidewalk! We hopped on a shuttle bus that drove us down the main road in Coronado. Oh my gosh - this is the most beautiful little town with magnificent shopping, lots of dining, it's beautiful around every corner. I still can't get over how beautiful it is there. I lived in San Diego for 4 years in the early 90s, but I really did not remember how lovely and perfect it seemed. I was in awe the entire time we were there, especially every moment spent on Coronado Island. The shuttle dropped us off at ferry and we hurried to our boat!

We were headed straight across the harbor to the San Diego Convention Center!

It didn't take us too long to realize that we had boarded the wrong ferry and ended up a good distance from where we wanted to be. HOWEVER! It was such a beautiful boat ride, I don't think either of us was too upset. It was just an adventure, and we did get a look at the USS Midway Museum.

Oh cool! I wish I would have known, we would have stopped by. We didn't make it over to the interactive zone, but it looked really neat when we saw it from the top of the library.