From my hotel room I could hear quite a number of sounds.
In addition to the hustle and bustle of India Street's restaurant scene,
dogs being walked some of which would bark,
the catholic church's chimes and
the sound of planes passing to the north on their approach to the airport,
Little Italy is close enough to the harbor to make out the blasts of boats
about to arrive at or depart from the piers at the base of Broadway.
With time I sure I would have begun to recognize the blasts of individual boats if not also their captains.
Actually there was one I thought I could pick out and it was that of the Cabrillo Ferry to Coronado.
After my late night and leisurely morning, I made my way mid-day down to the Broadway Pier
and caught the noon ferry to Coronado.
It was nice to get out on the water even if it was only on a ferry.
This was perhaps what I had put the highest on my list of things to do.
I ran short of time in January to give such a trip the time it needed.
Once on Coronado, I began my zig-zagging walk towards the Pacific.
My map showed four parks on the bay side of Coronado.
The
park at the ferry landing
was the biggest and I would have spent more time here
had it not been for my urge to get walking.
Harbor View Park was not much more than a nice view.
Bay View Park
was significantly better and sort of had a view of the
base,
but it's benches had no backs.
Shoreline Park no longer existed.
Making my way across the “island”
I found my first decent bench at Spreckels Park roughly midpoint between bay and ocean.
At Sunset Park there was another, but who's going to sit when
the Pacific Ocean is at your feet?
Meandering down the beach I took in
the waves and the hazy view of Point Loma behind them,
gulls with help from the wind
making a mess
of people's neatly piled items
and of course the
Hotel Coronado.
After
getting the finger
from a hermit crab in the rocks,
I found a place to sit in the public areas of the hotel grounds.
Wondering how long I should spend enjoying the atmosphere,
I took time to eat a little of the food I had brought with me,
make some notes in my journal,
determine that the sunset wouldn't be worth photographing and
rekindle my desire to be on the move again.
Since I had not come across Coronado by the main drag, Orange Avenue,
So I meandered it's sidewalks for a while before catching a bus back to San Diego.
It's benches were good, but positioned in such a way that,
while not uncommon, presents a problem for me.
The benches either looked directly into parked cars and the traffic beyond
or across the sidewalk into a store window or concrete wall.
I understand that some city planner is trying to create a buffer
between sidewalk and street traffic with trees and things that can go between them,
but I want my bench to look out onto the sidewalk and street together.
If you sit at the street side of the sidewalk facing out,
you have people streaming behind you and can find yourself staring into the side of an SUV.
If you sit there facing the buildings you are missing so much of the activity in the street and beyond it.
With some daylight remaining, I decided to tackle the hill near Old Town which is topped by the
Presidio.
Here unknown dead of the 1769 “sacred expedition” are buried—the country's first unknown soldiers.
I'm guessing they were killed in conflict with the natives.
If anyone knows something detailed about this let me know;
my searches so far have come up lacking.
Having enjoyed the view and entertained thoughts about how my favorite military engineer,
Thaddeus Kosciuszko,
might have enjoyed fortifying the city,
I made my way once again through Old Town.
If you notice that I have passed through here often
it is because Old Town is a well situated location,
an obvious first site for settlement and a major mass transit hub to this day.
Indeed the next day I would be here again catching a bus to Point Loma.
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