Old Town, San Diego

While in planning for our trip to San Diego, Bryan kept insisting that we visit “Old Town”.

I had no clue what Old Town was but Bryan set aside an entire day to take me there – and I'm glad he did!

Old Town is a California state park done in the style of a Spanish missionary village. Its a tourist attraction, a shopping area, and a historical distract.  It covers about a half mile and hosts Mexican restaurants, craftsman, a general store, outside cafes, and various gift shops with an array of souvenirs and handmade goods.

Bryan took me in to Old Town through the most unassuming side door and right into a cactus lined plaza. Bryan absolutely hates shopping but he let me go into every single shop one by one to check out all of the interesting sights.

The first shop was a copper artisan. My mum loves all things copper and I thought about picking up a gift for her but the simplest copper decorative was $80 (I love my mum but I need to eat too!) Then we saw a cactus gardener but how does one carry a cactus on an airplane?

Our third stop was a large store full of different odds and ends, jewelry, clothes, decorations, candy, and souvenirs. Bryan and I both ended up buying gifts from here.

Bryan bought himself a painted candy skull from Mexico. As for me, I bought a soft wool shawl (Bryan helped me pick it out), a cowboy boot shaped shot glass (for my mom), 3 fruit flavored candies with scorpions in the middle (for my co-workers), and a tequila flavored sucker with a worm in the middle (to go with my mom's shot glass).

Weighed down with our gifts, we ambled around Old Town. We ended up in the old-fashioned General Store where we bought couple of cold drinks (Coca-Cola for me and a Ginger Beer for Bryan).  In the General Store, behind the counter, were shelves and shelves filled with jars of black licorice in every shape you could imagine. They had licorice pipes, rolls, spiders, dogs, sharks, the whole shebang of shapes and sizes.

Once we'd had our drinks, we decided to sit awhile on the General Store's rocking chairs and admire the village square. That morning an elementary field trip was visiting Old Town.

After finishing our drinks, we decided to go look into one of the cabin-like shops that line the square. There was a cabin to the right of the General Store, tucked behind a very silly replica of a covered wagon. We went inside to discover it was a silver jeweler. The shopkeeper was a small Latino man with a very amicable face. He greeted us enthusiastically and offered us ½ off anything in the store. He explained to us it was the off season for tourist and most of the store was last year's stock, and let's face it, elementary students don't usually buy a whole lot of jewelry.

I've always liked turquoise since I was a girl and my family visited the southwest. The silver jeweler had several nice pieces of turquoise that I was admiring when Bryan tapped me on the shoulder.

'How about these?'

Bryan was holding up a set of blue opal studs. (I should at this point mention that Bryan has very good taste in clothing and jewelry, which is great because I lack a sense of style.) I adored the earrings and I agreed with Bryan that they were perfect. With the shopkeeper's discount our pretty little find was only $15.

I put the new earrings in immediately. We started wondering around Old Town (trying to avoid the school trippers). We stopped by several museums – including the Western Union museum. We had fun checking out the stagecoach and sending messages to each other from across the room via telegraphs. To add to the old western décor of the room was a modern ATM.

Next we checked out the jailhouse where we took turns locking each other up in the cells.

We saw a couple of shops (an overpriced handmade soaps and candle store and a Chinese imports store that sold very pretty jade figurines.)

By now we'd passed over several candy stores and toy shops without stopping (of course they were swarmed with children). The shops were starting to blend together but Bryan wanted to check out just one more that we saw had handmade ponchos and masks.

The last shop we visited was full of ponchos done up with a ton of sports teams and vibrant colors. As well, there were lucha libre masks.

Our friend Dan K. is a huge wrestling fan, so Bryan just knew a lucha libre mask would thrill our buddy. Bryan picked out a green and silver mask with a spiky Mohawk (I have to admit the pair of us were giggling like manics as we tried on various wrestling masks).

The day by now had turned hot and uncomfortable so we decided it was time to escape to the beach – but not before one last treat.

In a plaza adjacent to the town square was a couple of outdoor Mexican restaurants. A live mariachi band was playing and singing as the outside grills poured out delicious food.  The smell was fantastic, plus the sights and sounds were a feast for the senses.

While I don't think I could recapture the delight of discovering Old Town, I would be happy to take others there to enjoy the simple pleasures it offers.