A Balboa Park Story

I have been on a half-successful mission this summer to explore more of the city around me. One of the things I did a couple weekends ago was visit the famous and wonderful Balboa Park in San Diego. It's a sprawling park with a number of open amphitheaters, gardens, museums, and other things to amuse you. Seriously, I spent almost six hours there and I feel like I barely made a dent in the place. And it was a beautiful, sunny day, so that didn't really hurt either.

This is the enormous amphitheater where they have free organ concerts on weekends. I have never been here when there hasn't been a wedding party taking pictures all over the place.

There are street artists, magicians, musicians, etc. everywhere that are really good! I saw a high school kid do the most hilarious magic show I've ever seen. So good that I even felt the urge to come out of my Scrooge-y shell and give him a couple bucks at the end. Three guesses why I took this picture, though.

Lilly pond! Enough said! There were koi fish in there too.

They have this really cool exotic garden, and I wanted to include like half the plants I saw there, but seriously, I didn't want to bore you all with pictures of weird trees, so I stuck with this one, which is pretty sweet, right? "Snail" begonias! What I would give to have some of those growing in my yard.

The lovely obligatory fountain! I was probably the only person to manage getting a picture of this thing that didn't have kids running around in it, because let me tell you, those kids were having a right good time playing in this fountain, and it was all I could do not to join them myself.

All-in-all, it was a really fun day! And on my meager budget, it was perfect. I hope to have more adventures like it! Whimsic Alley, I'm talking to you.