Vacation 2003

SAK and JGT Take a Vacation and Even Enjoy It

Click on the sometimes grainy thumbnails to see larger and beautifully enhanced images.

Scenes from the Road, to and Fro
Our tour vehicle (don't click, it doesn't get bigger) was JGT's RAV4.	This shot proves JGT let SAK drive at least a bit. No drivers were harmed.	This is the kind of stuff we saw. There were even some purple mountain majesties, but very few fruited plains, other than Dateland, an actual place, with actual date palms!
Prickly Pear Fruit, good enough to eat, but too prickly to pick	Much of the desert looked like this part	This parade of windmills is one of dozens lined up on high hills across from the prickly pears
How could anyone call this boring scenery?	I-10 parallells train tracks almost the whole way across, and we saw some mighty fine freights	Suna means sand dunes. Lotsa suna here.
Artsy view of one of the signs warning against dust storms, near a rain storm	Heading from sun to clouds	It rained in the desert on our way back--we were in the remnants of the eye of a hurricane
Sightseeing in San Diego
Ocean Beach pier--typical morning hazy weather	Yep, people were swimming and "sunning" but we never actually got our feet wet.	The city from the pier.
There were people actually fishing, gutting fish and all that stuff; we watched.	Us, ain't we cute.	Apparently that's Coronado behind SAK
Danger! No access due to rampant construction tape!	JGT finally found an angle where you couldn't see that there was construction work going on.	Was a bit cloudy in Point Loma too, but pretty nonetheless
Danger! No access due to rampant construction tape!	There were some pretty bizarre plants out on this spit of land!
Zoo Day
OK, off we go to Balboa Park and the San Diego Zoo...lotsa photos	The Arboretum, where SAK gushed over plants a lot	The most beautiful orchid, which we both liked
A begonia, which SAK liked	The Venus Fly trap, which JGT liked	This koi looks so eerily 3D
A begonia, which SAK liked	Some rather spectacular larkspur--oooh, the colors	The koi were so bright se had to wear shades
Now we are at the zoo, where there were many cool reptiles	The colors on this one are lovely. All these were taken through glass, but still look pretty good	This was a bit blurry, so it got artsy-fied
Now we are at the zoo, where there were many cool reptiles	This looks like a National Geographic photo!	Sleepy baby
This was a HUGE albino anaconda--raised in captivity. How beautiful.	Hard to believe these are the real colors, but they are.	Some disease had most of the birds in quarantine, but we did get so see some doozies
	This one was SAK's favorite	Our vigilant friends the meerkats, always on watch.
Now for lots and lots of apes for Declan. These guys were SO graceful.	The orangutans were having a great day	These guys were ready to go play
Up, up up	The playful pair	If you look closely, you will see that Big Daddy here is catching ants in that mound on a stick, just like on TV.
The gorillas were also playful and active when we were there	Big Daddy Silverback	The one at the top is trying to keep her bamboo toy away from the others
A real no-nonsense guy	Wondering where the bamboo toy went	These guys were just hungry
Note the left camel has a deflated hump	These kopeki have teeny feet	Apparently, this koala had not moved for hours
Ah, the quiet life	This one was pacing in front of the glass	We think this is the photo that irritated him and caused him to try to attack JGT when he turned to leave. Yay plexiglass.
Underwater photo magic	The weather was nice under there, I guess	The strangest animals...
Friends of JGT
Billy and Cindy were our gracious hosts, along with Luke and Sela	Sela=not shy	Check for family resemblance... (can't believe I didn't get a photo of Luke. assume he is cute.)
Very patient JGT got to do this MANY times.	Visiting Wayne. We wanted to be sure and get as many wall colors in as possible--they had a real cool house	This time, with Esther, too.
We sure surprised Tom!		At Tristan's house
A Man in His Element with His Friends
JGT surprised Koko Loco out by the marina and got to play the cool new guitar	Way too much fun was had when they actually invited him...	Either hitting a very high note or a very low note
Reunited with Jerry at last	Reunited with Sannon, too	Everybody here's known each other for 20 years but SAK--well, she's known Elvis a long time
Oh look, it's Roger--some excellent surprises for JGT!	SAK was coerced into posing under the hard lemonade sign with her beverage	believe it or not, this is just a selection...