Tales of the South Pacific - San Diego Pre Cruise

The Surfliner and San Diego

Saturday, September 27, 2025

Our South Pacific Cruise began way too early for Val and I.  We are taking the Amtrak Surfliner train to San Diego and it leaves just after 6:00 AM from San Luis Obispo.  We had to get up at 4:00 AM and neither one of us could get to sleep last night, so we only got around four hours of sleep, so we started our day very tired.

Val’s friend Marsha picked us up at 5:00 and we were on our way.  Marsha will be taking care of our house while we are gone and besides being very grateful for that, she went above and beyond to pick us up so early in the morning.  Thanks so much Marsha!!

It's very quiet at the San Luis Obispo Amtrak station early in the morning.

Finally we see the headlight of our train approaching, it's time to head to San Diego.

The train left right on time, and we started our trip south.  This is a very scenic route with the highlight being the train following the coast through Vandenburg Air Force Base, an area not accessible unless you are on the train.  Unfortunately, it was barely light as we passed through the area, so we really didn’t see much.

We opted for the business class car, so we had coffee, tea, juices and water available as well as some breakfast snacks that we really needed so early in the morning.

It was a seven-hour trip to San Diego and the time passed surprisingly fast.  We arrived in San Diego right on time just after three.  We gathered our luggage and made our way through the station and went outside to find a cab, and to our surprise, there were none there.  These days everyone uses Uber, so I guess the cabs don’t bother to show up.  Although Uber is available in our area, it doesn’t really work well because we are in a rural area so it is often difficult to find an Uber, so we haven’t even bothered with an account.  I had to call a cab company for a taxi, and one showed up shortly and took us to our hotel.

We are staying at the US Grant Hotel that is on the edge of San Diego’s Gaslamp Quarter.  The hotel is one of the oldest hotels in San Diego and is part of Marriott’s Luxury Collection.  It got its unusual name because one of Colorado’s first senators purchased the Horton House Hotel in San Diego for his daughter in 1895 and she was married to Ulyssess S Grant Junior.  She and her husband decided to tear down the original hotel in 1905 and built a new hotel that opened in 1910, and they named it the US Grant Hotel to honor his father.

This is a great hotel, and the service is unbelievably good, but the rooms are not the most comfortable we’ve had, but it’s still very nice.  After settling in and resting for a bit we opted for an early dinner as we were very tired.  We ate at The Grant Grill, the hotel restaurant and had an excellent dinner.  Val had salmon and I had scallops and they were both delicious.  My dinner had a carrot puree that was probably the best puree I’ve ever had.  As we were finishing our dinner the head chef happened to walk by and I told him how much I liked the puree and he went into great detail on how it was made; he was obviously very proud of that.

That was it for us, after dinner we went back to our room and called it an early night.  Rising at 4:00 AM after only four hours of sleep had left us exhausted and all we wanted to do was get some sleep.

San Diego

Sunday, September 28, 2025

Even though we were in bed by nine last night, we still slept in until almost nine this morning and woke up feeling very rested and ready to go.  After getting ready, we went down to the Grant Grill and had their Sunday Brunch.  It was good, but not nearly as good as our dinner last night.  We didn’t finish until after eleven and then walked around the area looking for a clothing store as Val realized she needed a belt as she hadn’t brought one with her.

From the looks of the area, it looks like the Gaslamp Quarter may be a kind of party area as there are lots of restaurants, bars and clubs.  It also looks like the area is a little down and out as it was a little run down and the stores seemed to have a lot of security. This is just our first impression, and it may be totally inaccurate about the area.  There were quite a few people walking around and we certainly didn’t feel like we were unsafe.

The US Grant Hotel.

After that we returned to the hotel and got some things ready for embarking on our cruise tomorrow and then relaxed for a while.

After eating a large late breakfast, we hadn’t bothered with lunch, but around four we both were getting hungry and decided to go out and look for a place to eat dinner.  We walked in a different direction into the heart of the Gaslamp District, and I must say I have a different view of the area than I wrote earlier.  This morning, we were on the edge of the district, but now we were walking into it and while it was an old area, it had a lot more character and was much more interesting with many restaurants, bars, clubs and entertainment venues.

We found a place called Noodle and Bun that looked interesting and decided to eat there.  They made their own noodles, and we could actually watch the person making them, it was a very interesting process, and it looked like it took a great deal of skill.  They started out with a long tube of dough and gradually it turned into many strands of noodles.

I chose to have a cucumber salad and chow mein, and Val had spicy won ton.  We shared our plates with each other, and it was all delicious, particularly the noodles.  After we finished, we continued our walk through the area.

This is my chow mein and it was delicious.

We came across a Mid-Eastern place called the Reina Bakery and Café and decided to go in and have some dessert.  I don’t know what it was called, but we shared a piece of cake that was a specialty of Abu Dabi and it was really good.  We also bought a sample of three types of Baklava, and they were all delicious.  By now, we were very full, and it was time to head back to the hotel.

Tomorrow is embarkation day, so we had to get our things together and get ready to head for the ship tomorrow.  After getting everything together, we relaxed for a while and called it a night.  We are really anxious to get this cruise under way.