San Diego Weekend and Plastic Fantastic
The weekend to San Diego started with a number of members leaving at different times on Friday.  I don't know how the morning or evening traffic was but I do know that the afternoon traffic to San Diego was heavy.  We arrived at the Holliday Inn "Harbor View" at 5:30 PM, after a 'go around the block again' we managed to find the entrance to the Inn.  Parking was covered and was adequate as were the accommodations.  Once settled in our room we tried to call a couple of the earlier arrivals.  Ah, no luck.  It seems that Ernie, Martha, Jerry, Georgia, Steve and Linda all went to the Del Coronado for dinner.   This left Joan and I to our own devices.  We decided to go for a nice leisurely walk (Note to Randy "Leisurely").  After several miles we found ourselves in the Gaslamp District.  Interesting area this place, at the turn of the century this was the infamous 'Red Light" District of San Diego.  Then as the years progressed it became a skid row, this area continued to change eventually becoming a hotbed of restaurants and night clubs much like 'Old Town' of Pasadena.  As we walked through this charming area we found that some of the left over denizens are still there to be seen.  Ok, so they still have a way to go but it was still fun.  As we searched for a nice restaurant low and behold we hear our names called.  As it turns out we ran into some old friends that live in San Diego and ended up having a wonderful evening of dinning with old friends.

Saturday morning we all met in the lobby of the hotel to discuss our options.

What evolved was that most of the members went on a run provided by Steve that took them on into the back country.  It was a short run and ended with lunch.  The remaining members chose to go for a walk down to the oceanfront and shopping.  The walking group consisted of Bob, Karen, Joan and Ansel (yes I like to walk).  Well what happens when you go for a walk with and old firefighter, you drag everyone into the  local Fire House Museum.  From there we continued to lunch  and on to the shops.

            

One thing to note is do not get in the way of a woman when she has jewelry on her mind, has a glazed look in her eye and a firm grip on the plastic card!  This is also a good time to mention that I drug Bob (unsuspectingly) into a little watch store.  I spotted a nice (very) looking wrist watch and asked to look at it.  While turning it over in my hands I asked the salesman how much was this nice little watch.  His reply was "it could be yours for the small amount of $38,000 (that's US Dollars)".  A trickle of sweat began running down my back as I placed the watch back in his hands and we beat a fast retreat to safety.

Later that afternoon we all got together and decided to go to dinner and looking around.  Again we walked...

The restaurant we chose was Anthony's Fish Grotto (thanks Bob) and it was good.  The pictures below show us waiting in the lobby and sitting at our table.  There were twelve of us and there was no problem seating us.  Steve was in heaven with his lobster and I think he fell asleep.

After dinner we walked on over (you got it, walked) to the Gaslamp District until it became apparent that a few of us were just plain tired.  In the picture below we see Randy getting a pick-me-up to make it back to the hotel.

It is now Sunday morning, the day of the big car show known as Plastic Fantastic.  I was out voted for leaving to go to the event real (real) early, so instead we left at 8 AM.  This proved to be the perfect time.  We were able to get registered and parked in fairly good time.  As I am still somewhat new to this game I signed up for the Concourse Division along with Jerry.  It wasn't until later that I found out that everyone else signed up for Peoples Choice.  As I was cleaning and cleaning and... I watched everybody march off to breakfast.  Well at least Joan stayed back to help which ultimately turned out for the best.  Below are many of the pictures I took of the car show.  We had a fun day.

PVCA took home a second place trophy in the Concourse Division and my thanks to Joan and the rest of the gang for all the support.  It was a fun, no it was a great day.

Now for the long ride home with a stop off for dinner.  /Ansel