SAN DIEGO

 Left Honolulu on Hawaiian Airlines, and truly enjoyed our 5.5 hour flight.

Began with some bubblies, the  Johnny Walker Black Label and beer with brunch of fruits, pork sausage and egg soufle with a musubi.

Saw the movie The Holiday, an okay film given 51/80 ratings from Rotten Tomatoes.

Got into San Diego.

A replica of the Spirit of St. Louis is here because Charles Lindberg's plane was build here.

View from our Marriott Marquis room at sunset.

Went down for our free wines, then to M Club for some snacks.

Creative assemblage of colorful vegetables.

Yellow and purple carrots, gold and purple broccoli, purple turnips and green cheese.

I haven't been to San Diego for at least a couple decades.

• Historically the home to the Kumeyaay people, for they migrated here at least 9,000 years ago, and has been referred to as the Birthplace of California.

• 
  In 1542, Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo claimed the area for Spain, and named the site San Miguel.
• In 1602, Spanish explorer Sebastian Vizcaino name the bay and surrounding area San Diego de Alcala.
• The permanent European colonization of this area began in 1769.
• In 1821, became part of Mexico when they gained independence from Spain.
• Following the Mexican-American War, reverted back to the U.S. in 1848.  California became the 31st state in 1850.

• 
  In the late 1860s, Alonzo Horton built New Town, which later became downtown San Diego.
• Remained as a backwater town until the arrival of a railroad connection in 1878.

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  San Diego hosted the World's Fair twice, both in Balboa Park, the largest urban park in the USA.
• The Panama-California Exposition in 1915.  The exotic animals provided the basis for the San Diego Zoo.
• The California Pacific International exposition in 1935.
• This I never heard before, but...

...During the final months of the war, the Japanese had a plan to target multiple U.S. cities for biological attack, starting with San Diego. The plan was called "Operation Cherry Blossoms at Night" and called for kamikaze planes filled with fleas infected with plague (Yersinia pestis) to crash into civilian population centers in the city, hoping to spread plague in the city and effectively kill tens of thousands of civilians. The plan was scheduled to launch on September 22, 1945, but was not carried out because Japan surrendered five weeks earlier.^[58][59][60]

• 
  In 1962 at age of 32 Tom Hom became the first Asian American member of the San Diego City Council.^[62]  He would be succeeded by Leon Williams, the first Black member of the city council.^[63] Hom became mayor in 1967.

• In 1911, the first tuna cannery was founded, making San Diego the tuna capital of the world through the 1970s.  However, foreign competition was suh that the last of the canneries closed early in the 1980s.
• There was considerable naval presence until the end of the Cold War.

• 
  San Diego has since become a center of emerging biotech, and is home to t4elecommunications giant Qualcomm.
• Tourism has grown with the popularity of the San Diego Zoo, SeaWorld and Legoland in Carlsbad.

• 
  It is the 8th most populous state in the USA, with a population of 1.4 million.  The metropolitan areas has 3.3 million, but the San Diego-Tijuana region is home to 5 million.  However, San Diego has experienced negative net migration since 2004.
• The average temperature is 71F, and there is low annual rainfall of 9-13 inches.  Hawaii rains 6 times more.
• Once NFL and NBA teams, but the the only remaining major team is the San Diego Padres.

• Some fun facts.
• The top employer is the U.S. Navy.
• Produces the most avocados in the U.S.
• Has the most farms in a city with 7,000.
• Has more fleas than any other city in the USA/\.
• Imports 168 million gallonso f freshwater daily.
• WD-40 was invented here.

• 
  The first drive-in restaurant in the U.S. was opened here by the Robert Peterson, who later founded Jack in the Box in 1951
• A video on 12 facts about San Diego you probably didn't know.

Tomorrow, the San Diego Zoo.

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