Downtown San Diego might be a bit more laid back than other big cities, but it’s still a bustling place. And so it feels good once in a while to just sit in a quiet, green place to relax.
Pantoja Park is a welcome patch of tranquility in the Marina District of downtown San Diego. Registered as a San Diego Historic Landmark, it was created in 1850 and is the city’s oldest park. The park was named after Don Juan Pantoja y Arriola, a Spanish navigator who drew the first map of San Diego Bay in 1782. A couple centuries ago ships would periodically enter the bay to supply the old Spanish presidio.
Fringed with gleaming skyscrapers, Pantoja Park today contains one notable sight: a statue of Benito Juarez, by Mexican artist Ernesto Tamariz, which was a gift to San Diego from the Mexican government in 1981.
I happened to walk through recently, so I took several pics…
UPDATE!
Here’s a better pic of the statue I took on a later date…
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so beautiful – i lived close by that park for 2 years before heading back to nyc. 🙂
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It would be a really great area to live!
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