Author: Richard Schulte

Downtown San Diego has been my home for many years. My online activities reflect my love for writing, blogging, walking and photography.

Ukrainian Festival adds joy to Balboa Park!

A lively, joyful celebration of Ukrainian culture was held today in San Diego. The House of Ukraine’s big Ukrainian Festival drew an enthusiastic crowd to the International Cottages in Balboa Park!

Several artists on the lawn smiled and showed their art for sale. A couple of booths raised money for charitable causes. Much of the money raised during the festival would go toward providing relief to war-torn Ukraine.

After grabbing authentic Ukrainian food, such as kovbasa sandwiches and varenyky, families sat on the lawn and watched folk dancing and listened to traditional music.

I took these photographs…

A big crowd gathered at Balboa Park’s International Cottages for the House of Ukraine’s 2023 lawn program.

Sales of treats at one table raised money for the Ukrainian School of San Diego.

Two smiling artists were selling great artwork with a Ukraine theme.

Cheerful artwork by Svitlana Ivasyuk includes sunflowers.

Fun artwork by Orysya Barua includes traditional Ukrainian dress.

The next two people you see were raising money to help Ukraine during its present difficulties.

On the left is Daniel Bondarenko, who was promoting Healing Scalpel. The organization is sending medical supplies to Ukrainian field hospitals during the war.

On the right is artist Kateryna Marchuk. Sales of her art go to emergency supplies for Ukraine. Check out her fine art here.

People walk around the House of Ukraine cottage.

Signs around the cottage concern the invasion of Ukraine and the defense of Freedom.

A big line waits to purchase Ukrainian food during the festival.

Lots of tasty items on the menu!

Some crafts and souvenirs for sale. Money raised helps Ukraine.

House of Ukraine’s rock band u3zubmusic performs before the 2 o’clock cultural program begins.

Chamber Music Ensemble of the University of San Diego performs the Ukrainian National Anthem and other traditional songs on stage.

Here come the folk dancers! They are the Chervona Kalyna Ukrainian Dance Group out of Los Angeles.

Performing a joyful Welcoming Dance.

A hospitable welcome includes a big loaf of bread!

Young people dressed as Cossacks arrive.

Ukrainians love dancing!

The audience is then treated to traditional Bandura music.

Soulful singing during the 2023 Ukrainian Festival in San Diego!

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!

Painting a fierce panda mural in North Park!

A very cool mural is now being painted on one side of the Shank & Bône Vietnamese restaurant in North Park! Up on a cherry picker, Thao Huynh French of Mindful Murals was spray painting bold color around two large, very fierce panda bears! She saw me and waved!

You’ve seen Mindful Murals artwork on my blog several times over the years. It’s always great and often inspirational!

I learned this awesome panda art got started about a week ago. It’s a collaboration with Los Angeles artist Aaron Martin.

As we spoke for a moment, Thao (@thaofrenchart) explained that the adjoining mural LAHAINA LOVELETTER, depicting a rooster, was by her partner in art Kolten French (@koltenfrench)!

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!

Battling for stickball’s The Jillie in San Diego!

A little San Diego drizzle on an early September morning couldn’t stop 16 stickball teams from battling for The Jillie Championship Trophy!

Three days of competition during Labor Day weekend, on three asphalt “fields” in Little Italy, will determine the ultimate champion. Teams have traveled to San Diego from New York, Florida and Puerto Rico to have their name engraved as winners on The Jillie!

I walked down to Little Italy this morning to view several hard-fought games. Batters were concentrating, smashing the ball, sprinting, or sadly fouling or striking out. Fielders were making great catches and throws, occasionally flubbing or misfiring. Taunts and encouragement filled the air as a brotherhood of stickball players shook hands, win or lose.

Head down to Little Italy in downtown San Diego all this Labor Day weekend to watch the action for yourself! You’ll find the main field of battle in front of the San Diego Firehouse Museum at the intersection of Columbia Street and Cedar Street.

Enjoy these photographs…

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!

Fun street art and signs from various walks.

This morning, before I head out to watch the big stickball tournament in Little Italy, I’m going through hundreds of old, unused photographs stored on my computer. All are from various past walks. A few of the photos are so old I’ve forgotten when and where they were taken!

Here are the fun pictures of street art and signs that I’d like to share. It would be a shame not to post them!

A very colorful East Village mural.

He who plants a garden plants happiness.

Sunshine on a Little Italy window by @artbysoup.

Sunshine, surf and surfboard in Oceanside behind the Regal Cinemas.

Voted #1 ice cream in the world by my daughters.

Street art by Jorge Mendoza.

dreamer @nestmurals

Oceanside chalk art on a sidewalk.

Long live the rose that grew from concrete -Tupac Shakur

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!

Massing of the Colors to honor Vietnam Veterans.

A patriotic Massing of the Colors event is returning to San Diego this October. The grand procession of flags will feature from 40 to 50 Color Guards from around our region, and will honor Vietnam Veterans, as 2023 marks the 50th Anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War.

The 67th Annual Massing of the Colors and Service of Remembrance, presented by the San Diego Chapter of The Military Order of the World Wars, is free and open to the public. The many Color Guards will assemble in Balboa Park’s Spreckels Organ Pavilion on October 14th, and the ceremony will commence at 10:30 am.

This year is also the 125th Anniversary of the famous march Stars and Stripes Forever. John Philip Sousa marches will be played by San Diego Civic Organist Raul Prieto Ramírez during the procession as it enters and exits the pavilion. The event is co-sponsored by the Spreckels Organ Society.

If you know of a Color Guard in San Diego that would like to participate, use the contact email shown in the graphic below.

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!

Cool photo memories from September 2018.

Here we go! Another month . . . another blog post about cool sights I photographed five years ago! What did I discover during September 2018?

A variety of astonishing things!

Such as eye-popping sand sculptures created by some of the world’s greatest sand sculptors! And the daredevil Swoop Freestyle World Championship on San Diego Bay! And the incredible, realistic Viking Festival in Vista!

Perhaps you’ve noticed how over the years I’ve photographed numerous murals in City Heights along University Avenue, between I-805 and I-15. Five years ago my first blog concerning this outdoor drive-thru art gallery appeared.

Check out the upcoming links!

Click the following links to enjoy many photographs…

Masterpieces by World Master sand sculptors!

Javier Marín and the human search for identity.

San Diego’s outdoor, drive-through art gallery!

A beautiful walk along Batiquitos Lagoon Trail.

Photos of restored rooms inside Casa de Estudillo.

Art, Color and Fiesta in Balboa Park!

Photos of Swoop Freestyle World Championship!

SMILE, you’re in San Diego!

Murals by Hugo Crosthwaite at Liberty Station.

Photos of Vista’s Annual Viking Festival!

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!

A mysterious little garden in Grantville!

A mysterious little garden can be found on the south side of San Diego’s Grantville neighborhood. It occupies a sliver of land at the corner of Fairmount Avenue and Alvarado Canyon Road–between a chain link fence and the channel that contains Alvarado Creek. Some homeless people appear to live nearby.

When was this small garden created? By whom? Why?

It appears this unusual garden, containing many cheerful flowers and plants, and a saintly statue, and a happy scarecrow, might memorialize a loved one.

Here are some photos that I took late yesterday as I walked down the sidewalk…

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X (formerly known as Twitter)!

Ten year anniversary of Cool San Diego Sights!

WordPress notified me just now that my blog Cool San Diego Sights is celebrating its 10 year anniversary today.

Ten years? Good grief! That means I’m already ten years older!

It’s been fun so far. Hopefully there’s much more to come!

Back when I started Cool San Diego Sights, I didn’t imagine these posts I publish in my spare time, using photographs taken with a rather old camera, could end up on popular news apps like Google News and Newsbreak. Believe me, if you’ve discovered my posts in those places and wonder how they possibly rate as news articles, don’t ask me. As I understand it, it’s all determined by mysterious algorithms. Take my blog for what it is. A curious guy walking around San Diego taking photos!

But what a wonderful opportunity to express my love for my city.

And a great opportunity to meet all sorts of interesting people, too!

Perhaps I’m most thankful that Cool San Diego Sights has allowed many people to discover my Short Stories by Richard website. As a consequence, my short story One Thousand Likes is now included in a 12th Grade textbook, and part of at least one English Literature course at a major international university.

Ten years ago I had no conception such a thing might happen. If there’s a lesson here, it’s that persistence can pay off. Never lose hope!

Once again, thanks to those of you who swing by Cool San Diego Sights from time to time for a few moments of enjoyment. I keep learning new things. I hope you make a few fun discoveries, too!

Onward!

Richard

P.S. I spied a mysterious garden today in a very unexpected place. That’s coming up!

Labor Day stickball returns to Little Italy!

Young player on the Sidewalk Slammers team takes a swing during the early innings of a fungo-style stickball game.

Big news! After several years’ absence, the big Labor Day weekend stickball tournament is returning to the streets of Little Italy!

This will be the 25th Annual Labor Day Stickball Tournament, and will run all this long weekend, September 2 – 4. It appears there will be 17 or 18 teams competing, according to the San Diego Stickball Facebook page.

Come on down to Little Italy and look for the action! These tournaments are very entertaining to watch! And the players mean business!

The event has a fundraiser here to pay for the necessary permits, and to help a special family. This year’s theme is called “Fallen Heroes Stickball Tournament.” A few family members of a hero lost in battle will Honor him by participating in this year’s event.

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

Our amazing Balboa Park forever in transition.

One of the most wonderful aspects of Balboa Park is its dynamism. Every day, with every walk, new discoveries come into view.

This evening, as the sun cast lengthening shadows, I wandered about photographing a park that is always in transition, forever new.

A new exhibition of Korean art is coming to the San Diego Museum of Art.

One end of the Botanical Building’s steel structure has been renovated.

New love, perhaps?

Inflating the huge screen at the Spreckels Organ Pavilion for Silent Movie Night.

What’s coming next at the Casa Del Prado Theater?

Painting patio tiles at Spanish Village Art Center.

Flowers fall away as new flowers appear..

Walking into the light through one wonderful park.

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!