Tag: beautiful

A glorious day as Balboa Park reopens!

The day that many in San Diego have anticipated for nearly three months has arrived!

Balboa Park is reopening!

During the coronavirus pandemic, the Central Mesa area of Balboa Park–the beloved center of San Diego’s cultural life–has been closed to the public. But that changes today! While most of the museums aren’t quite ready to open yet, visitors will again be able to amble down El Prado and enjoy the park’s sunshine, gardens and architectural beauty.

And a few places in the park will be open!

The world-famous San Diego Air and Space Museum will be open! So will the Visitor Center, the Prado Restaurant and the Japanese Friendship Garden’s Tea Pavilion! Visitors will notice that modifications have been made to ensure social distancing and generally increase public safety during the COVID-19 pandemic.

You can bet I’ll be heading to Balboa Park first thing after work today. And I’ll be there all weekend. I miss it so much.

Here are a few photographs from my rather inactive blog Beautiful Balboa Park. These photos were taken at sunrise on a summer day almost three years ago.

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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!

More pots filled with beauty for downtown!

I was walking down Cedar Street this morning when I noticed a worker had placed several large pots on the sidewalk at Third Avenue. In a trailer behind his truck were several beautiful plants.

The Downtown San Diego Partnership is adding even more beauty to the neighborhood!

UPDATE!

Here’s what it looked like when I walked past a few days later…

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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!

Stained glass panels beautify Paseo Santa Fe!

Take a look at this beautiful new public artwork in Vista, California!

Colorful stained glass mural panels, by artist Buddy Smith, are being installed along S. Santa Fe Avenue, between Vista Village Drive and Civic Center Drive. They’re part of the City of Vista’s ongoing Paseo Santa Fe green street improvement project.

A lot of public art has already been added to one section of S. Santa Fe Avenue, including many of these stained glass panels in new information kiosks. A once blighted part of downtown Vista is being revitalized!

I took photos of some finished panels as I walked around today. I saw depictions of Vista’s flowers, birds, natural landscapes, and historic places!

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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!

You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!

The sun rises again over San Diego.

The reliable sun rose again this morning. It cast its warm light over San Diego.

The sun promised to eventually climb above downtown skyscrapers.

Breathing in fresh air, moving between long shadows and seeping sunlight, I aimed my camera eastward and took a few photographs as I walked along the Embarcadero.

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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!

After the riot, the bright green of Spring.

This morning, during my walk to work, I witnessed a strange contrast.

I began by walking through downtown, heading down the length of the Gaslamp Quarter. I saw a few broken windows, many boarded up businesses, much graffiti.

After a crowd of thousands gathered downtown on Sunday, peacefully protesting the death of George Floyd while in the custody of Minneapolis police officers, a few hundred rioters brought chaos to our city after dark. These people moved at random down streets and around corners, vandalizing businesses and looting. A peaceful and quite powerful protest had been hijacked by a relative few and made ugly.

Later this morning, as I neared work, I walked a short distance along the San Diego River. The sun was up, illuminating the bright green growths of Spring.

A thought-provoking morning experience.

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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!

Patterned tile benches outside Santa Fe Depot.

Some very unique benches are arranged around the perimeter of the outdoor courtyard at downtown’s Santa Fe Depot. The courtyard, featuring a fountain near its center, is located directly south of the large passenger waiting room.

These tile benches present an eye-pleasing variety of colorful patterns. Upon closer inspection, you’ll notice their symmetric patterns are derived from the “cross” of the Santa Fe Railway logo, which consists of a cross inside a circle.

During an architectural tour of the Santa Fe Depot that I took a couple years ago, I learned these benches were installed in the 1980’s. I learned quite a lot during that special tour! If you want to read more about the historic train station, and about the original forecourt that existed a hundred years ago, long before these outdoor benches appeared, you can find images and descriptions from that architectural tour here.

For an example of the Santa Fe railroad’s logo, check out the next photo from that tour. It was taken inside the enormous and truly amazing passenger waiting room.

Now on to the outdoor benches…

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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!

You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!

A garden’s spring beauty–that none can see.

The Japanese Friendship Garden in Balboa Park is one of San Diego’s most beautiful places. Unfortunately, the coronavirus pandemic has closed the garden to the public temporarily.

It’s spring. The world is newly green. Leaves stretch skyward to drink in bright sunlight. Flowers bloom.

Even though our eyes cannot admire the garden at the present moment, there is absolutely no doubt its great beauty persists.

Let’s enjoy some photographs that I took in past springs at the Japanese Friendship Garden…

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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!

Photos for a very Happy Mother’s Day!

With these flower-filled photographs from all around San Diego, I wish all the Moms out there a very Happy Mother’s Day!

Hummingbird and flowers.

Field of Diamonds quilt, about 1860. The design is achieved by creatively combining hexagons.

Lady of the Garden, Veronica McFarland, acrylic. San Diego School of Creative and Performing Arts.

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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!

Oil painting the iconic Hotel del Coronado!

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One could make a convincing argument that the Hotel del Coronado is the second or third most iconic building in all of San Diego, after the California Tower in Balboa Park and perhaps the historic Mission San Diego de Alcalá.

The image of the uniquely grand and beautiful “Hotel Del” has been made famous in movies, on television, and through countless postcards sent around the world by enthralled tourists. Most people who think of Coronado immediately picture this impressive Victorian beach resort, the second largest wooden structure in the United States.

It’s said that The Wonderful Wizard of Oz author L. Frank Baum used the fanciful architecture of the Hotel del Coronado as his inspiration for the Emerald City. (He wrote several Oz books at a house he rented in winter a few blocks away. To see photos of that house, click here!)

A month ago I used graphic software to change some of my photos of the California Tower into digital oil paintings. Yesterday, as I walked around Coronado, it suddenly occurred to me that I might do the same with the picturesque Hotel del Coronado!

I’ve altered some old photographs and a couple of new ones to make them appear like oil paintings! Just for fun!

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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!

You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!

Bright, fantastic patterns in the city sky.

As an amateur photographer, I’m always looking for interesting photo opportunities as I walk about.

In downtown San Diego some fantastic images can be captured simply by turning my little camera skyward.

Bright reflection, shadow, and the grid-like windows of tall buildings produce strangely appealing patterns. The photographs that result can make what is familiar mysterious.

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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!