Tag: events

House of Taiwan hosts exhibit in Balboa Park!

Did you know the House of Taiwan is one of the newest members of the International Cottages in Balboa Park? I learned today that they joined the House of Pacific Relations International Cottages in August!

Today they hosted an exhibit in the Hall of Nations for their very first time, and wow, what great displays! The history and culture of Taiwan was celebrated with all sorts of information, traditional crafts and art objects, a film, and even treats! (I sampled an imported pastry-like buttery fènglí sū (鳳梨酥), or pineapple cake, for which Taiwan is famous. Yum!)

I met some super nice people and took a few photographs of the event.

I see the House of Taiwan has a website and they are already very active in the community. Check out their site here!

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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.

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A free Phantom of the Opera concert in San Diego!

A great free concert will be held in San Diego this coming Saturday, October 25, 2025. Just in time for Halloween, The Phantom of the Opera in Concert will be performed in Balboa Park at the Spreckels Organ Pavilion!

The 75 minute concert will begin 6:30 pm, but you might want to arrive early for the best seats. The concert will feature soprano Laynee Dell and tenor Cole Tornberg and include popular music from Phantom of the Opera and spectacular organ solos with spooky projections on the front of the Pavilion!

Audience members are encouraged to come in costume! You’ll be able to get your photos taken with the artists on stage!

This very special concert is presented by the Spreckels Organ Society.

How awesome!

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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.

Feel free to share!

House of England celebrates Jane Austen’s 250th Birthday!

The House of England in Balboa Park celebrated the 250th birthday of Jane Austen today!

Dressed in Regency attire, members of the Jane Austen Society of North America San Diego Region assembled outside the House of England cottage and listened to beautiful music performed by Amanda Fagan. Many of the ladies were wearing bonnets!

Jane Austen was a major literary figure who wrote such famous novels as Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, and Emma. Songwriter and prolific creator Amanda Fagan (@amandafaganofficial) entertained everyone with original compositions inspired by Jane Austen novels!

I learned that Amanda Fagan is writing a screenplay for a musical based on Austen’s satirical novel Northanger Abbey. I suspect it will include a good deal of humor! See her YouTube page here.

Inside the House of England cottage they were serving Victoria sponge cupcakes and scones with proper British jam and cream, and, of course, a cup of tea. I noticed that a few displays in the cottage pay tribute to Jane Austen and her importance to world literature.

Heading into the cottage…

Back outside. (Did they have smartphones at the turn of the 19th century?)

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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.

Feel free to share!

Native American Heritage Festival in Escondido!

The First Annual Native American Heritage Festival was held this afternoon in Escondido’s Grape Day Park.

The free community event was hosted by the Native Youth Foundation and featured Native American culture, education, crafts, food, music and fun for the entire family.

The festival brought together tribes from around the Southern California region to honor Indigenous Peoples’ Day. It was a celebration of Native voices shaping the future.

I came by in the late afternoon as the festival was kicking off. When I departed about an hour later, a good crowd had gathered for this inaugural event.

I enjoyed listening to the Campo Bird Singers, visiting various booths and eating crispy tacos.

What are some of the things I learned?

I learned the people in the next photo represent Volunteer Escondido. They’re neighbors who come together to help build a stronger community and enhance the quality of life for all!

You can visit their website here! Check out their event calendar and perhaps you can participate as a volunteer in their good work!

I was interested to learn from the next group of smiling people that there is a National Native American Hall of Fame!

The organization, with its headquarters in Oklahoma City, honors Native American achievements in contemporary society, from the 1860s to present day!

Visit their website here! There are various ways that you can support them!

Look! More friendly people at the next booth!

They represent the La Jolla Generations Program, a tribal youth program of the La Jolla Band of Luiseño Indians.

They would be demonstrating basketmaking later during the festival!

In the late morning, the Campo Bird Singers were on stage performing traditional, sacred Bird Songs.

Lots of tasty food, including carne asada and Kumeyaay frybread!

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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.

Feel free to share!

Chalk art at Galbani Bella Vita Fest in Little Italy!

Artist team Brianna Cunha.

Check out this collection of photos! My camera was aimed at amazing chalk art at this weekend’s Galbani Bella Vita Fest in Little Italy!

The festival, produced by the ArtWalk San Diego team, is similar to the old Festa events held in San Diego’s Little Italy neighborhood years ago. In addition to chalk artists decorating several blocks of India Street, there’s plenty of Italian culture, including food, live music and wine tasting.

The public can stroll through the festival for free, which many people were doing this Saturday afternoon!

Dozens of chalk artists have arrived from all over, including from out-of-state. Most are friendly and welcome a few words from admirers.

The event continues Sunday, October 19, 2025 from 11 am to 5 pm. Consequently, many of the artists when I walked by were still at work on their colorful chalk masterpieces!

Here are some of the Italy-themed chalk art creations, most of which are works in progress. I’ve included artist team names in the photo captions…

Artist team Graceful Meadow.
Artist team Cecelia Linayao Fine Art.
Artist team Madonnara.
Artist team The Kim Sisters.
Artist team Kimberly Canilang.
Artist team Shawdell Smith Art.
Artist team Team Arcala.
Artist team MDFerrera Fine Art.
Artist team Tonie Garza.
Artist team Meg Beverly Canilang.
Artist team Gutierrez Family.
Artist team Steele Canyon High School.
Artist team Maddalena & Rogalski.
Artist team Kat Brown.

Look who else was present at the festival. Friendly people representing KPBS!

They told me they could use a little extra help now that federal government funding has ended. Check out their website if you’d like to help.

And a few tables down India Street I found ArtReach! They engage youth with art education and paint beautiful murals all over San Diego. You’ve seen many on my blog.

People passing by had created small works of art at their table, too!

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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.

Feel free to share!

Scary signs Halloween approaches San Diego!

Attention! Beware! Halloween is creeping ever closer! It’s steadily drawing nearer, nearer…

Halloween is destined to arrive in San Diego in merely two weeks!

Are you ready to encounter spooky ghosts, crafty witches, thirsty vampires and undead zombies? Have you stocked up on candy?

Looking around, it seems the entire city is preparing for Halloween. Ominous signs are everywhere. You see omens of the approaching day in shop windows, front yards, public spaces…

For the past couple weeks I’ve been photographing Halloween stuff that I’ve encountered.

Can you identify a few of the places where I took these photos?

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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.

Feel free to share!

Memories on the 250th birthday of the U.S. Navy.

Today is officially the 250th birthday of the United States Navy. On October 13, 2025, the U.S. Navy was established by the Continental Congress.

Needless to say, the Navy has a very large presence in San Diego, with important bases that include Naval Base San Diego, Naval Base Point Loma, Naval Air Station North Island (where naval aviation was born), and Naval Amphibious Base Coronado. Over the years, countless sailors trained at the old Naval Training Center San Diego, and have deployed from San Diego’s harbor on ships in both wartime and peacetime. Until 1997, Top Gun pilots trained at Naval Air Station Miramar.

I’ve published a wide variety of blogs concerning the U.S. Navy in San Diego. Given today’s 250th anniversary, I thought this would be a good time to revisit some of those past blog posts.

Click the following links to bring back some U.S. Navy memories…

Creating a plaque: Navy history in San Diego revealed!

History of recruits at Naval Training Center San Diego.

The Ship’s Bell mosaic at Liberty Station.

Inside the Navy’s landlocked USS Recruit training ship!

Nautical History Gallery & Museum opens!

The Naked Warrior stands in Coronado park.

Chow: Feeding a Navy in San Diego.

Coronado’s surprising role in submarine history.

Top Gun fans vs. reality on USS Midway!

Monument to tallest structures ever built in San Diego.

Bronze plaque marks birthplace of naval aviation.

Memories of the Greatest Generation at Liberty Station.

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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.

Feel free to share!

Day of the Dead and early San Diego residents.

Another year is passing by. In a couple of weeks, Day of the Dead (Día de los Muertos) will be observed. Loved ones who’ve passed on from this life will be remembered.

The gravesites at El Campo Santo in Old Town are decorated already. Every early resident of San Diego buried here is remembered with flowers, papel picado, Day of the Dead skulls… Every person here was loved by someone.

This small cemetery is the final resting place of so many different people: the Kumeyaay, Spanish, Mexican, American. Newborn babies, the elderly. The rich, the poor. Public figures, unknown people. The lucky, the unlucky. Victims of old age, disease, accident, violence, injustice.

Mortals all.

Every one was loved by someone.

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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.

Feel free to share!

Polar research sailboat Persévérance in San Diego!

Have you seen the enormous sailboat Persévérance docked in San Diego?

I saw the amazing boat this morning. It was a little north of the Maritime Museum of San Diego. I was told it has been in San Diego the past few days.

The Persévérance is a research vessel operated by world-renowned French explorer and polar expedition pioneer Jean-Louis Étienne.

According to a map displayed on the boat, the 2025-2026 Jean-Louis Étienne and Elsa Pény-Étienne’s Expedition has has already visited Greenland and the Arctic region via the Northwest Passage. After leaving the West Coast it will cross the Pacific Ocean and head south to study Antarctica!

The unique oceanographic schooner gathers data on climate and ocean currents, visits Marine Protected Areas, and seeks to analyze human impact on the oceans. Marine Protected Areas on the itinerary include Clipperton, French Polynesia, Ross Sea, and the proposed Dumon d’Urville MPA in East Antarctica.

I asked whether there will be public tours of this remarkable sailboat, but was told, unfortunately, no.

If you’d like to learn more, here’s the Persévérance website!

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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.

Feel free to share!

Borrego Springs artist’s sculptures in San Diego!

People in downtown San Diego have a special treat this weekend! Four metal sculptures by Ricardo Breceda (whose famous landmark sculptures can be seen around Borrego Springs) are on display in front of the San Diego County Administration Building!

Check it out!

There are two bighorn sheep about to butt horns, a giant coiling rattlesnake, and a fierce dinosaur on a flatbed! They’re on display in the sunshine on the grass near Harbor Drive. You can’t miss them!

Ricardo Breceda’s sculptures in Borrego Springs have won the artist international renown. He brought these four pieces here so residents of San Diego can enjoy some of his work, and so everyone is hopefully inspired to head out to the desert where over 130 of his incredible sculptures can be viewed. Here’s his website.

(Five years ago I photographed his Wild Horses public art installation in Vista, California. You can see those photos here!)

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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.

Feel free to share!