The construction fences are down! The San Diego Natural History Museum’s new outdoor native garden has opened, and there’s a trail that follows the newly planted greenery around the museum!
Native plants, flowers and trees now abound, but since the garden is just getting started, most plants are small and the landscape appears a bit bare. Once everything is grown, the garden should be much more beautiful!
Right now there’s plastic fencing along the pathway, protecting the new plantings from careless visitors and dogs. It appears to be temporary.
Informative signs can be read along the looping trail, and smaller signs indicate the native species planted nearby. There’s a boulder-filled sitting area and short side trail, too, on the museum’s north side–you know, the side with the enormous Moreton Bay Fig.
The “Nat’s Nature Trail” features various themed segments. As you walk around the Natural History Museum building, you encounter Pollinator Paradise, Spiny Sidewalk, Boulder Garden, Discovery Path, Wildlife Walkway, First People’s Garden, and Container Corner.
What a great addition to an already amazing Balboa Park!
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Did you know there are beehives high up on an office building rooftop in San Diego? The beehives are atop the Pacific Center I building in Mission Valley, which rises on Frazee Road north of Friars Road.
I saw the above sign while walking near Pacific Center the other day. It explains how coexisting with bees in cities is easy and natural. This web page tells all about the beehives at Pacific Center, which were established on the roof in 2021. The bees, which collect pollen from miles around, are very gentle and thriving!
I see that many of the tenants are bee enthusiasts and have enjoyed jars of honey and created crafts with beeswax!
Very cool!
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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
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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 X.
Rob Hutsel, President and CEO of the San Diego River Park Foundation, provided a guided walking tour this morning that I and several others thoroughly enjoyed. He explained how in the next 6 to 8 weeks the River Center will really be taking shape, with many of its features finally completed.
He explained how the center will be an active outdoor classroom for thousands of San Diego school children–particularly Title 1 schools within a 15 minute drive, serving urban, less affluent communities.
The River Center is designed to welcome city kids who might have no real experience out in nature. They will be eased into the experience from the moment school buses arrive, enjoying presentations in a 100-seat amphitheater by the entry courtyard. I learned there will be animal encounters hosted by Joan Embery!
Kids will then walk past a waterfall, separate into smaller groups, and walk down nature trails, where they will learn about the environment and the San Diego River: its geology, history, flora and fauna.
If you’d like to go on one of these preview tours, you have the chance tomorrow–Sunday, May 19–between 9:30 am and 11:30 am. Check out the San Diego River Days website for more information here!
In September there will be a big Grand Opening celebration! Stay tuned!
Construction gate at the future entrance to the River Center at Grant Park in Mission Valley. The area beyond used to be an abandoned sand mining site.Early visitors have arrived for the first tour that would preview the new River Center.The public can support the project by buying personalized pavers at the River Center’s entrance.Kids stepping off school buses will encounter wild animal tracks in a concrete walkway.Almost time to start our early Saturday morning tour!A rendering of the entry courtyard, showing The Den pavilion structure with restrooms and a sheltered sitting area that faces a stage and river trees. Famous animal educator Joan Embery is partnering with the River Center and will provide animal presentations (perhaps a hawk) for young students!This is where the 100-seat outdoor amphitheater with stage will be built.Much of the dirt area in the 17-acre River Center will soon be transformed into a beautiful park space. A gateway garden and expanse of grass (Grant Park) will be open to the public! Just beyond Rob will be an artificial waterfall!A walkway will wind toward the south side of the San Diego River. There will be lighting along the path. The environmentally friendly River Center will be powered mostly by solar.Where the walkway turns there will be a beautiful arbor–an acoustic shade structure.Just beyond the arbor, a dirt trail will lead into nature. Kids in small groups will be led by trained educators into the native river environment.Here we go! The irrigation pipes you see will eventually be removed.Kids can learn about how buckwheat seeds spread, and learn about plants and trees like prickly pear and lemonade berry, and willows and oaks.Gazing down toward the San Diego River in mid-May, when water levels are low. That’s Interstate 805 in the distance. I saw birds flitting about in the lush greenery.Now we’re back on the curving concrete walkway, looking at the visionary River Center at Grant Park project. Some big boulders were donated, adding beauty to the park space.Rendering shows families enjoying the grass of Grant Park when it’s finally completed.Master gardeners will be adding their expertise to the public park. The California Garden Clubs will also be contributing. The River Center and park will be alive with birds. As our tour concluded, a swallow flew overhead.Join the effort to open the River Center at Grant Park! Donations for this amazing (but expensive) project are appreciated!
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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!
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The public has a special opportunity to tour the new River Center at Grant Park this Saturday. The amazing nature center beside the San Diego River in Mission Valley is currently under construction. Completion is scheduled for this summer. The goal is to have 10,000 students connecting with nature each year in the River Center’s unique outdoor classroom!
Saturday’s family tour is one activity of many during the San Diego River Park Foundation’s annual River Days event. Other activities along the river through this weekend include gardening, clean ups, wildlife hikes and bird walks.
To view a listing of all the free River Days activities in 2024, click here!
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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)!
An inspirational art exhibit is now on display at the Japanese Friendship Garden in Balboa Park. Beautiful paintings remind us that rebirth can come unexpectedly after a period of destruction.
Boatloads of Mizuaoi are works by artist Shintaro Araki, who is a member of the Mizuaoi Project.
As the Japanese Friendship Garden’s website explains:
The Mizuaoi Project, initiated by a group of artists receiving a seed found in Fukushima from an artist, Shigenobu Yoshida, celebrates the “rebirth” of the nearly extinct Mizuaoi plant…a genus of flowering plants…considered a weed species in Japan…exterminated so as not to corrupt rice cultivation.
Thought to have been eradicated throughout most the country, the Mizuaoi lay dormant until the Great East Japan Earthquake, on March 11, 2011, and tsunami, brought the Mizuaoi seed back to life and sparked a poetic Movement, spreading the Mizuaoi image as a symbol of hope, and regeneration throughout Japanese society.
Members of the Mizuaoi Project cultivate the plants in pots, metaphorically referred to as “Boats” and distribute their boats nationwide…
These individual works by Shintaro Araki do indeed resemble boats filled with robust green life. Their simplicity and beauty float before our eyes, flower in the mind. The art expresses hope. It reminds us of nature’s inherent power to renew living things.
The exhibition can be viewed in the garden’s Exhibit Hall through April 28, 2024.
Here are just a few of the beautiful pieces on display…
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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)!
Spring is in full bloom at the Japanese Friendship Garden in Balboa Park!
On this sunny day, many visitors were walking through scenes of lush natural beauty.
In the Lower Garden the cherry blossoms were still like clouds of pink through which anyone could serenely amble. Being the third Tuesday of the month, San Diego residents could enter the garden for free. Lots of families took advantage!
As I walked along the high path near JFG’s newest waterfall, I noticed that an azumaya is under construction. An azumaya is defined as a traditional arbor or summer pavilion found in formal Japanese gardens.
These photographs show how dreamy the garden now appears.
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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)!
In 2023, a long mural was created in the alley behind Bread & Salt in Logan Heights. Transmutation – Exploring art & Healing is the title in English. It’s by San Diego artist May-ling Martinez.
The artwork combines various elements, including geometry, anatomy, natural forms and design. It seems that creativity is in our human DNA.
I saw this mural for the first time a few days ago when I explored the old Weber’s bread bakery, the historic building in which the Bread & Salt cultural center is located.
In late 2020 I walked around the same building and through the same alley, taking photos of different murals, many of which remain today. See those here.
Looking at the artist’s website, I see she created fun art that I photographed almost ten years ago in East Village. It’s the closet-like mural titled Inside Outside that you can see here!
Here are more photos of Transmutation, taken along the alley as I walked from left to right…
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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)!
Several signs posted along the edge of the San Diego River Estuary indicate: Endangered Species Predator Control in Progress. These signs were placed by the City of San Diego Public Works Department. I saw them today for the first time.
The Light-Footed Ridgway’s Rail uses the San Diego River Estuary as natural habitat, and efforts to protect this endangered subspecies involve trapping predators like raccoons, feral cats, and rats. The sign asks people to not feed feral cats, which are being trapped and relocated to the nearest Humane Society.
As I walked along the river on a beautiful late February day, I saw many birds in the water, among vegetation and on distant mudflats. I don’t believe I spotted any Light-Footed Ridgway’s Rails, but I can’t say for sure.
When I walked into the nearby Marina Village Conference Center, where Audubon’s San Diego Bird Festival is taking place all weekend, I asked an expert how the Light-Footed Ridgway’s Rail is doing. Hanging on, was the gist of the reply.
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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 free “Bird Friendly Home and Garden Fair” will be open to the public this coming Sunday, February 25, 2024. It’s part of San Diego Audubon’s big five-day San Diego Bird Festival, which is presently underway at the Marina Village Conference Center!
The Bird Friendly Home and Garden Fair will feature local organizations and businesses that help you help birds. There will be exhibitor booths, educational presentations, and people can build a bluebird nesting box for the California Bluebird Recovery Project. The program schedule includes a family music program and a live birds of prey presentation. There will be information about native seed libraries, what to do if you find an injured or baby bird, and much more!
To read more about this unique weekend event, click here and scroll down. You can participate in other San Diego Bird Festival activities, too!
(If you’re curious about the above photograph–that’s a Great Blue Heron that was perched in a tree above the San Diego River. I spotted it yesterday while walking across the pedestrian bridge near the Fashion Valley transit center.)
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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 beautiful new mural has debuted in San Diego’s Rolando neighborhood!
Depictions of homes in the community, nearby San Diego State University, and familiar plants and animals enliven a wall on 62nd Avenue, a block south of El Cajon Boulevard. The mural was created in partnership with SDG&E, whose substation is located here.
This colorful public art debuted earlier this week and is the work of ArtReach. The lead muralist was Katy Yeaw.
(While visiting Katy’s website, I learned she painted a fun electrical box that I photographed years ago in Little Italy!)
Late this afternoon I checked out the three sides of this great new mural…
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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 San Diego Sights! 