Many beautiful flowers are now gathered near the base of the Tunaman’s Memorial on San Diego’s Shelter Island.
Last weekend, the annual Tunaman’s Memorial Mass and Celebration began at St. Agnes Catholic Church in Point Loma. A procession was then made through Roseville to the Shelter Island memorial where a service was held.
The many flowers remember tuna fishermen, particularly of Portuguese descent, who were lost at sea.
Even yesterday, almost a week later, the flowers were still bright and colorful.
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The Japanese cherry trees are in bloom on San Diego’s Shelter Island around the Japanese Friendship Bell!
Beautiful pink cherry blossoms now surround the traditional bronze bell, forged in Japan and given to San Diego in 1958 by its Sister City Yokohama.
The Sakura Grove (sakura in Japanese means a flowering cherry tree) was planted during the Japan-U.S. Nationwide Centennial Cherry Blossom Tree Planting in 2012. A nearby plaque explains the grove is a living symbol of friendship between the people of Japan and San Diego.
In 2022, I experienced the sublime ringing of the almost two and a half ton Japanese Friendship Bell. That doesn’t happen very often. If you’d like to read about the bell ringing and see those photographs, click 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.
The Point Loma Association’s volunteer Mean Green Team must have been busy lately. Because look at all the beautiful, bright spring flowers planted along Shelter Island’s long Shoreline Park pathway!
I took this series of photographs today as I walked along the edge of Shelter Island beside San Diego Bay…
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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.
Antonio Garra Day is returning to Old Town San Diego tomorrow, Saturday, March 22, 2025.
Presented by the Pala Band of Mission Indians, the event will be held from 12 pm to 4 pm in Old Town San Diego State Historic Park, at the First San Diego Courthouse Museum.
I attended the event back in 2020 (see the next photo) and learned Antonio Garra was a leader of the Cupeño people in Southern California who sought to organize tribes of our region to resist unfair taxation. Even though Native Americans were not citizens of the United States, a tax was levied upon their animals, property and agriculture. This taxation without representation was considered by many fair-minded people to be illegal and unjust. Read more about it here.
You can see my photos from Antonio Garra Day five years ago by clicking here.
This year, as before, Antonio Garra Day will feature traditional Bird Songs, inspirational speeches and cultural exhibits. Everyone is welcome to drop by and learn an important aspect of our region’s history.
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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.
It’s the first morning of Spring. As the sun rose over the mountains east of San Diego, the Inez Grant Parker Memorial Rose Garden in Balboa Park awakened.
The few rose blooms that have already opened caught the early light and became even more beautiful.
I was there to take capture a bit of the transformation.
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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.
Western Flyer, the world’s most famous fishing boat, will be visiting San Diego on March 26, 2025, and you have the opportunity to tour it!
If you’ve read John Steinbeck‘s famous book Sea of Cortez, you’ll recognize the name of this fishing boat. In 1940, Steinbeck and his friend Ed Ricketts explored the Gulf of California in this very boat.
For decades the boat was lost, then it was found and restored by the Western Flyer Foundation. It now operates as a floating classroom, educating youth about the intersection of science and literature.
With a General Admission ticket, visitors to the Maritime Museum of San Diego will be able to step aboard and tour the legendary fishing boat as it makes its visit to our city!
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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.
The 2025 Major League Baseball season is about to begin. And look who has appeared on San Diego’s Embarcadero along Harbor Drive. Players representing the San Diego Padres!
Before the start of every season, new Padres player banners appear on downtown lamp posts. You can find the banners around Petco Park and elsewhere. Some of the banners inevitably feature new faces.
I took these photographs today.
Last year the Padres were arguably the second best team in baseball. They were a game away from beating mighty Los Angeles and going to the National League Championship Series. How will the team do in 2025?
Jackson Merrill 3Nick Pivetta 27Xander Bogaerts 2Manny Machado 13Yu Darvish 11Fernando Tatis Jr. 23
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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.
The first solo exhibition in the United States by Dutch artist Afra Eisma opened recently in San Diego. The Institute of Contemporary Art San Diego in Balboa Park is overflowing with her imaginative works that promote healing. The title of the exhibition is Hush.
As a sign at the gallery’s entrance explains: Dutch artist afra eisma transforms ICA San Diego into an immersive environment were healing becomes a collective experience. Through vibrantly colored tapestries, soft sculpture, and interactive installation, eisma creates dreamlike sanctuaries for mythological beings, animals, and otherworldly creatures to support and nurture each other…
Afra Eisma has created artwork to help process her own personal trauma. Hush not only encourages pause and thoughtfulness, but focuses specifically on the healing properties of breathing.
Much life, color and creativity permeates the exhibition. When I visited, I felt as if I were wandering through a strange, living fantasy world where all are welcome.
If you enjoy contemporary art, certainly head down to Balboa Park and step into the free Institute of Contemporary Art San Diego. Hush will be on display through June 1, 2025.
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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.
For many years–as long as I can remember–the north side of the Reliable Pipe Supply lot on San Diego’s Commercial Street has been decorated with street art. Most of the images reference pop culture characters–in particular, comic book superheroes and villains.
When I walked along Commercial Street between National Avenue and 15th Street recently, I noticed much of the artwork changed in 2024. After doing a little research, I see that a variety of San Diego artists came together during San Diego’s Comic-Con to create this street art.
I took these photographs as I walked along.
(This string of pop culture street art is similar to a stretch that was painted a short distance down the road to the east, near the intersection of Commercial Street and 31st Street. You can see those photos, taken in 2018, by clicking 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.
Why does a person enter a library? To read, write, think and dream.
That’s certainly what students do after walking through the doors of the Geisel Library at UC San Diego in La Jolla!
Indeed, the front entrance of the Geisel Library celebrates human thought and creativity with its four word proclamation: READ WRITE THINK DREAM.
I was surprised to learn that these words, together with the colorful glass doors and images of students at the library’s entrance, were the creation of an internationally important artist: John Baldessari!
Born locally in National City, John Baldessari would go on to become one of the world’s most recognized conceptual artists. His work would be featured in over 200 solo shows and 1,000 group shows in his six-decade career. His awards and the museums that have collected his pieces are numerous.
READ/WRITE/THINK/DREAM debuted in 2001 and is included in UCSD’s Stuart Collection of public art. Visit the webpage that provides a detailed description by clicking here.
Baldessari liked to provoke thought with his art. His works are described as open-ended puzzles.
With outside sunlight shining through, the primary colors of the transparent doors create new colors when they slide open and overlap. Combining basic elements into something that is different and new–that’s the essence of dreaming, creativity and discovery–isn’t it?
Perhaps you’ve seen another work of John Baldessari in La Jolla. I photographed his Brain/Cloud outdoor mural a few years ago and posted the images 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.
Cool San Diego Sights! 