Tidepooling at Swami’s Beach
If you are wanting to explore tide pools in North County San Diego, then head to Swami's Beach in Encinitas. I had no idea that there were tide pools here until a friend invited us to join her and her children for some afternoon fun at the beach. They had previously been to this location to explore the tide pools, and although I have driven past this beach more times than I can count I had always considered it more of a surf beach.
It's quite a steep decent to the beach as you can see in the photograph below, which means if you are tired at the end of your beach and tidepooling adventure, you still have to make it all the way to the top of the stairs, which I have to say almost defeated me (I am also one of the most unfit people).
Even though we arrived at the beach a little later than we had intended, we still got quite lucky finding a couple of starfish and a hermit crab.
High Tea in Seal Beach
If you are looking for the perfect location for a girls day out, head to Seal Beach in Orange County, California.
In the downtown area you will find vintage and re-sale stores, art galleries, and lovely places to get a meal, or enjoy an ice-cream. A short walk away is Seal Beach Pier, which is apparently one of the longest wooden piers in California.
I had recently come across a Groupon deal for McKenna's Tea Cottage - the deal was for their Queen Mum's Tea (for two people). They had me at 'mum', and of course indulging in high tea is on my bucket list this year so I immediately snapped it up, and then contacted a couple of friends who have daughters and we made a reservation for mother/daughter tea together.
Of course I didn't think to take my camera to high tea, but thankfully when you have a friend who is a photographer she is bound to remember, and capture some beautiful shots like the few below. Normally I hate being on the 'other side' of the camera, but for shots like this I'm more than happy to be.
Photograph by: Mandy See
They have quite a lovely selection of tea to choose from, and for little girls who don't care for tea, there is pink lemonade, in a tea pot of course.
Pennypickle’s Workshop
If you live in Southern California and are looking for something fun to do with the kids this weekend, head to Temecula and take them to Pennypickle's Workshop. Temecula is located about an hour north of San Diego in Riverside County.
Kids are going to absolutely love this fun, educational, and hands-on children's museum. Entrance to the museum is done in sessions, there are 2-3 sessions per day, so find one that fits with your time frame. They are normally closed on Monday's, however with the long weekend, they will be open this coming Monday.
I have a few photos to share from our visit there, however, I did forget my camera (I know, again), so please forgive me for all of the grainy cell phone shots. I'm really going to have to just leave a camera in my car from now on aren't I?
Black Star Canyon Guided Hike with Kids
The New Children’s Museum
A couple of weeks ago friends invited us to join them for a play at The New Children's Museum. It had been a few years since I had taken the kids there so we jumped at the chance. I thought it might be a little busy on the weekend, but we parked right out the front and didn't have to wait to participate in any of the fun activities throughout the museum.
As soon as we arrived the kids ran outside to play with clay, and paint a car.
Hiking at Los Penasquitos Canyon Preserve
It's amazing that you can live in an area for a number of years and not know that a 15 minute drive from your house is a 4000 acre preserve and around 10 miles of hiking trails within that space.
One afternoon while trying to avoid freeway traffic, my husband suggested we take a back road that uses occasionally, which is not a route I had driven before, however we passed a sign and parking area to the Los Penasquitos Canyon Preserve. As soon as we got home I researched the area, and then arranged to meet with our kids to do a 6 mile hike there that weekend.
I printed out a map from the San Diego Parks & Rec website and we with drinks and snacks in our backpacks set off. This is the route we took.
Map of route via Runkeeper
At the 3 mile mark (halfway through our hike) we arrived at the waterfall. If you are thinking side of a mountain water falling, that is not what you will find here, it's more large rapids and a small drop off as you will see from the photographs below that run through volcanic rock. Our hike took us along one side of the creek, we crossed over at the waterfall and then returned to the parking lot on the other side of the creek.