Got up early to catch the 9:40 a.m. Amtrak to San Diego. I'm excited to meet up with Jade for the next few days! Especially after receiving her impressively detailed itinerary for my short stay at San Diego. I'm so ready for the adventure! The 2 hours train ride was decent. Felt a little lost when everyone scrambled off after the gate opened. I was glad I boarded the right train and grabbed a seat as soon as I saw one. There were couple students sitting at the area and there were no announcements about seating so I didn't think much. I later found out from Jade that the first floor was for the elderly and four seaters were for families. I broke both rules but, surprisingly, was not told to leave. I had a good time listening to my music, pausing my thoughts, and just savoring the scenery out the windows.

I arrived at 11:49 a.m. and headed to the bus stop with Jade. While we were at the crosswalk, the bus that we were supposed to catch kept rolling after the green light. We ran and ran as soon as our light turned green and, thankfully, the bus driver waited for us. Jade had to buss out her friend's UCSD bus pass to me and got a little scolding from the driver for keeping them waiting. We dragged our luggage onto the bus and was relieved to have made it! We headed to Jade's apartment on campus to drop off our luggage and took off on another bus ride with my new identity, Emily, to Old Town. The express bus was pretty sweet, just took half an hour or so. From there, we took a taxi to Sea World, which costed 10 bucks with student discount! Wow, far from what Jade calculated for $2.30 per mile. We got there around 2 p.m. and I had a third new identity thus far for Sea World's annual pass. Not as lucky as Disney though, since they have a fingerprint system that there was no way I was gonna pass. Not capable of pulling off a lie, I was extremely nervous when the red light flashed. I was on the verge of paying the 90 bucks entrance fee but Jade told the lady about how the same thing happened the last time, blah be di blah, while I kept as quiet as I could. After a couple of tries, the lady renewed the code, rescanned my fingerprints, and I got in successfully. Phew, I think the lady was a little skeptical, especially when I said I didn't have my ID with me, but at least she let us through. Thank goodness.

We started off with the Pets Rule Show, then to the Journal to Atlantis ride, which I enjoyed. Our picture turned out horrible though, so we decided that we would come back for a second. While heading out, we saw these mesmerizing commerson's dolphin and stayed there starring at them for the longest time! Ah, new found love! We tried looking for commerson's dolphin souvenir but to no avail. We watched the Dolphin show, had our first Strawberry Funnel Cake, which probably wasn't healthy but delicious nonetheless, went to take a peek at the flamingos, headed for the shamu show, and went back for another Atlantis ride. Now that we know where the camera is, shaka success! It was almost 6 p.m. at this time but we rushed for the polar bears since Jade missed it the last time she came. I loved the icy polar bear paw print thing on the wall! When the closing announcement was made, we strolled towards the entrance, taking last few pictures on our way out. We saw a bus 8 waiting and, as it turns out, it would take us right by our next destination, Olive Garden! Cheers for free bus rides! We had an extremely friendly waitress, which made our day that much better, who took our order of the Tuscan Garlic Shrimp and the Tour of Italy. We meant to share our portion so that we could try a little of each but we were bloated even before finishing our half, so we saved the leftovers for another day.

We had a nice walk to Old Town, which allowed us to digest our dinner, and strolled along the walkway of Old Town. Sadly, most of the stores were closed by 8 p.m. I really liked the architecture there. Reminded me of old western towns with cowboys shouting yee-haa! I wish I had taken more pictures. Since I hadn't done any shopping this trip, I knew I had to find something today. From what I remember, Traci, who will be picking me up from the airport, likes pigs! So I got her a San Diego piggy bank. Hope she likes it. I really appreciate her help. It means a lot to me, especially with all the chaos that was going on. But that's a whole other story that I won't get into. We caught a bus back to UCSD and made a quick stop at Ralph's and CVS. A shopping cart followed us back to the apartment, making its way up the steep steep hill. Good workout.