Birthday Adventures and San Diego’s Finest

I started the tradition of doing something special for my birthday way back in 2012. I was visiting Ukraine during Euro 2012 football tournament and ended up getting a ticket to the finals game. Sure, the final game was a few days after my birthday, but just being in Kyiv and watching the prior games from the fanzone, at soon to be famous Maidan, while catching up with childhood friends and family was great. Being right in the middle of the roaring Spanish sector when they destroyed Italy in the last game was exhilarating, to say the least.

Then in 2013 I went on an epic two month long road trip around the western part of the US, camping at over 20 national parks in 15 states. The actual birthday celebration happened to be at Yellowstone, with a little dehydrated Mocha Mousse Pie and a match instead of the candle.

In 2014 I went for an even more remote celebration at the Easter Island. Very remote!

I was back at work in 2015 (boooring!) so a grand trip was out of the question. Still, we managed to travel across the border for a last minute celebratory dinner in Tijuana.

Somehow I managed not to take a picture but this one was from an earlier trip to the same restaurant in 2015

2016 was another epic idea - starting celebration at 6am in Hong Kong (at the complimentary Grand Hyatt Suite with a great view of the harbor and Victoria peak), flying back to the US across the international date line (in First class on Cathay Pacific… for $49 instead of the peachy $13,997 full ticket price), celebrating with friends during a long layover in Los Angeles, and finishing celebration at midnight in Vancouver. That made for my 33rd birthday last 33 hours in three cities/three different countries, all on one single day. Good times!

In 2017 I was finishing my June dash through the Stans with a week in Mongolia. So how about a 34 hour celebration for my 34th? I might have started with a drink at the lounge after landing in Seoul at 4am. I may or may not have timed my flights to have a 12 hour+ connection there - Seoul airport provides a wide range of complimentary tours for folks with long layovers and so off we went to a nearby temple and then to the old town in the city center. Afterwards it was time to hop on the next Korean Air flight (upstairs on the 747!), yet again across the international date line, to San Francisco and finish with some hiking along the beautiful PCH.

My 35th in 2018 was special in a different way. Back in 2013 I attended Chris Guillebeau’s “End of the World” party in Norway - he finished visiting all 193 countries in the world as he turned 35. In return, Chris threw a huge party for me at Portland Timbers stadium, attended by 1000+ unconventional, amazing people. Ok, so some might have actually called it an opening party for the World Domination Summit, but deep down we know the truth! :) Oh, and kudos to the awesome gelato place across the road from Salt & Straw for staying open a few minutes longer.

I turned 36 in 2019 in the middle of a crazy two-week long train trip. Yes, for those keeping score, I have fallen from Grand Hyatt suites and first class on Cathay Pacific to… Amtrak. But their long distance sleeper cabins with observation cars and free dining aren’t the worst way to experience the vastness of the US of A: Pacific Surfliner from San Diego to LA followed by the Coast Starlight all the way up the West coast to Seattle, Empire Builder across the northern part of the country to Chicago, the Cardinal over to Baltimore, the Vermonter to Philadelphia, Northeast Regional up to New York City, Acela Express and the Crescent down to New Orleans, and Sunset Limited back along the southern border.

Side note: with those exotic and epic sounding names, Amtrak’s crack marketing team isn’t far behind Apple’s.

That was two weeks on the train and my birthday happened to fall on the overnight layover in New Orleans, although even more special was a quick meetup with my friend from middle school in Ukraine during our long stop in Atlanta earlier in the day. With the Amtrak station being well outside the city, it just happened to be right next to her office so I got a precious cup of good coffee to go along with Amtrak’s signature cheesecake.

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Whew. So how am I going to beat that in 2020, in this crazy age of ‘rona lockdowns? Fortunately, I live in the awesome San Diego and while I am not traveling anytime soon, there is still plenty to do around here. Deserts, mountain peaks, waterfalls, and the beach? Check, check, check, and check!

Just an hour drive east of San Diego is Cuyamaca State park: pine forests at 4000 feet, granite mountain peaks, and waterfalls. And we hoped that it won’t be as crowded as San Diego itself, especially on a Sunday afternoon. The start wasn’t great with lots of people at waterfalls and nobody wearing masks. Well, to be fair, there were two other people besides us in masks.

Not surprisingly, we turned around right away and went to our Paso Picacho camp ground. Fortunately, it was very well spaced out and quite pleasant in the evening, except for very strong wind gusts that we could hear coming from far away. We anchored the tent as tight as we could, but it was still a struggle during the first part of the night - waking up each time a gust hit us. But at least we didn’t get any rain (apparently San Diego got drenched overnight).

The wind died down and the morning made for a very pleasant hike to the top of nearby Stonewall Peak. Being a Monday, we encountered very few people on this popular hike, so that was a relief (most were still unmasked thou 😤).

Next was the desert! Another hour east lies Anza Borrego, a part of the low altitude Colorado Desert region of Southern California. It is also home to Anza Borrego state park with its own set of hiking but we were already exhausted and quite burned up by the sun (yes, we are losing it with all these months of sheltering at home). So instead of hiking, we decided to hunt down some of the, seemingly random, “metal sky art” sculptures rusting in the sun.

Exhausted and now fully burned up by the sun, it was time to head back to the cooler coast. An hour and a half later, I was back to my favorite place in San Diego - Torrey Pines beach. While Torrey Pines state park is still closed, the beach is open and, expectedly, very popular so we didn’t stick around for long. Still, it was great to feel the cool waves of the Pacific splashing on my feet after the day full of adventures.

Oh, and following the first camping celebration in Yellowstone eight seven ago, I celebrated with another dehydrated dessert of an apple cobbler just before we hit the mountain in the morning.