California has long been associated as a place with all of the natural conditions in place to be well. Enviable weather, miles of coastline, open spaces, and in San Diego in particular, sunny days nearly year-round.
And in San Diego’s northern parts, where I spend most of my time when I’m home, there are numerous opportunities to carve out a moment to unplug and reset. Currently, these are my go-tos in North County, San Diego that fill me up when I want to slow down.
In honor of the rain that has seemed to arrive early in the San Diego region this week, I’m resurfacing my 2019 piece published on Medium. It’s a beginner’s guide to visiting an art museum, which is a practical activity to do on a rainy day in San Diego given we’re blessed with more than 300 days of sun a year.
Not only that, but if you’re into stretching your cognitive limits, immersing oneself in art may help refine those soft skills too. Skills like critical thinking and empathy.
“It’s good to stretch ourselves,” by working through our discomfort with a work of art we don’t quite understand, notes Anita Feldman from the San Diego Museum of Art.
Art also gives voice to things that are hard to articulate. “An emotion, idea, experience,” says Katherine Hall of the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft. “Art can succeed in this space.”
Pro tip for San Diego residents: Did you know you can get in free to many museums at Balboa Park? Make sure to bring your ID and check this link to participate in Residents Day at museums including Fleet Science Center, Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego Museum of Art and more. A couple of museums, including ICA San Diego, offer complimentary admission year-round. I’d recommend going early to beat the crowds, especially after January 5, 2026, when it’s been reported that Balboa Park will now charge for parking.
Sometimes, it’s less about where you’re going than who you’re with. Unless you really got to pee, then it’s all about that bathroom. Melina, Shannon, this one’s for you—Merry Christmas and cheers to 2020!
By the time we groaned across the border into San Diego, a welcome stretch of U.S. highway open in front of us like a first spring bloom, it was 5 p.m. At 9 a.m. one hot summer Sunday in Tijuana, our 4Runner pulled into a line leading up to U.S. border control that snaked around street corners and across bridges. And then we stopped, completely. We were optimistic, naive rather—maybe we’ll have time to squeeze in brunch before some of us continued north, we thought. After eight hours, interminable stops and starts, time wore us down, but not enough to wipe away weekend memories created just days before. While we waited, and waited, we dipped into this fresh well of memories from a long weekend in Baja California—the eponymous state and peninsula that slices through the Pacific and Gulf of California—to sustain us.
the curious passport 