48 Hours in San Diego

I knew Tyler and I needed a mini-vacay and while I was searching for the right place, San Diego came to mind because I had just seen some bloggers, I follow posts about all these cute places. I found well-priced flights from Southwest and a cute Airbnb in Mission Hills that I highly recommend (click here) and booked us a trip.

I’m usually a “go with the flow” kind of girl, but knowing we only had 48 hours, I started writing an itinerary down. This totally helped get everything in order. I had a few things on me “must-dos” and some on my “possibly if we have time”.

The three I absolutely had to go to was, Holy Matcha, Communal Coffee, and Balboa Park. Others I had on my list were: La Jolla Cove, Parakeet Café, Suspension Bridge, and Pigment. We didn’t go to Parakeet, Suspension bridge, and Pigment. I’m not too bummed about it. My boyfriend’s sister and cousin live in San Diego, so we decided to have dinner with them both nights there since we hardly see them.

If you need help getting some kind of itinerary together, I’ll share mine with you here.

Arrived at San Jose airport early AF
Got coffee
Boarded the plane at 6:37 AM
Fell asleep.
Arrived in San Diego 7:46 AM
Shuttled to Car Rental place (free service provided by San Diego Airport)

Picked up our car rental by 8:20 AM (reservation was at 9) Shout out to Expedia for finding us the best deals.

Stop #1. HOLY MATCHA

I saw that this cute spot opened at 9 which was perfect. It was only 5.3 miles from the car rental place. ETA 13 mins and I figured it would be empty so I can take a zillion pictures comfortably. We got there a little before it opened so we had some time to kill and luckily there was a cute Mexican restaurant open for breakfast. Tyler and I highly recommend it, the tortillas were hand-made and delicious, it was called El Comal.

Ok back to Holy Matcha, so after breakfast, we headed over and boy was it beautiful! I was in awe; I swear it was like every girl’s dream coffee shop.

Tyler felt so out of place hahaha but he also thought it was cute. I tried their OG Matcha which I heard wasn’t too good, but it was not bad. It was Tyler’s first time trying matcha and he loved it. We hung out for a bit enjoyed our drinks, and of course, took pictures.

The store pigment wasn’t too far but since it was raining, * eye roll * I decided to skip it and move on to our other stop, Balboa Park.

Address: 3118 University Ave, San Diego, CA 92104 (North Park)

Stop #2. BALBOA PARK

I highly recommend getting an explore pass that lets you visit 5 museums. Prices are $48 for an adult and $29 for a child. Unfortunately, it was still raining so we didn’t get to walk the entire park that day, but we did go to the museums. You can read about them on this blog post here.

The following day we went back to Balboa Park since the sun was out (finally) and walked around the Japanese Friendship Garden which was so beautiful. Tyler talked about getting married there lol, that’s how beautiful it is. Side note, I wouldn’t get married there, it’s gorgeous but not my style. Ok let’s get back on track, the Japanese Friendship Garden is a nice walk, there isn’t anything to do there, it’s just a nice relaxing walk.

We were done with all of this around 2:45ish which worked out perfectly because it was time to check in our Airbnb which was only 1 mile away from Balboa Park, ETA 6 minutes. Total score.

Address: 1549 El Prado, San Diego, CA 92101

Airbnb

I usually stay at hotels, but they were really expensive when I was searching for one especially in the areas I wanted. So, I did what every normal person would do, look for deals elsewhere. I found Canyon Retreat in Mission Hills and based on the pictures and reviews, I decided this is where we’ll stay. I was scared pictures were going to be deceiving but it was not. This place was so cute, it had everything we needed and more. Highly recommend staying here if you’re in the area. The only thing I didn’t like, which isn’t that bad, or the owner’s fault is parking. Since you’re in the hills, you’re either parked uphill or downhill and if you’re like me, this makes me anxious. I don’t know why it freaks me out driving and parking on these roads, but it does. Luckily there was an area where it wasn’t that bad, and we parked there both nights. You will be fine. If I was ok, you should be ok.

So, we had stopped at 2 of the 3 MUST DOs all in one day. We were so good on time and decided to relax a bit at our little retreat. Tyler talked to his sister about dinner plans and she invited us over to watch the last episode of Game of Thrones which…I won’t even go into it because I’m still not over it *crying hysterically* So that concludes our first 24 hours in San Diego. Oh, his sister recommended stopping by the Sugar Factory to our mini list and thankfully she did because this place was so cool!

Day 2

Stop #3 COMMUNAL COFFEE

I would have to say this was my favorite stop. The coffee was good, the décor, ambiance, just everything. I was bummed I couldn’t get pictures indoors because it was PACKED but I got the famous outdoor pictures which are what I was there for in the first place since I saw my friend Jessica post about it years ago and even tagged me saying I would love it…which she was 100% right.

Address: 2335 University Ave, San Diego, CA 92104

Stop #4 SUGAR FACTORY

I am a sweet person, I’m not talking about personality-wise which ok I am, I even won the sweetest senior in high school but that’s not what I’m referring to lol. I’m talking about sugar sweets! Anything with sugar, count me in!!

So, it was a no-brainer to come here and after seeing the milkshake pictures I was game. So, Tyler and I got there early and it was perfect. We got to sit in these cool things. We shared food because it seemed like a lot and sure enough, we couldn’t even finish what we got. For the price, it was perfect. If there’s one thing I hate, is overpaying for shitty food.

Everything inside of this place is just adorable, even the bathrooms are decorative so well. I highly recommend this place.

Address: 701 Fifth Ave, San Diego, CA 92101

What we ordered:

Rainbow Sliders
Waffle Burger
Princess Shake
2 Waters

Stop #5 LA JOLLA COVE

So beautiful here, honestly, it’s a must. There are wild sea lions and by wild, I don’t mean they are running around smacking people but maybe they have and that’s how they got their name? Anyway, they were mostly just laying down chilling and you can get really close to them.

It totally smells like sh*t though, that’s one thing people tend to leave out when mentioning this area. I mean the smell was pretty bad I felt like I was getting lightheaded.

Regardless of the smell, it’s beautiful as you can see here in my pictures. There is plenty to see, eat and do in La Jolla.

Address: 1100 Coast Blvd, La Jolla, CA 92037

Stop #6 BARRIO DOG

This is not your typical hot dog joint, their website describes it perfectly, Chicano comfort food. I loved it here, super cute, good ambiance, and last but not least amazing hot dogs. I ordered El Pueblito and boy was it good!

Address: 2234 Logan Ave, San Diego, CA 92113

So that was our 48 hours in San Diego, as you can see, we had done quite a bit and probably could have squeezed in a few more stops but we were tired and felt this was enough for 2 days. Hope it was helpful and inspires you to visit the lovely San Diego.

As always thank you for reading, I appreciate you and your time.