SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA VACATION: Staying in Ramona; General Conference Viewing; Safari Park; Strawberry and Flower Fields

Mark and Michelle brought Kate and Nina to Utah for the general conference weekend. They stayed with us, which we always enjoy. 

The next day, the four of them got all ready in their church clothes and drove down to attend the Manti Temple open house. When they saw the super long lines and had heard about the hours-long wait to get in, they turned around and left. 

That part of their vacation did not pan out as planned. The girls still got their shopping time in, so they were happy. 

Knowing Glen and I were planning on leaving on our 2-week vacation Friday morning, Mom had asked if it would be okay if the family dinner party could be held at our home in our absence.

The more we got thinking about it, we decided we would delay leaving until the following morning so we could be home for the family dinner. We were thinking we could listen to the three sessions of general conference as we were driving on Saturday. 

We were happy we made the decision to delay our trip, and we were happy to partake of the delicious ham/turkey meal with the family.

Mark's family had tickets to attend the Saturday evening session of general conference in the conference center. That was exciting for them to have that opportunity. 

Despite our guests still being at our home, we got up early Saturday morning and headed south. This is the scene as we were heading out of North Salt Lake. 

Another snowstorm had hit the area, but it wasn't bad and we had mostly great weather the whole way to Southern California.

We were using a vacation plan we had purchased many years ago. We couldn't find a week's rental right in our preferred area of our mission--the Carlsbad area. 

There were some weeks available in Ramona, so we decided to give that a try. 

We knew it was about an hour away from San Diego and an hour away from Carlsbad, but felt like that would be okay. We could make it work.

Little did we know we would have to drive forever on narrow, winding mountain roads to get to our destination--which was in the middle of nowhere! Happy day when we found our rental in a nice resort area in the small town.

We had stopped at a Walmart in Murrieta to pick up some breakfast food and were happy to see a full-size kitchen in our unit when we opened the door.

We were thrilled with the spaciousness of our home away from home. 

This is the view standing out the back door on our upper balcony. Loved seeing all the green.

We had listened to general conference as planned on our drive. On Sunday, we fixed our breakfast and then settled in to watch the two sessions of conference that day.

That evening we walked all around the resort and adjacent neighborhoods enjoying the movement after so much sitting. I loved seeing the beautiful flowers and appreciating the beauty of that particular part of California. 

We decided to go to the Safari Park on Monday. It was a walk down memory lane as we remembered what a reprieve that place had been for us when we could take a break for a couple of hours on our mission. 

Glen stopped for a while to talk with Dad on the phone about an internet issue he was having. Right at that moment, two singing performers walked by and stopped nearby to serenade me and one other woman and her two children. 

I enjoyed the song they were singing as they were walking, "Here Comes the Sun." It was the day of the eclipse, so it was very appropriate. They sang a few songs for us before moving on. I told them I was happy they entertained me while my husband was tied up.

Then they were so kind to let me use a pair of their eclipse glasses so I could see what the big excitement was about. 

These are a few of the birds, animals, and scenery we saw on our "safari."

We ate lunch at the Safari Park.

Once we were finished there, we drove to the strawberry fields in Carlsbad to get some delicious, fresh strawberries to eat at breakfast for the rest of the week.

Close by were the Flower Fields which were in full bloom. We enjoyed walking along the upper sidewalk looking over the wall at the beautiful ranunculus flowers blooming with the ocean in the background. This was another great memory we had from our time serving on our mission.

That evening we met Richard and Barbara McClellan at a restaurant close by for dinner. They were one of our senior couple missionaries who were there when we arrived. 

Richard was in charge of the fleet of missionary cars. Barbara was over all the housing for the missionaries. Such dedicated people who loved being around the missionaries.

We enjoyed our evening with them. The only drawback was having to drive back to Ramona in the dark. 

Once we got to the narrow, winding, mountainous road, it was pitch black because there were no street lights out that far in the country. 

We did make it back safely, had a good night's sleep, and woke up the next morning ready to have another adventure.