California Trip

I have always wanted to go to Disneyland and have never had the chance to go. Darren had some meetings in San Diego the end of April and the first part of May so I finagled it so we could take a family trip and experience a few fun things in California. The first part of our trip was in San Diego where we got to stay at the Hard Rock Hotel. We definitely were out of our comfort zone (meaning Hotel 6), we pulled up to the hotel, our doors were opened and the gentlemen informed us it was valet parking only; they would take our luggage up to our room and park our car. We weren't quite ready so we needed to take a trip around the block to make sure we would get everything we needed. We were staying in this hotel for 3 days, so being so "cheap" I had packed food that we could eat up in our room. I wasn't prepared for a lot of people to see just how conservative we really were. I stuffed all the food in suitcases, camera bags and anything else that we could smuggle it in. We were now ready to park...let me mention that Darren is a freak about being prepared so in our trunk not only did we have our food (food, water, shelter) we also had 2 gallons of diesel, a safety back equipped with everything from water purifying kits, ponchos, battery cables, waterproof matches to a hatchet just in case we needed to every start a fire and had to chop wood...the safety kit in our trunks is a little treat from my dad. Every year on Christmas Eve Dad goes shopping and buys things to add to our car kits, love it but not the point of my story...we were finally ready to be parked and escorted to our rooms. I had not been informed that the bottom of the Hard Rock was a happening place for the nightlife, fully equiped with security guards in tuxedos and red velvet ropes that had to be crossed to get into the lobby. Kennedy really got to see some short low cut dresses and also some other very interesting attire. I wonder if I would have noticed what people were wearing as much if my 7 year old's eyes weren't popping out of her head. We made it up to the room and it was awesome. The Padres stadium was directly across the street and there were many quaint little shops to walk through during the day while Darren attended his meetings. We became quite accustomed to being taken to the front of the line with securitey...Kennedy was a dead give away, I guess, that we weren't there to party and were no real threat. There was a rooftop pool where we spent much time-we had our own private cabana equipped with a big screen t.v., personal fridge, and 2 couches. I truly wondered it we had gone to heaven. Here are some pictures of the first stop on our trip.