John and I love having visitors and were elated to spend our weekend with our guests Nikki and Ryan! They flew into San Diego on Wednesday and headed right over to DT to see me! Unfortunately, their flight was delayed so they missed DT's yummy lunch, but I showed them around my office and got to see them, which was awesome! They left DT to go eat at In 'N Out, and ended up stopping by John's office to visit him too! After saying hi to us at our respective places of employment, Nikki and Ryan headed to North County to see their friend Tracy. They spent the night up north and did Disney on Thursday. Friday afternoon and morning were spent up in north county near the Encinitas and Carlsbad areas, and they arrived back in the downtown area near John and I on Friday evening. 
We started off our visit together with some sushi from Sushi Deli, followed by a night exploring the Gaslamp downtown. We started off at the Tipsy Crow and headed to Quality Social later on in the night. It was super fun because Nikki's friend Tracy and a group of her friends all went out with us, and John and I were able to meet some new friends! We had a great night meeting and hanging out with the group, and hopefully we'll hang out with them in the future! 
Nikki brought us Chargers hats as a gift!
Saturday morning we checked out the Little Italy farmer's market, which Nikki and Ryan LOVED! They were jealous that we get to enjoy a farmer's market like that on a weekly basis! :) And after the market, we went to the world famous San Diego Zoo! John and I were once again pumped to have a zoo membership, as this past weekend was our 7th visit (if we're remembering correctly) to the zoo since we moved to San Diego in April! We even saw the giant pandas for the first time this visit! It was so fun to walk around and show our friends some of our favorite animals!
Once we had our fill of zoo fun, we headed off to Old Town for the Dia de los muertos (Day of the Dead), which is a huge Mexican holiday. It was pretty neat to walk around Old Town and see the celebration. I was expecting it to be similar to the cinco de mayo celebration that John and I went to in Old Town back in May, but it was much different. It was more of a spiritual and remembrance type of event instead of fiesta-ish. But it was still a good time and very interesting! 
After working up a hefty appetite at dia de los muertos, we headed to one of our favorite joints that Nikki and Ryan had been dying to try because of what they've read here on the blog - Blue Water Seafood Market and Grill! We all really enjoyed dinner - especially Nikki and Ryan who had ordered a variety of different items so that they could try a bunch of what Blue Water had to offer! We indulged in a massive amount of food, and while digesting, enjoyed a relaxing post-dinner dip in the hot tub at our apartment complex. It was an enjoyably chill evening after all of our daytime walking.
Saturday we were up bright and early for our trip to Donut Bar! As I said before, Nikki has been reading Changing Lanes and keeping tabs on all the great food that they wanted to try - so John and I headed off to donut bar to indulge in yet more donuts (I think we're cutting ourselves off from donuts now until John's family visits for Christmas). We got a variety of different donuts so that Nikki and Ryan could try several flavors, and we all stuffed ourselves with early morning dessert-breakfast before heading off to one of John and my favorite spots - Balboa!
Nikki and Ryan LOVED the park, and as always, John and I truly enjoyed showing them! Nikki was also super excited to see our engagement spot in real life :) Aside from Balboa, we also drove down to the bay for some beautiful views of the city, Coronado Island, and all the sailboats.
Once we had walked around Balboa and checked out the bay, we headed off to Ocean Beach (OB) for some true So-Cal beach experiences. We started off at the beach, where Ryan did the obligatory dipping of his feet in the ocean. There was a small surf competition on the beach, which was fun to see, as well. We all enjoyed seeing all the surfer kids doing what they do best!
Walking around all morning had made us all ravenous, so we decided to satisfy our craving for food with an abundance of it - at Hodad's! Another place that Nikki had on their must-eat list, we all enjoyed some burgers, fries, onions rings, and shakes. Ryan was even able to eat his whole double bacon cheeseburger (truly a feat), and we were all shocked at how large our shakes were when they arrived to the table. We could barely walk by the time we finished indulging ourselves, and spent a couple hours after lunch moseying around the small OB shops for some souvenirs. After checking out Sunset Cliffs (even though the sunset wasn't great), we headed back to the Penthouse Penthouse to relax while Nikki and Ryan packed up.
Early Monday morning Nikki and Ryan headed out for their flights, and John and I were sad to see them go. We had another amazing weekend with our guests, and we're so excited for our next visitors to get here - John's parents and brother are visiting us right after Christmas. After reading about all the fun that we had with Michelle last week, and now reading about all the amazing activities we did with Nikki and Ryan, I bet you're all looking forward to booking your first trip to visit San Diego !
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