Old Town Stories
December Nights Balboa Park Join your fellow citizens on December 2 and 3 for the City of San Diego’s largest free holiday festival in beautiful Balboa Park. The family friendly ...
“Designed by the architectural firm of Richard Requa & Henry Jackson and built by Walter Trepte between 1929 and 1932, the ‘Bohannan Estate’ is one of Mission Hills’ most prominent ...
On September 3, Patricia Fillét said she and her Old Town neighbors smelled and saw smoke billowing atop the Morena Boulevard and I-8 interchange. They logged onto the NextDoor and ...
A project proposed for Presidio Park would make the historic Junipero Serra Museum more accessible to visitors with disabilities - but archeologists are afraid it will harm a site still ...
Old Town Stories
She’s wearing her red jacket. It flaps around her as she jerkily spins around and around. Makes her look as she must have when Roger first fell in love with her. He has a play ...
Honestly, I walked up through Old Town without a lot of hope. These have been tough days, specially for Congress, and I don’t mean DC. I’m talking about the Cinderella street, the one that always ...
“Chubby, round, and very pretty.” That’s how Google translates gordita redondita y bien bonita, the Spanish words written in pink neon on the wall of Barrio Donas. The shop’s name itself translates to “neighborhood donuts,” ...
"On New Year's morning, UFCW Local 135 union member Martin Andara was senselessly killed after being pushed into an oncoming train at the trolley station in Old Town San Diego," reads the union's January 7 ...
Clickety-clack along the track! We’re rolling! The Pacific Surfliner snakes through the hills around Sorrento Valley, slowly, methodically rounding the canyon curves like a hunting dog following his nose. That distant horn I hear? Oh ...
It’s fair to assume that the Michelin Guide will never revisit San Ysidro. Nor that any restaurants in the small border district will again receive attention from magazines including Food & Wine, Fortune, or GQ. ...
If seems as though Perry’s Café has always been there, always easy to spot from the 5-North to 8-East freeway interchange. They say the family-owned breakfast diner has been in business over 35 years, and ...
The California Geological Survey released new earthquake fault zone maps in late September – and San Diego-area homeowners may be surprised to learn their property sits atop a fault. A press release from the agency ...
I think I’m in love. Again. With tacos. I’ve been tramping the streets of Old Town. I can see it’s trying hard to get back on its partying feet. And yes, places like Cafe Coyote ...
Jazz concert promoter and Dizzy’s operator Chuck Perrin began showcasing (mostly) jazz talent back in April 2000 — first at the Culy Trucking Warehouse, within spitting distance of Petco Park. Seven years later, a construction ...
In the past two months, the city has cut down four of Kensington's historic pepper trees that are as old as the subdivision itself. Since there are only about 32 left, neighbors wonder where will ...
Happy Fonso bongos away to a recorded song coming out of his car. “Working for tips,” his cardboard signs says. “Your help is needed and appreciated. Thanks!” Except, since the lockdown, Old Town is pretty-much ...
In a Dickensian back room behind the tobacconists Racine & Laramie, in Old Town Plaza, Geoffrey Mogilner rifles through the contents of his high security safe. “It’s somewhere here. I would never put it on ...
Fashion blogger Erin Miller may not be native to San Diego, but since her move from Iowa two years ago, she has managed to grow her online following here in Southern California significantly. Now, many ...
As indoor dining is still off limits, I didn’t expect to find myself at Tahona Bar. Old Town’s best modern Mexican eatery boasts a stunning rustic-meets-contemporary interior, punctuated by tastefully arranged bottles of its signature ...
When 2020 began, I did not expect to spend two and a half months writing about take out and delivery. Since dining rooms re-opened in late May, it’s been fun, and at times felt a ...
There was bound to be some awkwardness. The ‘rona closed restaurant dining rooms more than two months ago, and if the intervening weeks taught us anything, it’s to be leery of human contact. The government ...
“On this site in 1897,” says one of those joke plaques, “nothing happened.” “Hey,” says Gary. “On this site in 2020 nothing happened either. This is the lamest Cinco de Mayo I’ve ever been at. ...
Walking around Old Town last month, I noticed a sandwich board sign advertising afternoon tea at the Cosmopolitan Hotel. That’s the proper, British-style afternoon tea, complete with a big ceramic pot and a three-tier platter ...
General store ledgers tell how people lived in Old Town Finding which store the ledger came from involved detective work. In 1864, there were only two general merchandise stores, one in Old Town, the other ...
It can be fun to play tourist in your own city, but that doesn’t mean we’re obliged to eat Mexican food when visiting Old Town. While traipsing about the historical park the other day, rather ...
“It’s the best seabass in San Diego.” That’s what a server tells me, when I tell her I’m trying to choose between the grilled Chilean sea bass and the teriyaki black cod. Often, black cod ...
Almost five years ago, Bill Lawrence, president of the San Diego History Center, went to Los Angeles to accept an award from the California Preservation Foundation. The purpose of the award was to honor the ...
‘How far?” says my friend Annie. “I’m so sick of these crowds I could croak.” We’re in Old Town, Friday night. We’re at the last gasp of Old Town’s Mile of Bars on San Diego ...
It’s Friday night. Left eating till the last moment. Tramping up Congress. Gonna head up toward San Diego Avenue, the glam street of Old Town. Most of everything here on Congress is closed down. Except ...
‘It’s been vacant as long as I can recall” was the consensus I got when asking about the vacant lot on the corner of Congress and Harney streets in Old Town. An empty lot is ...
Fun fact: the State Department has still been issuing passports during the federal government’s partial shutdown. For this, I am grateful. My renewed documents arrived this week, prompting the return of a favorite hobby: studying ...
Tahona Bar in Old Town is one of those places that is going to get a lot of jokes, just because of its location: next to the Old Town cemetery. “Tahona? I’m dying to go ...
Back in 1966, a young Dave Naylor remembers he and his father attending a dedication of the new Interstate 5 rest area at the La Costa Avenue exit, in Leucadia. He clearly recalls a time ...
Ed. Adam Parfrey, publisher of books from Feral House and writer for the Reader, died on May 10, 2018. The following came by email to the Reader on July 3. It is not generally appreciated ...
Graffiti is nothing new along transit routes. The local trolley's general manager was quoted in 1987 saying graffiti clean-up was a high priority. "When graffiti is noticed, it is our policy to remove it immediately." ...
Metropolitan Transit System or MTS has been hanging Choose Transit posters at bus stops around town. Plus they reached out to ask public opinion in April and May. Shorter commute times, more transit options, and ...
In March, the city rejected all proposals vying to operate the Presidio Hills Golf Course. This was a harsh blow to the Friends of Presidio Hills Golf who spent a lot of time and money ...
When we last saw Ceviche House, chef Juan Carlos Recamier's business had graduated from farmers market stall to a tiny counter service shop in North Park. Not even two years later, Ceviche House took another ...
It’s been 26 years since Joe Flammini opened Java Joe’s, one of the few coffeehouses back then that offered live music with your latte. In 1991, Java Joe’s was located in Poway. The shop moved ...
A half-acre of Old Town State Historic Park, located at the junction of Taylor and Congress streets, is a native plant landscape that focuses on coastal native plant restoration. The San Diego Chapter of the ...
Sixties time-warp! I’m sitting in the friendly gloom, watching Lisa Sanders and Karen Hayes sing personal songs in dreamy harmonies. Acoustic, coffee-bar singing, outside. It feels time-warpy in more ways than one. This space is ...
On May 24, a city council subcommittee unanimously recommended to make $14 million available for golf course projects over the next three years. Kris Shackelford, city’s public works department, gave a one-minute presentation. The whole ...
In 1769, Father Junípero Serra along with Gaspar de Portolá established the mission and presidio as the first European settlement on the Pacific Coast. There is minimal evidence of the original site just west of ...
Between the quality shows at Cygnet Theatre and the lighthearted comedy of Old Town Improv, I’ve been finding more reasons to spend time in Old Town, an area that, along with the Gaslamp, I once ...
If ever there were a compelling reason for San Diegans to hang out in Old Town, it’s Home & Away at the former location of Kelly’s Pub. For about two years now, locals and tourists ...
San Diego Unified’s iHigh Virtual Academy, “a tuition-free public high school offering students the opportunity to earn a high school diploma primarily online,” per its website, has an overspending problem. So says a report for ...
"Milwaukee.” “San Diego.” “Milwaukee!” “Saan Diy-egow!” “’Scuse me. Ever hear of Miller? Schlitz? Pabst? Old Milwaukee? And you’re trying to tell me San Diego is the beer capital of America?” Did I mention Saf is ...
A May San Diego County County Grand Jury report accuses officials at the Metropolitan Transit System of refusing to get onboard with the city's bike-sharing program. DecoBike, launched in 2013, has been touted as a ...
He thought they were joking. Even when they had him standing on a horse-drawn dray with a rope around his neck. All he’d done was go for a joyride in a rowboat. He called it ...
Set above Old Town, San Diego’s forty-acre Presidio Park is a National Historic Landmark preserving the first permanent European settlement on the West Coast and the site from which exploratory missions embarked into California's interior. ...
“It’s fresh, not processed, and have you ever seen a fat Japanese guy? Except for sumo wrestlers?”
Cygnet Theatre offers a “double bill” of Noël Coward’s The Vortex (1924) and Hay Fever (1925). Staging his early plays in repertory has advantages. The dark, brittle Vortex is almost a photographic negative of the ...