(Tim is the 2nd from the right in the 1st row)Last week, Manny and I were able to go to San Diego for my younger brother, Tim's graduation from Marine boot camp. If you ever get a chance to go to something like this, you should. It's a neat experience. They make such a big deal out of it, and it's cool to see them, all the different things that they do. It's a whole different world inside the base. They had Family Day on Thursday. We were able to walk around the base and watch them march, run, do drills, and all sorts of other things.
This is right after they got done running 4 miles in about 18 minutes
The picture below is of them marching.
They finally let them have a break to visit with their families for a few hours, but we had to stay on the base. We did go and eat at where they went to church on the base. The missionaries that serve on the base were holding a luncheon for the LDS members and their families, and for anyone else who weren't members, but had been going to the LDS church. It was funny because the missionary couple who were in charge of it, Elder and Sister Gourdin, were from our old ward in Orem. It was nice to see them and visit with them. They totally knew who we were. It's a small world after all.
Not all of my family was able to go, but a lot of us did. There was me, Manny, my brother Paul, my brother Joseph (in the sunglasses), his wife Erika (in the pink), his 2 kids Jakson and Xander, my sister Julie, and my mom and dad.
Here's an obstacle course that they train on.
This is the parade deck where they practice marching. We can't walk on it or anything, if we did, we'd get yelled at.
We went to the museum that was on the base. Manny is sitting in front of an ambulence that was used in WWI.
Here we are on Friday, Graduation day.
They stood at attention for the whole graduation, which was almost 2 hours long.
Tim (on the left), and his buddy, Morris
After the graduation, we took everyone to Mission Beach. For the most part, none of my family had ever been to San Diego, so Manny and I tried to take them to some fun places. We played at the beach for hours.
Me and Xander pictured below. We're jumping over a wave.
Oh, my precious dockers. I think this is one of the first times I've ever seen my dad in water.
After the beach, we walked around Old Town for a very long time, and then we ate at a yummy Mexican restaurant. My dad absolutely love Old Town, and the restaurant. While we were in Old Town, we thought about joining a new church.
Everyone left Saturday, but Manny and I stayed with Tim. He hadn't been around San Diego, so we took him to some more places. We went to the Gaslamp district, Seaport Village, Coranado, and La Jolla Beach.
The tide pools at the beach were so much fun, and it was such a nice, beautiful day.
There were tons of seals lounging on the beach.
Later that night we ate at Phil's BBQ, the best ribs place ever. Tim was dying to eat some good food. He chowed down so quick on EVERYTHING he ate. It had been quite a while that he had eaten something good. You could tell too, because while he was at boot camp, he lost 36 pounds!
We went home on Sunday, and on the way home, we stopped in Vegas to play for about 2 1/2 hours. We lost big time! I don't know how we'll survive after losing those $4.
I did forget to mention that we stayed with Manny's grandparents on Wednesday night when we first got there. It was so nice to see them. They live in the middle of an Indian reservation called Aguanga, that's about an hour away from San Diego. We love it when we can visit them.
It was such a quick trip, but we packed in as much as possible, and had such a blast. To my family in CA, sorry we didn't call you or anything, but we really didn't have to time to visit or anything, we spent most of our time on the base. Sorry!
On a side note, my birthday was Tuesday, the 9th (which by the way, a policeman gave me a wonderful birthday present as I was headed to work).
I consider this trip as my birthday present. I turned 26, and I couldn't have asked for a better gift. Thanks Manny, for making this trip possible.
