What should I avoid in San Diego?

SeaWorld San Diego charges north of $70 per adult for a park that opened in 1964 and peaked about 30 years later. The orca shows are gone, replaced by roller coasters you can ride at any regional theme park. If marine life is the draw, the Birch Aquarium at Scripps in La Jolla costs around $25 and sits on a bluff where you can smell salt sage and hear waves hitting the rocks 300 feet below. Seaport Village, the waterfront shopping strip near the Embarcadero, sells the same souvenir magnets and saltwater taffy stocked in every American port town. Walk 10 minutes north to Little Italy instead, where India Street has actual restaurants run by people who care what you eat. Old Town San Diego State Historic Park is free and worth 45 minutes for the 1820s-era adobes, but the restaurants lining San Diego Avenue aim squarely at tour-bus traffic, with $18 combo plates that taste like $8. For real Mexican food, eat at Las Cuatro Milpas in Barrio Logan, where the line has stretched out the door since 1933.

The Gaslamp Quarter is fine for a Friday night, but the restaurants along 5th Avenue between E Street and L Street split into two categories. Half are solid. Half have someone standing outside waving a laminated menu at you. Walk past those. A reliable tell is the menu itself. If it promises 'world-famous fish tacos' in a city where every neighborhood taco shop makes better ones, keep moving. Pedicab drivers work the Gaslamp after dark and will pedal you a few blocks for the price of a good dinner if you don't agree on a fare before sitting down. The Convention Center area south of L Street empties out between events, and the walk toward the Hilton Bayfront feels desolate after 10pm, with little foot traffic and poor lighting. Take a rideshare from that stretch. Balboa Park, established 1868, is free to enter, but the 17 museums inside sell separate tickets from $15 to $62. The San Diego Zoo, in the park's northeast corner, runs $72 for a single-day adult pass. The Explorer Pass covers any 3 for $59, less than the combined door price at most of the 17 venues.

San Diego's weather reputation is half-true. The stretch from July through October delivers the 24°C sunshine you came for. But mid-May through late June brings 'June Gloom,' a thick marine layer that rolls in off the Pacific around 4pm and doesn't lift until noon the next day. Morning temperatures hover near 17°C, the sky looks like wet concrete, and the sand at Pacific Beach feels cool under your feet until after 1pm. First-timers who book a morning snorkel at La Jolla Cove in early June end up shivering in 19°C water under a flat gray sky. Plan ocean activities for July or later. The other surprise is how cold the water stays even at the height of summer. Locals wear full wetsuits. If you're used to Caribbean water at 28°C, the Pacific off Mission Beach in August holds at around 20°C.

Do not rent a car for your first 2 days if you're staying in the Gaslamp, Little Italy, or Hillcrest. Parking downtown runs $30-50 per day at hotel garages, and street meters enforce until 8pm Monday through Saturday. The airport sits 3 miles from downtown. A rideshare to the Gaslamp runs $12-15, and the MTS bus connects the terminals to the Old Town Transit Center, where the Trolley reaches downtown for $2.50. You'll hear the rail squeal on the curves and smell diesel at the platform, but it works. A car does matter for the coast. The 30-mile stretch from Ocean Beach north through Pacific Beach, La Jolla, Del Mar, and Encinitas has no useful transit between towns. Avoid I-5 northbound between 3pm and 7pm on weekdays. The merge at the I-8 junction near Mission Valley backs up for miles, and a 20-minute drive to Del Mar turns into 55.