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Below are some resource websites whether you are visiting for a few days or you are a resident:

IN GENERAL
1) www.weather.com Local San Diego weather
2) www.UnionTrib.com : San Diego’s local newspaper, The San Diego Union Tribune
3) www.SanDiegoReader.com : Local San Diego event magazine
4) www.SDDT.com The San Diego Daily Transcript

THINGS TO DO
1) www.GoSanDiegoCard.com: 55 Attractions, 1 Low Price!
2) www.SanDiego.org: The official travel resource for the San Diego Region
3) www.AroundAndAboutSanDiego.com: See San Diego Virtually
4) www.SanDiego-Romantics.com: Romantic Things to Do in San Diego
5) www.101SanDiego.com: 101 Things to do in San Diego
6) www.BalboaPark.com : A landscape of art and culture.
7) www.SeaWorld.com : Sea World Adventure Park
www.SanDiegoZoo.com : Your guide to San Diego Zoo and Wild Animal Park
9) www.LegoLand.com Legoland’s official website
10) www.GasLamp.org . Your guide to shopping, dining and playing in the Gaslamp Quarter
11) SanDiego.about.com The 10 best shopping malls in San Diego

RESTAURANTS
1) www.Where2Eat.com . Restaurant guide for San Diego County
2) www.SanDiegoRestaurants.com. Find, book and review San Diego restaurants

BEACHES AND WATER EVENTS
1) www.A-ZSanDiegoBeaches.com : Your guide to San Diego Beaches
2) www.SurfingSanDiego.com . The site for all of your San Diego surfing needs
3) www.SanDiegoSailing.com The premier online destination for the San Diego Sailing Scene
4) www.Worldwide Fishing.com . World Wide Fishing Guide

SPORTS
1) www.Chargers.com . San Diego Chargers NFL Internet Network
2) www.Padres.com . the official site of the San Diego Padres
3) GoAztecs.Cstv.com The official site of Aztec Athletics
4) www.foVAVI.com Sport and Social Club of San Diego

SCHOOLS
1) www.SDCOE.net San Diego County Office of Education guide to District websites
2) www.Sandi.net San Diego Unified School District
3) www.SDCOE.net List of all San diego County Colleges
4) www.SDSU.com San Diego State University
5) www.USD.com Univeristy of San Diego
6) www.UCSD.com University of California San Diego
7) www.SDCCD.edu San Diego Community College District

UTILITIES
1) www.MySanDiegoMove.com Just type in your address and it will give you all services
2) www.SDGE.com San Diego Gas & Electric

HEALTH CARE
1) www.Kudzu.com Searchable list of hospitals in San Diego
2) www.RetirementHomes.com Your guide to retirement living including senior services

PLACES OF WORSHIP
1) www.SignOnSanDiego.com A guide to locations or worship, religion and other services

PROPERTY OWNERSHIP
1) www.SDTreasTax.com San Diego Tax Collector (Pay your Property Tax here)
2) www.ARCC.co.San-Diego.CA.US/ San Diego Assessor/Recorder/County Clerk
3) www.profundrealestate.com Monthly Real Estate Trends for San Diego County

MEXICO
1) www.BajaTravel.com The premier on line source for information on Baja
2) www.TijuanaOnline.com Sponsored by the Tijuana Convention and Visitors Bureau
3) www.Rosarito.com Guide to Rosarito
4) www.Ensenada.com Guide to Ensenada
5) www.Carnival.com Cruises from San Diego to Mexico (3-6 days)

SPECIALTY SITES
1) www.PetLoversPublications.com The Ultimate Guide for Pet Information

San Diego combines perfect climate, beautiful beaches and unique attractions for visitors such as our famous ZOO, Wild Animal Park, Sea World or Mexico (about 15 min. from Downtown).

Semi-tropical San Diego, with its mean temperature of 70 degrees F, Mediterranean-like white-washed stucco buildings and strong cultural influences from sunny Mexico, is as close to visiting a foreign country as visitors could get and yet, is as American as apple pie.

The heart of this clean city lies at the foot of the harbor just minutes by car from Lindbergh Field, where most travelers debark. Yet, modern San Diego has become much more than just a harborside city. Spanning from the North County beach areas to the South Bay cities along the Mexican border, San Diego is one of the top ten largest cities in the United States. While all these areas fall under the San Diego umbrella, each individual community maintains its own personality, geography and identity. Truly, in San Diego’s case, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

Downtown Less than three miles from the airport is downtown proper. This thriving commercial area with its active waterfront is a bustling, colorful combination of major hotels, convention facilities, restaurants, nightclubs and shopping venues. Its focal point is Horton Plaza, an architectural masterpiece that holds trendy shops, lively restaurants, a theatre and even an ice rink during the holiday season. Just east of Horton Plaza is the Gaslamp District, a 16-block source of civic pride. Once slated for destruction, this area has been reclaimed by the people of San Diego thanks to the 1970s Redevelopment Plan. Where once dilapidated warehouses and run-down Victorian houses stood, and where no one dared to enter after dark, the Gaslamp District has now become the pulse of the city.

Due west of the city proper is the Embarcadero, a fun daytime location where visitors can take in leisurely views of the bay, hop aboard a harbor cruise or enjoy seafood at its finest. For shopping, visit Seaport Village, a 14-acre shopping and dining complex designed to emulate early California-style architecture.

Balboa Park No visit to San Diego would be complete without a trip to Balboa Park. Home to the world-famous San Diego Zoo, the park is much more than a beautiful place to see exotic animals. Gardens and grounds in Balboa Park were established as a city park for the people in 1868. In preparation for hosting the Panama-California Exposition of 1915, a celebration of the opening of the Panama Canal, founding fathers, architects and master gardeners collaborated to create the fine Spanish Colonial Revival-style buildings and gardens that still grace the grounds today. Additional buildings were raised on the site in the early 1930s, this time incorporating the look and feel of the Mayan civilization and California’s early indigenous peoples. Within the confines of the park, visitors can enjoy scores of museums and art galleries including the Museum of Man, San Diego Museum of Art, Timken Museum of Art and Spreckel’s Organ Pavilion.

Old Town For a taste of what San Diego was like in its earliest years, take in the sights and sounds of this colorful settlement, now preserved as a state historic park. Famous as the first European settlement in California, this area is also well known for its glorious year-round gardens, mouth-watering Mexican dishes, lilting Mariachi music and free-flowing margaritas. Be sure to spend a little time browsing through Bazaar del Mundo, truly a marketplace of the world.

Within easy walking distance from the center of Old Town is the Presidio, a must-see while in San Diego. This structure, now a historic landmark, is where Junipero Serra established the first of the Spanish missions in California.

La Jolla A short drive up the coast takes visitors to La Jolla (“the jewel” in Spanish), and truly a jewel it is. Despite its dense population, the people of this affluent city have somehow managed to maintain its beautiful natural setting. Cliffs along the main streets overlook the beaches and coves along the Pacific Ocean; tropical vegetation creeps and climbs across red-tiled roofs and verandas; and sunsets at La Jolla Shores are simply spectacular. Beyond breathtaking oceanfront scenery, this seaside community is home to the Birch Aquarium, which features the largest oceanographic display in the United States.

North County Travel a few miles further north along the coastal drive to reach Del Mar, another fine beach community. Famous for its racetrack, founded by Bing Crosby and fellow Hollywood cronies during the 1940s, this seaside town offers as much to families as it does to racing aficionados. Beaches here are clean and family friendly. Boutiques and open-air restaurants line the main street, giving it a Riviera-like quality. Just north of this city, visitors can find the renown Carlsbad Flower Fields and LEGOLAND California, great for those with young children in tow.

Moving inland, the city of Escondido is a quieter, more rural version of San Diego, replete with avocado and livestock ranches, vineyards and granite-strewn hillsides. The community hosts the San Diego Zoo’s 2,200-acre Wild Animal Park, an extension of the city’s world-famous zoo providing visitors a look at animals in the wild.

South Bay Visitors would be remiss if they never traveled south from the city proper into the area referred to as the South Bay. The main city in this area is Chula Vista, home to one of San Diego’s greatest music and entertainment venues, the Coors Amphitheatre. This entertainment complex provides state-of-the-art acoustics, VIP tables complete with cocktail table service, stadium seating and picnic seating on grassy knolls. Adjacent to the amphitheater, visitors (and especially their children) can cool off in the watery fun at Knott’s Soak City U.S.A..

While each district of San Diego has an original flair, the various sections blend seamlessly into a thriving, cosmopolitan city. From the North County beaches to the downtown shopping districts, San Diego’s first-class attractions consistently please tourists and locals alike.

Courtesy of travel.yahoo.com. Article written by Kathe Nielsen

POINT LOMA AND OCEAN BEACH

Point Loma is a neighborhood of dramatic contrasts encompassing at least four distinct districts. Up on The Point are beautiful, multi-million dollar mansions. Down by The Midway you’ll find seedy strip shows. On the Ocean Beach side, surf pounds the rugged coastline, while The Harbor side is a safe haven for yachts.

LAND’S END
A peninsula jutting into the sea, it’s easy to think of Point Loma as a dead end – “land’s end” in fact. But, as the site where San Diego was discovered in the first place, it seems more appropriate to consider Point Loma as a starting point – the start of a new land, a new dream, a new way of looking at things. And that’s just the place to start your own exploration of San Diego, with a voyage around Point Loma.

CRUISING AROUND
take a ride out Catalina Boulevard to Cabrillo Memorial Drive. You’ll pass through the Fort Rosecrans Military Reserve and National Cemetery with its orderly rows of grave markers commemorating soldiers lost in battle and sailors lost at sea. At the end of the road, on a promontory high above the water, three inspiring sights await you at the Cabrillo National Monument (619-557-5450). The first is the Cabrillo Monument itself, a simple statue honoring the momentous occasion in 1542 when European explorers discovered San Diego Harbor and set foot on the West Coast of what would later become the United States. The second is the historic, 150 year old Point Loma Lighthouse that guided ships safely home from the sea. But the most worthwhile reason to make the trip to the tip, is the spectacular 360 degree view. To the north, miles of white, sandy, San Diego beach. To the west, open ocean stretching to the horizon. To the east, sailboats racing in the protected waters of San Diego Bay. To the south, the Downtown San Diego skyline, Coronado Island and Mexico beyond. You’ll have to backtrack to Hill Street to reach “the low road” – also known as Sunset Cliffs Blvd. – that will carry you to Ocean Beach. In the 60′s, Ocean Beach used to be a hippy community of sorts, and as the Aquarian generation matured so has the neighborhood. But O.B. has retained the best and hippest aspects of its old, free-thinking atmosphere and you’ll find a refreshing mix of responsible real estate remodeling combined with simplified lifestyles and social liberation.

Continuing your circumnavigation of the Point Loma Peninsula, take West Point Loma Blvd. to Sports Arena Blvd. This primarily commercial area of town is known as The Midway District or Loma Portal. If you need to buy hardware, gardening supplies, sporting goods, stereo equipment, discount clothing or anything of that nature, The Midway is a good place to find it. The Sports Arena complex hosts everything from hometown hockey games to high-profile rock concerts. Swap meets are held in the parking lot on weekends, and many of the surrounding stores seem to hold perpetual sales in answer to the bargain-minded clientele that frequent the area.

Take Sports Arena Blvd. to Rosecrans Street to complete your circuit. Rosecrans leads you past the new planned residential communities around the Airport, to North Harbor Drive and the Harbor Island and Shelter Island yacht harbors. Here you’ll find shipyards and marinas, tackle shops and marine supplies, every conceivable need to serve San Diego’s voracious boating community. Racing enthusiasts will enjoy the daily spectacle of America’s Cup Class sailboats training offshore, while hands-on seafarers can book fishing trips, whale-watching tours and harbor cruises at Fisherman’s Landing (619-221-8500), Point Loma Sportfishing (619-223-1627) or any of a dozen other private charter operations in The Harbor area.

INSIDE TIPS
Geographically speaking, Ocean Beach is a simple place to figure out. All the stores and restaurants are centralized along Newport Avenue and down around the beach by the foot of the Municipal Pier. Take a stroll out to the end of the Pier on a stormy winter’s day, and watch the surfers battle the sea from the comfort of an indoor cafe, or join a beach volleyball game in the midsummer sun.

With its close proximity to the Airport, it comes as no surprise that there are a large number and variety of hotels in the vicinity of Point Loma’s Harbor District, especially on Harbor Island. And, with its large population of sailors, it’s also no surprise that there are a wide array of bars and restaurants in the area, particularly in and around Shelter Island. Check out Humphrey’s summer concert series, where you’re certain to find one of your favorite artists on the bill (800-542-7400).
SHOPPING
For shoppers, the best prices and selection on everyday items can be found in the Midway District around the Sports Arena, while the most unusual merchandise is on offer in Ocean Beach. In fact, O.B. is the perfect place to shop for old-school surf gear or new-age novelties, buy take-out junk food or sample exotic health foods. In the Harbor area, try Seabreeze Books, where you’ll find a small, but outstanding selection of nautical books and by-products to inspire your own adventurous spirit.

SURFING
Experienced surfers will like the challenging reefbreaks along Sunset Cliffs, and skaters will enjoy the public skateboard park by the soccer fields in Ocean Beach. Also in O.B., check out Dog Beach, where our four-legged friends can mingle freely with their own kind. The beaches on the Harbor side aren’t really suitable for swimming but they’re great for jogging. There are excellent tide pools to explore below the lighthouse at the west end of Point Loma and, in the winter, you stand a good chance of spotting Gray Whales here.

Point Loma isn’t land’s end at all; it’s a beginning, the start of great adventures and new discoveries.

Courtesy of www.Sandiego.org

Top 10 Top City of San Diego Urban Neighborhoods

San Diego isn’t exactly known as a city of neighborhoods, but they do exist in this bastion of suburbia. Here is our guide’s Top Picks for urban neighborhoods, based on purely subjective intangibles and tangibles such as whether the neighborhood is pedestrian friendly, has an interesting mix of businesses and restaurants, is close to public transportation, and the cool factor.
1) Hillcrest
New York has Greenwich Village. San Francisco has the Castro. Vancouver has the West End. And San Diego has Hillcrest, our closest thing to a diverse, lively, hip and colorful neighborhood. This gay-friendly ‘hood just north of Balboa Park is a mix of apartments and bungalows mixed with a pedestrian-friendly business district. Best Bets: Landmark Cinemas, any restaurant.
2) Kensington
This upscale enclave on the southeast rim of Mission Valley is picturesque, with attractive (and pricey) Spanish-styled homes for upwardly mobile yuppies. It’s a peaceful pocket amid the hubbub of the inner city. There’s a tiny business district along the single main artery Adams Ave. Best Best: The venerable Ken Cinema, the Ken Club bar, Kensington Video, Ponce’s Restaurant.
3) Mission Hills
As you head west on Washington Street, Hillcrest turns into Mission Hills, and the aura becomes more staid and low-key. With its grand homes with manicured lawns and winding hilltop streets, Mission Hills is for the decidedly well-to-do, yet it doesn’t have the snooty essence of La Jolla. Yes, I could picture myself living here. Best Bets: Mission Hills Nursery, Phil’s BBQ.
4) University Heights
University Heights is located between Hillcrest and North Park. Similar in ways to both (not as lively as Hilcrest; not as worn as North Park), it is a mix of Craftsman bungalows and apartments. Its small retail area is at the north end of Park Blvd. where it turns into Adams Ave. Best Bets: Adams Avenue Grill, Twiggs Coffee House, Parkhouse Eatery, Trolley Park.
5) Normal Heights
Or “Abnormal” Heights, as it’s sometimes referred to. Bookended on the west by University Heights and Kensington on the east, Normal Heights completes the Adams Avenue ‘hood trifecta along the main drag. Crowded, diverse apartment dwellings on the south side of Adams, quiet single-family homes on the north side. Best bets: The Ould Sod pub, Antique Row, Lestat’s Coffee.
6) Golden Hill
With its once stately old mansions, quaint bungalows and apartment buildings, Golden Hill is enjoying a rejuvenation. On the southeast end of Balboa Park, Golden Hill (and adjacent South Park) has some fine views of downtown and pockets of really cool neighborhoods, like Burlingame. Best Bets: Turf Supper Club, The Big Kitchen, M-Theory Records, South Park Grill.
7) North Park
The most sprawling of the urban neighborhoods, North Park is a hodgepodge. Cozy, tidy pockets of Craftsman homes on the north edge of Balboa Park (hence the name), dense apartments, and the pre-interstate retail stretches of University Ave and El Cajon Blvd. define North Park. Best Bets: “downtown” North Park (30th & University), Red Fox Lounge, Chicken Pie Shop.
City Heights
East of North Park is San Diego’s true melting pot, City Heights. The newly emigrated is found here: Hispanics, Southeast Asian, Somalian…you name it. Drive down stretches of University Ave. and watch the storefront signs change from Spanish to Vietnamese to Ethiopian. It can be rough at times, but it’s also the American Dream. Best Bets: any Asian market.
9) Ocean Beach
O.B is more like a town within the city, but I’ll include it here because it has a little business district and it truly does have a neighborhood feel, albeit one steeped in the ’60s and ’70s. Ocean Beach has resisted gentrification, and for that it should be commended. Because it wouldn’t be O.B. ifitdidn’t have it’s funky charm. Best Bets: The O.B. Pier, Dog Beach, Winston’s.
10) Little Italy
Little Italy has always been a neat ethnic enclave within downtown, but only in the past year or so has it become a bonified “cool” neighborhood, thanks to the addition of new condo highrises. Plus, the business district has been refurbished, including it’s own nifty street-spanning neighborhood sign. Best Bets: India Street, Mimmo’s Italian Village, Indigo Grill, Filippi’s.