Wait a minute…weren’t you just in Canada?

Just a quick note to let everyone know that GreatScot! is in San Diego! For those of you wondering what happened with the rest of my vacation trip in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, never fear—I will eventually get those posts completed. I have lots of great pictures and stories to recount.  However, the Outlander Premiere is rightly interrupting all previously scheduled programming.

The trip began this morning with me meeting Tricia Leedom, Heughligan, in the gate area of the Atlanta Airport. Sorry there aren’t any pictures of this meetup, but I’m pretty sure we never stopped talking from the point I arrived until the gate agent started boarding the plane. I never even thought to take a picture.

Once I boarded, I made the now obligatory tweet to Terry Dresbach with the shoe picture.

@draiochta14 The adventure begins! San Diego or bust. #Outlander pic.twitter.com/Cjpl1Ge9Uj

— Mandy (Màndaidh) (@rtidwell730) July 24, 2014

For those who may not know, Terry began the tradition of taking pictures of her shoes almost a year ago when this journey began. I now feel obliged to do the same every time I begin an Outlander related journey and it always makes me smile. Oh, the places these shoes have been and the stories they could tell. But, then again, that’s why this blog exists.

Winging across the continent to San Diego

Once in the air, I passed the time with the inflight Internet service making sure that I didn’t miss any of the great pics coming from the lucky ComicCon attendees. I also managed to snap a couple of pictures as we crossed the desert east of San Diego.

Desert

Desert

Coming into SAN airport

Once I had deplaned, I hung around in baggage claim waiting for my companion for this weekend’s adventure. Soon enough, she had also arrived and we made our way to a taxi for the ride to our hotel. Thanks to the craziness that is ComicCon in San Diego and the exorbitant price of downtown hotel rooms, we are staying about 10 miles north of the downtown area—where I can use hotel points for a no cost stay. Nothing beats free! Luckily, I have the Uber app on my phone to help us get around economically.

Fish Tacos, Calamari and Mussels…oh my!

Once we settled into our hotel, our thoughts quite naturally turned to food as neither of us had eaten much all day.  We decided to head downtown to the Gaslamp District for some food, so I put my trust Uber app to use and within 4 minutes Scott had shown up to take us downtown. Turns out Scott was a retired TWA airline pilot who drives for Uber to stay out of his wife’s hair. She told him he had to stop hanging around the house so much after he ate some wine and cheese destined for his wife’s book club. And, get this, the book that was going to be discussed at that meeting was A Breath of Snow and Ashes. You just can’t ever get too far from an Outlander reference, can you? I’m sure his wife is going to be very jealous when he tells her of the two girls he carted around today who are going to the premiere tomorrow evening.

Another strong point in Scott’s favor is that he pointed us to the Bay Park Fish Company for their 3-6 pm Happy Hour. Marisa and I gorged ourselves on Fish tacos with Mahi Mahi, Mussels steamed in coconut milk and lemongrass, as well as Kung Pao calamari. Everything was splendid. Scott even hung around the area so he would be available to take us back to the hotel to rest up before a night on the town. Can’t be out too late though! Lots to do tomorrow and we’ll need to be well rested.

The Big Day is coming…

Tomorrow is D-day! I’ll catch you up on any of tonight’s activities worth mentioning and have extensive coverage of all the events at the Outlander Premiere. People keep asking me what I’m looking forward to most. Obviously, I’m very excited to actually see the first episode and all of the cast plus Ron and Diana. But even more than that, I think I’m most looking forward to is the live performance by Bear McCreary of some of the music for the Outlander series.

For those of you who may not have seen it, Bear recently published a piece on his website titled “Outlander Fans’ Guide to My Music” where he details some of the steps in his life and career that have led him to this project. It is obvious from reading it that he truly has a passion for the music of the era Outlander encompasses. I can’t wait to hear more from him as he has promised as many blog posts during the Outlander season as living with a newborn baby will allow.

Stay tuned. I have a feeling things are going to be verra exciting tomorrow!