8. December 2015 | Von Lena Siemers 

California Dreamin’

I guess every new post around this time starts with: ‘Oh gosh, when has all the time passed by?’ On one hand: Yes, it is crazy and shocking where all the time has gone! On the other, it shows us how much we have enjoyed surfing, travelling and living here in San Diego. Oh, and of course studying … It is quite difficult to sum up the last five months of our lives as we have done so much different stuff.

California Dreamin’

The chilled and laid back lifestyle faded on every one of us. Waking up in the morning by the sun like nearly every day is an awesome feeling. You do not have to plan trips nearby in advance, because most of the time you can trust the San Diego weather with its warm and sunny days and be spontaneous to go just anywhere. There has been the time where we all just could not get enough of the beaches in summer. Summer officially ends on the first weekend in September but I’ll tell you a little secret: It really doesn’t.

It can get a little colder at night from October to December but during the day it stays mostly sunny and warm. Sometimes it does start to rain but this is nothing compared to what we are used to in Germany. Especially if you are from Hamburg you can leave your raincoat at home. You won’t need it! However, California is more than this. Even the ‘winter’ is beautiful. If you do a 2.5 hours trip up north, you get to see a beautiful winter location named Big Bear Lake. For those who love skiing and snowboarding, that’s the perfect place for you. But enough said about the weather.

A totally different experience was to visit Mexico. In only about 30 minutes you reach the Mexican border. Of course it depends on where you live in San Diego but it is easy to get there from nearly everywhere. Make sure you bring your passport and your I-20 with you; otherwise you could get in trouble reentering the border to the United States again. Mexico is definitely an experience by itself. Right behind the border you will recognize that Mexico is still a developing country, even if it is that close to the United States.

The road and driving conditions are worse than in San Diego and I thought that is hard to overcome! All over the place you will see rubbish and bad living conditions. However, you will enjoy the friendly Mexican hospitality while eating the best tacos and drinking the yummiest margaritas you have ever had. But still be careful that you will not walk alone in Mexico, especially not at night. If you decided to go to Mexico by car, make sure you will get in the right lane to come back to the United States. It can happen easily, that your GPS tells you a way to get to the border, where you automatically end up in a wrong lane.

Once, it happened to my friends and me that we got stuck in the fast track lane, where you have to register in advance and show various documents from the last six months of your income, health status etc. Luckily, we did not get in trouble because the border patrol are used to strangers, who cross the border by car the first time. The only thing is if you end up going through this special fast track lane by accident, that you will end up in a kind of special control, where we had to wait at least three hours to get back to the United States. Our luck was that one of the officers did not make a big deal about it and let us go after 40 minutes.

Resuming the last months, we had a blast. It’s just the kind of lifestyle in San Diego, which got us right away. ‘Worry less, surf more, travel often and enjoy every single moment of it’, is the kind of motto we have followed. Soon it is time to say good bye but I am glad that I have made so many different experiences, met so many great people that makes saying good bye so hard. Cheers to an unforgettable and indescribable time of our lives!

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