CityPASS San Diego articles

Looking for a break from theme parks during your Southern California vacation? The San Diego Zoo® Safari Park offers something completely different: massive open habitats where herds of animals roam across rolling savannas just 35 miles north of downtown San Diego.

Old Town Trolley Tours calls the experience "Transportainment®," a mix of transportation and entertainment. The live narration comes from conductors who know San Diego well, blending historical facts, local legends, and plenty of humor. That personal touch sets the ride apart from a standard bus tour with a prerecorded soundtrack.

This guide maps standout San Diego dessert shops to the areas travelers explore most — the Embarcadero waterfront, Little Italy, La Jolla, and Old Town — with picks for vegan, gluten-free, and dairy-free eaters noted along the way. Consider it permission to schedule dessert between every stop on your itinerary.

Few travel experiences compare to the moment a whale breaks the surface of the Pacific, exhaling a plume of mist against an endless backdrop of blue. Thanks to its position along one of the busiest marine migration corridors on Earth, San Diego delivers that moment more reliably than almost any other city in the country.

San Diego is one of the easier California cities to explore without a rental car. The MTS Trolley links major hubs like Downtown, Old Town, and the Santa Fe Depot; an extensive bus network and rideshare cover coastal spots and hillier neighborhoods; and walking handles compact districts like the Gaslamp Quarter and Little Italy.

Every stretch of sand here has its own personality, whether you want gentle surf for the kids, a sunset worth photographing, or a boardwalk humming with skaters and surfers. This guide sorts San Diego's standout beaches by what each does best, and it highlights nearby stops that make them easy to fit into a single, well-rounded day.