Indoor

NickelCity_Bowling — Kids love the mini-bowling lanes at City Fun Center.

By Carolyn Howard
PassPort to San Diego

A Sunday morning around 11 a.m. is a great time to have a birthday party at City Fun Center in San Diego. My son was turning 11 and he invited 15 of his friends to help celebrate his big day. Given the time, our group basically had the place to ourselves until noon when another celebration was scheduled. We had selected the “Extreme Party Package,” which included pizza and bowling. We enjoyed 2-1/2 hours in the private party room, a personal party host, set-up, clean-up and party supplies, four pitchers of soda and three buckets of popcorn/chips.

Each guest received free admission, a $10 bag of nickels, a free return admission pass, 300 redemption tickets, two slices of pizza, five frames of mini-bowling and a bowling pin pen. My son, the birthday honoree, received a light-up lanyard (which he thought was really cool), a spin of the ticket wheel, a jumbo dice roll for tickets and a surprise bowling gift.

I appreciated that City Fun Center splitting the $10 bag of nickels into two $5 bags and started the kids on just one. The kids received the other bag after we ate pizza. As a mom, I suggest letting the kids play first before trying to get them to sit down and eat. Kids have a ton of energy, and the guests our group couldn’t wait to spend their nickels on the more than 100 games offered by this great amusement center.

NickelCity-Kids — Enjoy a private party room for birthdays at City Fun Center.

My son said the games were “awesome” and all of his friends had a wonderful time. I was a little concerned that City Fun Center may be too young for 11-year-olds, but they absolutely loved the games, which were actually appropriate for any age. They even had some Old-School games such as Ms. Pac-Man, Centipede and Galaxian, which were free to play.

Their package also included mini-bowling, which the group had fun doing (and it was a good way to slow down their nickel game play!) The lanes have automatic scoring, built-in bumpers and in a nice touch, no special shoes were required.

The pizza tasted delicious! Everybody finished their two pieces and also munched on chips and popcorn. I had brought my own cupcakes for dessert.

Having relocated a few years ago to the Miramar area of San Diego, City Fun Center is new and clean. All staff members were friendly, accommodating and attentive whenever the kids had questions or needed assistance with a game or prizes. I would absolutely recommend City Fun Center for a party or just an exciting venue to hang out and have some fun!

The facility is at 8990 Miramar Road. The location has a large front entry and lounge area with tables and chairs, free Wi-Fi and TV. Call (858) 675-9700, visit http://www.nickelcitysd.com/ or best of all, come by and check it out!

Pay homage to classic motorcycles and collectable autos of the 20th century at this world-class museum in Balboa Park. Check out “Show Stoppers,” a permanent car and motorcycle collection including a stunning group of Indian Motorcycles, an extremely rare 1966 Bizzarrini P538 and of course the beautiful three-wheeled 1932 Morgan Super Sport just to name a few. Other exhibits include presentations on actor and automobile and motorcycle racer Steve McQueen, and Louis Mattar’s Fabulous Car.

San Diego Automotive Museum

2080 Pan American Plaza, San Diego • (619) 231-2886 • sdautomuseum.org

Cathy Hendrie
PassPort to San Diego

Engineer a day devoted to miniature heaven at the San Diego Model Railroad Museum in Balboa Park. Both San Diego locals and out-of-towners love this impressive venue, which spans 27,000 square feet of space in the lower level of the Casa De Balboa building.

The museum features six bustling train exhibits and an unparalleled attention to detail that has to be seen to appreciated. Chug along and be transported to real and imaginary railway lines with weathered and modern trains running through them.

The main exhibit loops you around fascinating displays featuring various O, HO and N scale exhibits. The large dioramas are completely landscaped to represent actual railway scenarios found in California and Arizona. Tiny towns, figurines, vintage vehicles, a carnival, trestle bridges over huge gorges, mountains and deserts, grazing lands, are all constructed with fine detail and accuracy.

A fifth operating display devoted to rare and modern toy trains is for the child in each of us. The Toy Train Gallery is a nostalgic trip for visitors remembering Lionel Type trains and the cute lighted villages set up at Christmas time, and a delight to little ones discovering the Lionel trains for the first time.

Outside the back door, find the newest exhibit, a small fenced-in garden called the Centennial Garden Railway. It is dedicated to the electric street car lines designed for transporting the masses who visited the San Diego for the Panama-California Exposition in 1915. The miniature street cars run past scale models of some of the original buildings like the Balboa Park’s famous Spreckels Organ Pavilion and the California Tower.

A labor of love, the San Diego Model Railroad Museum is operated and maintained largely by volunteers, and a must see for rail fans. General admission tickets include access to all indoor and outdoor exhibits and daily programs. On the first Tuesday of each month, show proof you are a San Diego County resident, and enjoy free admission!

The museum is open from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Tuesday-Friday and from 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Call (619) 696-0199 or visit the museum online.

A Wells-Fargo stagecoach, Wyatt Earp’s signature and the story of Bum the town dog make for fascinating fun at the San Diego History Center, located in the heart of Balboa Park. The 1866 stagecoach could travel from San Diego to Los Angeles in just two days. Gambler Wyatt Earp had business dealings in San Diego properties and bet on prizefights and horse racing. Bum the St. Bernard/spaniel arrived in the city as a stowaway on a late-1800s steam ship and decided to stay.

But the birth of “America’s Finest City” and surrounding areas begins centuries earlier with the Kumeyaay culture, followed by 18-century Spanish settlements, the 19th-century Mexican era and California Gold Rush.

Luckily for visitors, the History Center chronicles it all, through a variety of mediums and subjects, including art, photographs, documents, historic clothing and objects.

Along with the area’s aforementioned indigenous beginnings exhibited in “Place of Promise,” the center also illustrates the initial development and transformation of today’s downtown beginning in the 1870s, when Alonzo Horton built his wharf at the foot of 5th Avenue, to the 1985 opening of Horton Plaza in the newly designed historic district, The Gaslamp Quarter.

For visitors researching the city, the center carries 2.5 million historic photographs and 45 million documents to view in the lower-level library and archives. The center also offers a many popular programs for kids and adults. An 80-seat Thornton Theatre shows exhibit-related films and is also available for rent for corporate meetings, movies and lectures. The center may also be rented for weddings and other occasions.

Museum hours are 10 a.m.-5 p.m. daily. The center offers free admission for San Diego residents on the second Tuesday of each month. Stop in for a lesson in the region’s dynamic past! For more information, call (619) 232-6203 or visit sandiegohistory.org/.