We had a blast spending last week in San Diego celebrating Ryan’s birthday!  We travel all the time to shoot destination weddings and engagement sessions, but this was the first time in a LONG time that we took a trip just for us!  And there’s no better way to get out of the Arizona heat than an escape to the beach.  We stayed on Coronado Island so we could enjoy the beauty of one of our favorite spots, the Hotel del Coronado.  We photographed Audrey & Aaron’s wedding there and absolutely fell in love with the place.  So of course, it was our very first stop after 6 hours in the car.

Since we were on vacation, our iPhones came in handy when we didn’t feel like dragging out the “big camera.”  Here are a couple phone pics of the view from our room at the Loews Coronado Bay Resort.  LOVE!  There’s nothing quite like waking up to the sight of a sailboat gliding by your window. You don’t get a lot of that in Arizona. LOL!

One great thing about being photographers is that you end up making friends with other photographers from all over the world! On our first morning there, we had a chance to get breakfast with our pals Jeff & Erin, the incredible duo behind The Youngrens.  And we happened to discover that Ryan & Jeff are sunglasses twinsies :-) So awesome.

Some iPhone “selfies” from the beach!

Jeff & Erin recommended that we check out one of their favorite restaurants, C-level.  The food was amazing and the city views across the bay were absolutely stunning. This is probably my favorite shot from our whole trip and it was taken at our dinner table!  Thanks for the tip friends!

The next day we took a drive up to Newport Beach to explore the adorable homes and fun filled beaches of Balboa Island.

Our first order of business – snacking on “Bluth-style” frozen bananas.  We made sure to quote Arrested Development several times while  eating them :-) Yum!

I took lots of iPhone snaps of Ryan taking photos of the water. By the end of the trip he got pretty good at outrunning the waves.

Our last day was spent enjoying the sights and sounds of Coronado.  We rented beach cruisers and took a two hour bike ride around the island.

We even set up a little self-timer shot on one of the decks at the Hotel Del. Purse sized tripods sure come in handy on vacation ;-)

Happy birthday baby! So glad we could usher in 33 in such a fun way! Love you!