It’s an odd feeling, driving along State Route 76, to come across this ghost settlement, a few miles west of the Pala Mission. “Be careful of snakes,” my friend Kim shouts, “and people!” I’ve persuaded …

The little boy was hanging in a pear tree, with a rope around his chest, crying. The rest of his family had ropes around their necks. They were dead. The rebel Gani Beg came down …

Right next to the harpists’ colony, you spot an odd sight. At first, among the trees, it looks like an RV park. But then you realize: there’s no RV in here. It’s all houses. Lilliputian …

I’m halfway up Mount Laguna, walking off the Sunrise Highway into a little house on the edge of the forest. Through the gate, up redwood steps, through another gate. An elderly lady appears at the …

Pablo Cantua picks up the phone. “Hey man: Want to play Antarctica? I can get you the gig.” “Antarctica? Haven’t heard of that bar.” “No man. Not a bar, the continent.” And so began the …

My friend Joe and I are standing at the edge of the water on Coronado’s Central Beach. He’s a surfer. I’m a body surfer. “So do waves come in batches?” I ask him. “Can you …

Dave Franta lives your California dream. He surfs pretty-much full time. He can, because after 29 years as a firefighter, he has retired. He’s 59, looks 39, and doesn’t seem to have a worry in …

It’s a shivery night here in Barrio Logan. I’ve just come across these kids huddling with Anishka Lee-Skorepa in an empty lot often used for markets and performances. A small crowd waits on the sidewalk. …

Steve Wampler became famous when he somehow scaled El Capitan in Yosemite even though he uses a wheelchair. On Friday September 17, 2010, with help from a support team, he became the first person with …

As much as we’d like to think so, sometimes you hear things you’d rather not. Got a bit of a shock at the Campo Santo the other day. I was walking through San Diego’s second …

Jamie Sorenson knows suicides. She’s written a book on it, Why You Tried to Kill Yourself. And in the Navy, she’s counseled thousands. But when it comes to advising Coronado bridge suicide-prevention groups, she’s surprisingly …

This is my friend Ronda’s idea. “Come on down! Sneaky Tiki Ukulele night! Fast Times! Clairemont Drive. Bring your uke!” Except in the end, flu hits her and she isn’t going to be plucking no …

Victor Vasquez holds his head in his hands. His white parakeet Ginger sits on his shoulder. Coocooberry, his 25-year-old red-lored green Amazon parrot, sits atop his cage, looking at Vasquez, unblinking, silent. “It’s really painful,” …

The monk cuts across the courtyard to where we’re staring up at Wat Lao Buddharam, here on 44th Street in Chollas View. “Can I help you?” Soon he is inviting us to come look inside. …

“Just let it go, let it flow, kind of like life,” says Tony Trowbridge. He’s painting a watercolor of what he sees right here on Orange Avenue in Coronado. Quick, deft, light movements, mixed with …

"I want Scott Peters' job." So says Lucas Cannon. “I know I can do it better. I have been training all my life for this.” But wait. Cannon is a barman here at a South …

Can music be a cure? Letitia Rogers says yes, in the right circumstances. “In my personal life, music was a great way to get to know people,” she says. She’s a San Diego-based Hollywood movie …

I’m like everybody else on the street. We’re bending over, craning our necks to see inside. It’s like a rusty version of every getaway car you ever saw in movies such as Bonnie and Clyde. …

“Let me show you something,” says Gary Harper. It’s around nine on a Thursday night. We’re both taking a moment out on the sidewalk away from the music at Border X in Barrio Logan. I …

Rosie Gutierrez is 33, looks 23, and is not easily dissuaded. She’s a trainee nurse, wife, mother, works in a restaurant to pay the bills, and, oh, by the way, believes that the earth is …

Michael Schmid has decided to end his life. I first met Michael at the Café Madrid in Coronado. First thing you notice are his electric-blue eyes. The next is his soft voice, which makes you …

I spot him walking his bike along the avenue, downtown Coronado, Sunday morning. Blue and white Hawaiian shirt, jeans, spikey gray hair, Beach Cruiser bike, heading for a coffee at Café 1134. I’d asked to …

“The Hondurans aren’t bad, but their effect is ba-ad,” says Jorge. He’s driving me in his taxi from downtown Tijuana to the caravan’s rained-out encampment. “Now, I wait two hours for a job. It used …

You don’t have to do anything this holiday season. Despite what the song says, you don’t have to deck the halls, join the chorus, or don any sort of gay apparel. You don’t have to …

Half past 10, Sunday night. Coronado. Just happen to walk into this parking lot outside an eatery called “Nado Republic.” Two men are standing in the lot’s shadows. One has black eye-liner and black polish …

The young man in his sampot chong kraben picks up a red traffic cone and uses it as a loudspeaker. “Let’s go!” He’s launching the parade around the temple grounds, kicking off Loi Krathong, the …

“Longevity!” says Mr. Evans. “That’s the thing. Longevity: I come in here, and it’s familiar, welcoming, comfortable, like home. Like $2 beers on Thirsty Thursday. Still. Price unchanged! And Loni? Don’t get her mad. She’s …

“Donald Sheckler always told me, ‘If you find schist, there’s gold somewhere nearby.’” Jim looks at the piece of schist rock he’s just kicked out of the dirt here, halfway up Mine Canyon. It’s a …

Drums, giants, and Mother Goose Stargazing in Anza-Borrego 652 Palm Canyon Drive Borrego Springs This year, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park was officially designated an International Dark Sky Community, thanks to years of concerted effort to …

“Here,” says Hugo Castro. “Put it under the branches, in shade, but where they can see it.” A gecko darts out. I lean over. I’m expected to dash off a little note on the bottle …

I’d read my fellow Golden Dreams writer Matt Lickona’s funny July 3rd account of the “Before I die I want to…” chalkboard outside The Alibi bar, in Uptown at University and Richmond. I happened by …

The guy is 21. When I was 21, I didn’t yet have my first car (which would be a Fiat 500). This guy ­— from San Diego — is driving Formula 4 cars 150 miles …

“San Diegans could be growing their guitars in their front yard,” says Scott Paul. Say what? “Yes! Thousands of trees reach the end of their life cycle, and what happens? Too often, cities will mulch …

They’re are a worldwide phenomenon. They say 38 cities have installed pianos worldwide so far, including London, Boston, Los Angeles. And Coronado. Saturday afternoon. Sunny, breezy. Chloe Albert’s bored. She’s with her mother, the Coronado …

Adios, Costa Azul

Dead Owl, lost pearls

Mr. Stein’s ghost

Urban forester

Are San Diegans becoming as different from New Yorkers as bonobos have become, say, from chimps? Biologist Nathan Lents was in town the other day, talking at the Central Library and on KPBS about how …

“Conserving our planet one fish at a time.” You do a double-take when you see the sign. Because Randy Hupp’s a commercial fisherman. But he is serious about this. What he’s started, from his home …

“Two claps!” says Tysheen. “Now, shout it out.” “Bula!” “OK. Gulp it down in one. And, one more clap!” This is kava-drinking in City Heights. Boy. Have to say. It’s ceremonial and it’s fun. Only …

The one thing you notice about these taxi drivers is they’re always talking. Laughing, shouting, arguing, confiding. They’ll stop only if a passenger comes trundling across from the Santa Fe Depot to their Kettner Boulevard …

Has anybody seen the movie, Morgan: A Suitable Case for Treatment? About this crazy artist who couldn’t bear to see a bare wall? Each time, he had to fill it with a mural. It was …

My passport ran out of juice last year, just when the Mexican government was deciding it wanted to see official papers as foreigners headed south. That’s the only reason I didn’t hear, until the other …

Bill Caballero turns his trumpet towards Roy Robinson. Robinson lights up. His hands flail back and forth from one conga drum skin to another. Then Caballero’s wailing trumpet takes up a response. People watch the …

This is Chris Conway’s first day. He’s been meaning to come do this with his dad Gareth for years. But now here he is, in a game he’s never played, French bowls — boules, if …

Why not fish jerky? “I was sitting on a mountaintop in the Gila Wilderness,” says Nick Mendoza. “I was thinking beef jerky, and then the thought came: beef jerky? Why not fish jerky?” Mendoza was …

Is an upstairs office in downtown Coronado going to save the world? Out of his modest headquarters on Orange Avenue, Marshall Saunders founded Citizens’ Climate Lobby back in 2007. His idea was that we had …

Lyla sits still like a pro. Which is a miracle here in the middle of flailing dogs and foamy beers and baby strollers. The little black and tan pooch obviously doesn’t know what’s happening, because …

“What do Ben Franklin and Kim Kardashian have in common with me?” asks Cristy Boisvert. “Psoriasis.” I’ve just met Cristy here, on Silver Strand beach, soaking up the morning sun in today’s cold wind. Behind …