Mission Beach Boardwalk & Belmont Park Walking Tour

a walking tour of the mission beach boardwalk and belmont park in san diego california i'm chris this is yellow productions i do travel guides that are fun in form of entertaining in this video i'm going to be taking you on a guided walking tour of one of san diego's most popular beaches i'm going to turn the camera around so you can see forward and we're starting this walk on what's known as the boardwalk this wide concrete paved path popular for bicycles skateboarding uh roller skating but a lot of people definitely come here for the beach and this is a nice white sandy beach powder sand the waves are usually pretty mellow uh two miles of sandy beach here in mission beach if we look to the south the jetty on there in the south that's known as south mission the beach is the widest down there it's a little more quiet in south mission beach and it is the most lively right where we are here at the main mission beach parking lot in front of belmont park this amusement park on the beach that we'll be walking through in just a moment but first we're going to walk down the boardwalk to the main lifeguard tower we're going to hang a right go through belmont park we'll check out the giant dipper roller coaster this roller coaster wooden roller coaster been here since 1925 if you like roller coasters you will definitely like that one as we walk around i'll tell you what's here so you can see a little bit of the southern california beach city and you can think about if you want to come here or not it is one of my favorite beaches in san diego i grew up in san diego and so i consider this the beach that i go to most often i like the liveliness here it's always buzzing i'm recording this uh in april of 2021 so it's kind of spring break time so this is like the spring break crowd that we get here i will point out the water is still pretty cold so not a great beach day to go in the water and it's a little bit windy now on the right hand side here this begins belmont park there's a couple of restaurants and bars here draft on the bottom floor cannonball on the top floor there's great outside seating that looks out at this boardwalk you know one of the most famous boardwalks in california southern california is the venice beach boardwalk and it's kind of become like skid row west in los angeles it's a bit sketchy so if you're looking for a neat boardwalk that doesn't have the sketchiness i would definitely encourage you to check out mission beach now right here there's uh el jefe tacos a little taco shop right here on the beach it's probably only uh open on weekends for the spring and i assume that will be open every day in the summer that's how a lot of these businesses in mission beach are there's a wetzel's pretzels right here on the beach i think this one's pretty new i haven't seen this one before and then right here there's a beachfront uh bar it's called the beach house at belmont park it's uh it's about noon so people aren't really out there drinking and eating lunch yet there's another snack shack right here that has round table pizza you can get ice creams hot fudge sundae i will point out the ice cream cone is seven dollars so you're definitely paying beach prices but you know right there on the beach that's kind of neat you can see this beach house bar they've got lifeguard style type tables they've also put sand in there so you can feel like you're still at the beach when you're eating at the beach house i like this palm tree right here it kind of goes up and then it kind of goes down this thing with the lighting contraption on the top this used to be a big natural wave a big natural wave big artificial wave that people could surf on that is no longer running here though all right we are coming up on the main lifeguard tower uh in mission beach lifeguards staff this all year round so if you do want to do some swimming right in front of this main lifeguard tower all year round is always a dedicated swim zone so if you just want to swim and you don't want surfers to be around you running into you you can do it here okay so we're going to go ahead and turn right here on the right of belmont park which tells us about the plunge there's this swimming pool we'll see it on the outside but it is the best pool in san diego so says the sign the swimming pool has been here since 1925 which is when this area of belmont park was developed when it was built it was the largest saltwater swimming pool in the world uh largest indoor salt water swimming pool in the world and the building itself was built in a style similar to that of balboa park which is kind of san diego's uh maybe biggest attraction is balboa park which was built for a world's fair this kind of neat spanish style architecture the plunge went through some disrepair and so uh it's actually completely remodeled and a new pool now right here in front of the plunge is chicken charlies this used to be a stand that would always go to the san diego county fair because we've had no fair this year affairs for them to go to instead they're out here and so if you want to try some really interesting california fair food i would encourage you to check out chicken charlies in particular you might be interested in some of their totally fried frog legs they're totally fried twinkies totally fried oreos everything here is fried but uh if you get it fresh fried then it's it's pretty tasty again you are paying the beach prices to eat here at chicken charlie's oh this is a new one i haven't seen this one yet they have a cotton candy ice cream sandwich hey hey okay so this is looking at the building of the plunge now that has that big pool in it that i showed you earlier um we're not gonna go in there exactly but we'll just maybe take a take a quick peek from the door so you can see inside they have you know annual memberships you can get but i think they also have uh daily prices that you can pay to go in yeah it says it's 15 per person to go in for one day one session that's a pretty neat pool lots of things for kids these things that float that they can walk on and then they've also got like a gym up on the second story that's cool now back here behind the plunge they've got some zip lines so you can do like some ziplining stuff back here and if you're looking for clean restrooms down here mission beach i always point out restrooms you know that the best restrooms at mission beach are these in belmont park right behind the plunge those are going to be much better for you than the restrooms out on the boardwalk the public restrooms they're public and you know they're about as clean as you would expect a beach public restroom to be all right let's go ahead and walk back this way around chicken charlies uh if you didn't see this earlier they've got this wave that you can take a picture on a surfboard they've got this big chair you can take a picture of so if you're looking for some instagramable spots right there at the entrance to the beach house you will find them okay so now just in the background here behind the truck that's loading and unloading we see the giant dipper roller coaster this roller coaster was built something like in a hundred days and it's also been here since the 1920s it suffered some disrepair in the 60s and 70s where it was actually closed and then it was revitalized uh in the 80s and 90s reopened and there's some people riding the roller coaster today so you go chris our amusement rides open they are indeed open here in california they reopened on april 1st and this is a pretty fun one it's not quite as big as the one in santa cruz which is another popular seaside roller coaster uh but it's it's really quite bumpy and i definitely encourage you again if you like thrill rides to ride this i i can hear the car going up so we'll probably wait here for just a second as we walk slowly for that to go up so that you can see it drop now in this area they've also got other rides not just big thrill rides but they've got more kitty rides they've got the crazy yellow submarine back there and there it goes that sound of the roller coaster and people screaming if you're in the water here swimming boogie boarding surfing you can hear that in the water and you can hear people scream it's kind of fun there's also ferris wheels for the kiddos there's an arcade there are these boardwalk style games kind of like you would see at the san diego county fair where you could win a giant um ice cream cone or something like that a stuffed ice cream cone if you want more ice cream there's a sweet shop in here where you can get more ice cream i think this one's a little less expensive than the one that's on the boardwalk there are lots of gift shops in here so if you want to bring back your neon um pink t-shirt that says san diego that's where you can get it burger shack here called bel monte's burgers i have not eaten their burgers so i cannot tell you whether they are good or not in this little courtyard right here there's a climbing wall and there's also a pizza place in the corner there used to be bumper cars here [Music] it says overdrive bumper cars i don't know if they're just not open at the moment also on the other side of the roller coaster there are uh go-karts currently and they've also got some of these other big fare type rides right here which is the one that goes up and down and spins you around this one for me is a little too nausea inducing i should point out there's no admission to belmont park and also all of the parking in mission beach is free free parking no meters no paid parking so that is another nice perk about coming here uh if you like crepes and who doesn't like crepes i like crepes there's a new crepery right here you can get some crepes and if you want to know the uh what i think is the best gift shop because there's a lot of gift shops here in belmont park my favorite is this one here right on the corner of belmont park and the main parking lot where we started called wings uh and wings this is like a really huge gift shop i think they have some of the cheapest prices and some of the most things i've even bought like beach supplies here so if you're coming and you need a boogie board you need a sand pail you need something check out wings it is huge this video is not sponsored by wings i just like wings and if you want actual surf stuff like some board shorts or something then check out this one the san diego board shop that'll have your best um actually like kind of real surf gear instead of like face fake surf gear wings for the cheaper stuff uh the board shop for the higher quality things now this parking lot that's right by the beach where i started the video gets full really really quickly so if you're coming in the summer or you're coming in spring you're coming on a weekend don't expect to actually get parked in this lot there's parking across the street by the bay there's parking further down so consider all the other parking options to you you don't have to just park in this one now a lot of people maybe think they'll park in the residential neighborhoods in mission beach but that's hard because there's just not much parking there there's also a tiki town adventure golf here so this is a indoor mini golf course and we see the people walking by all the people who parked across the street to walk over here so it's an indoor mini golf course it's also an outdoor mini golf course and now we'll go ahead and walk down mission boulevard this would be the main street you would take to come here to belmont park mission beach i mentioned it's kind of this couple mile sandy spit i think is the technical term so mission beach in and of itself is only about four blocks wide like one or two blocks here on the left and then one or two blocks on the right before you get to mission bay and so be and so because of that mission beach is actually san diego's most densely developed residential neighborhood the lots here in mission beach are the smallest of any lots anywhere in the city and mission beach was developed a little after ocean beach to the south and pacific beach to the north because all of mission beach is developed on sand and so there was a lot of challenges about developing a neighborhood on sand okay so now that we've come back around here i want to show you the go-karts in just a second but also here to the left is a escape room so if you like solving puzzles and getting out of things then you can check out the escape ology escape room right there uh we got that roller coaster going again and these go karts this used to be a parking lot but now it's go-karts and this is cool because i feel like a lot of the family fun centers are closing places that have go-karts and how often do you get to ride go-karts right by the beach we can actually see there's quite a few people back there waiting to ride them so i think this is a popular attraction okay now these electric scooters are popular all over san diego you can use an app to unlock them they're usually like a dollar per hour or there's something pretty cheap to ride them i will point out that electric motorized scooters are uh not allowed on the boardwalk that we walked on earlier so if you want to ride those legally then you actually need to ride them like out here on the street on mission boulevard and not on the boardwalk i will say do so at your own risk because you know drivers in the beach neighborhoods can often be a little bit crazy now this intersection that we're coming up on this is like the main intersection in mission beach most people who come here come off the interstate 8 freeway take essentially all the way to the end come down west mission bay drive where you see the roller coaster hanging left at the roller coaster and that's where you'll find the big parking lots um there are not a lot of great food options in mission beach because it's just like a super touristy neighborhood and not a lot of residential but you said chris weren't you talking about it being a densely developed residential neighborhood i would say most of the places down here are used as vacation rentals there's a few hotels down that way there's a bahia hotel and just on the other side of the bay is a hyatt regency and then in pacific beach there's the catamaran other than that you are absolutely going to be looking at uh booking a vacation rental or an airbnb in one of these units now on the corner here san diego's all about mexican food we're the you know kind of southernmost big city in california and so if you're hanking for some tacos some fish tacos you could check out mr ruri berto's taco shop uh definitely get the fish tacos that would be my recommendation but you can see they got a lot of other things of course mexican taco shop breakfast super popular so our churros check out the churros too this little strip right here is kind of the strip of shops not in belmont park but this is where west mission bay drive just kind of dead ends to the street there's more mexican food here there is marcy's mexican food i have not eaten at this one but you know you generally can't go wrong with most san diego taco shops just next to it there's a liquor store that has opened an acai bowl window so you can get some acai bowls with granola banana if you're looking for something on the healthy side over here is the coaster saloon this is a really popular place to get your drink on they've got lots of outdoor spaces to drink they've set up these spaces along the sidewalk as well and when they're open in the evenings they've also got a barbecue to eat for dinner more gift shops here that you can pick up boogie boards frisbees smash ball all that stuff you would want um here is a gelato shop you know no beach town can really ever have enough ice cream this one looks new as well and i like the look of it this is a brick oven pizza place i've had the pizza here this pizza is pretty good in a pinch and i would probably pick this pizza over the ones in belmont park because i like the kind of pizza places that you can actually like see the slices right there and then just get one of those to go fresh out of the oven so if you want pizza consider this brick oven pizza spot more gift shops because there's never enough gift shops if you are particularly looking for bikinis i should zoom out again right here is the bikini shop this sells a whole bunch of uh bottoms and tops big store just of bikinis and now we're almost getting back to the boardwalk this restaurant right here it says they've been voted the best fish tacos in san diego that is a bold statement this place is called the sand bar and uh they've got a number of different tacos fish carne asada adobata carnitas chicken or shrimp they're open on the weekend starting at 9 00 a.m there's a euro place that hangs out here and i feel like a landmark in mission beach is this place this is the hamel's castle hamel's is another gift shop surf shop this just used to be like a standard i'm gonna make this wider so you can really see it this used to be a standard condominium building as a lot of these are on the front of the boardwalk but they built this facade on it to make it look like a castle which i think is super cool for someone to say i want my beachfront castle if you're looking to rent things to go to the beach like you want to rent a surfboard or you want to rent a bicycle the hamel's castle is the place to do it and now going back down the boardwalk here this is roughly walking on where we started except we started from the other side of belmont park that way past the main lifeguard tower and you can walk down this boardwalk a couple miles and it will take you to pacific beach in the distance you see the kind of hill of la jolla there's crystal pier out that way which we're gonna walk and explore in another video and so if you are interested walking tour or more of my walking tours then you can click right here for my entire walking tour playlist including the santa monica pier we'll be doing venice beach and a lot of other great california beach walking tours as usual i won't say goodbye because i'll see you over here in this playlist

Channel: Yellow Productions

Views: 36,648

Keywords: Yellow Productions, mission beach, belmont park, san diego, san diego mission beach, mission beach san diego, mission beach boardwalk, san diego belmont park, mission beach belmont park, belmont park mission beach, san diego travel

Id: 0VSqX-gB0p4

Length: 21min 7sec (1267 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 22 2021