My SD Moms Have you ever visited a San Diego attraction with relatives or visitors from out of town and thought to yourself, “Wow, this is great, and right in our own city! Why don’t we do this more often?”
We live in one of the most beautiful cities in America and sometimes there can be undiscovered treasures — even events and locations we’re familiar with — that we’ve neglected to visit in some time.
Maybe Balboa Park is one of them?
Time For a Visit?
Right now, there are so many things to do and discover in San Diego’s jewel of a park. The Mingei International Museum, The San Diego Museum of Art, San Diego Museum of Man, The Old Globe and Timken Museum of Art, make up Balboa Park West End, offering tons of options for entertainment and discovery.
Visitors can experience theatre, fine art, concerts, science, anthropology, Maya monuments, folk art, craft, design and even beer! From mummies to muses, artifacts to actors, there’s something for everyone in Balboa Park West End! For more on current exhibits, shows, happenings, and parking/route information, visit BPWestEnd.org.
Balboa Park West End
Here’s some of the offerings visitors can check out on the west side of Balboa Park this Spring:
- The Old Globe: An internationally-acclaimed, Tony Award- winning theatre and San Diego Institution. www.theoldglobe.org
Time and the Conways – (Opens March 29, plays through May 4.)
The curtain rises on a gorgeous English country home in 1919, in the middle of a game of Blind Man’s Bluff played by the young Conway family at a birthday party with their friends. Flash forward to 1937 in the same house: the grown children have gathered to settle family accounts in a world not so bright as it was. Time and the Conways, is the kind of theatrical gem Globe audiences love to rediscover, with the kind of sumptuous period scenery, costumes, and artistry for which The Old Globe is renowned.
- San Diego Museum of Man: Examines human history and culture with mummies, giant Maya monuments, the history of beer and more. The museum inspires human connections by exploring the human experience. www.museumofman.org
Current Exhibit: BEERology – Modern civilization is beer civilization! Agriculture, cities, writing and religion all have ties to early craft brewing. Ancient Egyptians, Sumerians, Chinese and others each perfected the brewing arts in interesting and strange ways. Learn fascinating stories and see phenomenal artifacts that reveal the links between beer and culture, and don’t miss their next tasting on March 20! Tickets on sale now.
- Mingei International Museum: Preserves and exhibits folk art, craft and design from all eras and cultures of the world. www.mingei.org
Current Exhibit: Function and Fantasy – Collaborators for over a decade, Steven and William Ladd’s intricate and unusual artwork moves freely between the worlds of craft, fashion, design and art. This brand-new exhibition includes hundreds of pieces created with materials such as beads, twill tape, metal fittings and fabric. On view through June 1.
- Timken Museum of Art: The finest European and American masterpieces in a collection that spans 700 years. Admission is free. www.timkenmuseum.org
Current Exhibit: A Peasant Smoking at a Cottage Door by the great English artist Thomas Gainsborough is showcased at the Timken and featured alongside the View of Volterra by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot from the museum’s permanent collection. On view through April 6.
- The San Diego Museum of Art: A nationally renowned Permanent Collection of masterpieces from around the world. www.sdmart.org
Miró, Matisse, Dalí, O’Keeffe… See works by these masters and more in the recently renovated and dramatically reconfigured Modern and Contemporary galleries. And mark your calendar for Spanish Sojourns: Robert Henri and the Spirit of Spain, opening March 31.
To access Balboa Park West End, visitors can take advantage of easy parking on the west side of the bridge on Balboa Drive or Sixth Avenue, and it’s a short and beautiful walk across the Cabrillo Bridge towards Plaza de Panama and the historic views of the California Tower and Dome. Parking is also plentiful on the east side of Balboa Park near Park Boulevard.
Balboa Park has also just introduced a new tram system. The vehicles depart from Tram Central, next to the large parking lots near Inspiration Point (east of Park Boulevard at Presidents Way). They operate daily from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., leave every 10 to 12 minutes, and follow a loop route, taking passengers to a drop-off station in the Plaza de Panama, right next to all the museums and theatres in Balboa Park West End.
With the new Balboa Park Explorer Pass, you can experience something new every day without worrying about the cost of admission! The Balboa Park Explorer Pass is the first-ever annual pass that provides general admission to 17 of the cultural institutions in Balboa Park – including four of the west end institutions! A family pass (up to 2 adults, up to 4 children ages 3-17) is valued at $199. One Adult pass is valued at $129.
Click here or on the image below to download a PDF map!
