Behold the SEAHAG5
Four San Diegans take the maiden voyage inside A Timeless Day’s new Volkswagen bus and the most chill day ever ensues.
SAN DIEGO — Pull up to Ian Bobolia’s home and prepare to be transported.
When I approached the 29-year-old San Diego native’s Bay Ho 1980s build on a crisp February morning, he was just unfurling my ride for he day, SEAHAG5, a 1971 Volkswagen Westfalia Campmobile, prepped and primed to take me and two other lifelong locals on an iconic Southern California adventure.
Its christening had been years in the making. Bobolia’d been hard at work, tinkering on the rides for Charlie Madruga and Austin Siragusa, my friends behind A Timeless Day, an up-and-coming travel company providing coastal day adventures to those who come to visit our fair city.
Early in 2024, A Timeless Day will begin offering coastal beach adventures in these bad boys. So if the cruise up the coast that we feature below sounds like your idea of a good time, then you are ready to embark on A Timeless Day.
Hi, I’m Sam, the San Diegan riding in the back. I’m the founder and creative director of Uptown 11 Studios and was called to duty to document the journey of these fellow Friars fans and fish taco lovers.
With the van fully stocked (more on that later) we got underway on our Timeless adventure.
I don’t think I’m sharing too much tourism secret sauce to tell you we started our summer sojourn (oh, snap, it’s actually February. Our bad.) by cruising up to Torrey Pines.
We were in between storms. Despite the parenthetical snark above, it does rain here. And when the skies clear, the locals come out en masse.
For the uninitiated, Torrey Pines reserve is global treasure, public lands set aside at the beginning of the 20th century to protect the beautiful tree.
A small fee gets you past the gates and cruising up one of the world’s most stunning cliffsides. At the top: panoramic views of La Jolla, Del Mar, clear down to Mexico and north to, well, whatever it is that’s North of San Diego.
The hike left us ready to eat. We decided to head on down to Oscar’s, which, full disclosure, is not a sponsor of ours, but, like, what’s up Oscar’s ;)
Heading North to South, it’s an easy route from Torrey Pines. Stay right. Then stay right. Then stay right. You can never go wrong hugging the coast in this town.
VW owners know that better than anyone.
So what to our delight and surprise when a new friend came around the bend.
Yes, this is the part of the story where you’re going to think we made this up. But it’s the real thing.
I began taking pictures out the back, much to the delight of the driver, who played along and followed for several blocks before signaling us to pull over.
“Down to get tacos?” Ian asked.
“Sure,” said our new friend. Nothing more. Then followed along.
From there, taco mayhem broke out. And we broke out the bottles.
Our new friend introduced herself. Jana Cooper. Another lifelong San Diegan, who grew up just around the corner.
“Sooo San Diego...random taco stop with strangers and cocktails on the curb while passers by tell their car stories,” she told me by email a couple days after the encounter as we pledged to stay in touch.
We’d thought of everything for A Timeless Day. And our sponsors (yes, these cats are actually our sponsors) Kove Brewing and Swell Soda had provided all the contraband beverages we needed to continue to delight.
As passerby came up and asked about the vans, we handed out drinks and shared our tacos. The more the merrier.
And like I said, we’d thought of everything.
Except, it turned out, a bottle opener.
No worries, Jana told us. She had a new ice chest in the back seat that would take care of that.
Tired from tacos and Torreys, we bid our new friends farewell (for now) and made one last stop at Fiesta Island to decompress and reflect on the day.
Austin took the moment to give a little more love to the van’s sponsors — early believers in a dream that’s coming to life today, but that will remain forever.
A Timeless Dream.
