Textures

I love all the different textures you can find at the beach.

This was created by the creek eroding the sand as it channeled a new route to the sea.

The sand looks like it has been cut with a knife.

Tiny grains in multiple colours.

The rocks are beautiful in their variety but not all the textures found belong there.

If you visit the beach this summer, make memories but leave only footprints.

Surf's Up, Standing Up

Hubby is a surfer. He has surfed since he was a teenager. He surfs the traditional way as in laying down on the board and jumping up after catching a wave. But what does a surfer do when there's no surf? He does stand up.
This is the big thing in surfing if you didn't know. As its name implies, you are already standing up when you catch the wave. Instead of using your arms to paddle into a wave, you use a paddle.
But how does this help a surfer if there's no surf?
Well another side to stand up is stand up paddling often called SUP for short. This is done on flatter water such as rivers and lakes although it can be done in the ocean too on calmer days.
There are two basic stand up boards. One is a board for surfing waves and one is made for paddling and is often called a racing board. The picture above shows Hubby and friend Steve Boehne taking out a tandem race board made by Steve.

Steve owns the Infinity surf shop in Dana Point and is a past world tandem surfing champion with his wife Barrie so he knows a lot about riding and making big boards.
The harbour area at Dana Point is a perfect place to go paddling. I have also gone out with Steve on this board but sadly there was no one recording it for posterity.

Hubby didn't know if he wanted a surfing board or a race board. Here he is trying the surfing version while a few of the locals line up for a chance to try it next.

Next he tried out a race board. Race boards are usually lighter and less stable than the surfing kind.

Come in number one your time is up.
The race board won and now graces a spot in the garage when not in the water. As Hubby said, if there's surf he's going to surf his regular way.

Lots of people have taken to SUP though not all of them shoulder their share of the paddling.

Bizzy Garden

Not very inspiring or attractive are some of the kindest things I could say about the patch of ground at the front of our home. Since we can't remove some of the grass (which is community property) to make a larger and better shaped area we must work with what we have.

Even though I didn't care for the colour the community chose for our house, it does look better having been freshly painted. The removal of the hedge that was full of spiders and never did anything (didn't grow, didn't flower) gave us a clean palette on which to work.

This area is always mostly in the shade hidden from direct sun by the garage. This means that my original desire for a beautiful English flower garden was a non-starter. 

Away go the old pieces of slate and some of the soil for a strangely shaped patio.

The soil is replaced by a layer of gravel.

Followed by one of sand.

Nice paving stone work but what is it for?
It's for hubby to be able to walk to and from the hose after surfing to wash the salt off his feet and wet suit without walking on the grass (which can be muddy).

The remaining area for planting gets dug over with the addition of some compost to break up the clay soil and provide better drainage.

The final result.
Over in the small strip of soil we have a Japanese Gold Dust Aucuba which has small red berries on it, and several impatiens (known as Bizzy Lizzies in England).
In the main section are more Bizzy Lizzies, another Aucuba, a Silver Lady Fern, a Philodendron (a version called Hope as in we hope it isn't going to grow too big), two Coleus, and two Daylilies. The Daylily is salt tolerant s it should do alright on the right hand side of the garden area.

High and Dry

Well here's something you don't see everyday at the beach.

There are buoys out in the ocean which designate how close boats are allowed to come to shore. Apparently something went wrong here.

Sorry sir, but you can't park here.