Friday, January 02, 2009

New Years Day

New Years Day was spent with family. At least the part of the family that was still home. Kira, Brandon and Ben (and families) were gone. Once everyone finally dragged themselves out of bed we had a big breakfast of pancakes and sausages. After that we decided to go for a short hike at Torrey Pines State Park. Torrey Pines is one of our many wonderful beaches and the park includes several trails that lead to the tops of some massive cliffs that overlooks the ocean.

left to right is Alycia, Trevor, Sarah, Travis, Amy, Alex, Me and Lisa. These cliffs frequently collapse and occasionally they land on some poor tourist killing them.


Torrey Pines is named after the Torrey Pine Tree that grows only in this area and on Coronado Island which is about thirty miles off shore. The Torrey Pine is protected and you can go to jail if you cut one down, even if it is in your own back yard. I wish I had taken a picture of one for you.









After the hike we decided to hit the beach. Unfortunately the marine layer (fancy name for fog) moved in and without the sun it suddenly got very cold. I suggested we build a sand castle but no one was interested.

Alycia now has the nasty cold that I had last week. Poor girl is so plugged up that her eyes are constantly watering and she has those painful sinus head aches. Salt water is wonderful for cleaning out the sinuses so she really wanted to go swimming but wasn't ready to brave the cold water. Finally she decided to stick her face in the water to see if she could snort some water up her nose.



Alex, Sarah and Amy are just like cattle out in a storm. They all huddled together for warmth.








Finally Alycia threw all caution to the wind and donning her wet suit she hit the waves. Travis is riding a wave on the right and Trevor is trying to talk Alycia into committing.






Our ocean current comes straight down from Alaska so we don't have warm water even in the summer. In the winter it is even colder, somewhere in the sixties.









This is Trevor riding a wave.












Trevor decides to try his skateboarding skills out on Sarah's skim board. He's pretty good at it.








By complete coincidence we happened to see one of Kira's best friends from high school. This is Lori Lester with Lisa.

3 comments:

KarinC said...

Happy New Year! What a great start to the 2009 year. Our Family wishes all the best things for the coming year.
From The Cahoons in NY

Lynn said...

Cliffs randomly falling on tourists? YIKES!

Going to jail because you might cut down the wrong tree in your own backyard? ( I hope the welcoming committee to the neighborhood has added that little bit of info on their welcome package. : D)

I was So envious of your New Year's Day hike in SHORTS!!! Until I saw that water and your description of it. LOL! Brrrrrrr...........

Looks like a REALLY fun day though! Thanks for posting it Fred. I really enjoy all the tid bits of interesting information about the area you add.

Kira said...

Oh I miss Lori, and the beach!