Beach burn

Today was beach day. The one thing the girls would not have forgiven if we missed it, was going to the beach while we were in California. Back in 2002, they spent all day at the beach on the Atlantic coast, and they've been bugging me ever since to go back. Today they got to take a dip in the ocean on the Pacific coast, but first we had to get there. One thing I did not realize was that the bay area really had no beaches to speak of. What everybody does if they're so inclined is drive thirty minutes south to Santa Cruz, where there's a nice beach, lots of parking, and a boardwalk with rides and games. However, there's only one route in or out of Santa Cruz, which makes traffic somewhat of a deterrent to going. We got up early and headed down there, so traffic wasn't quite terrible, though we hit the awful traffic on the way back.

The beach itself was pretty nice (it's been since I was ten that I've been to the Pacific Ocean), though crowded. The water was cold, but the girls endured (I just took pictures). And we all got a nice dose of sunburn. I didn't put on any sunblock, so I got what I deserved, but we put sunblock on the girls, and while Shelby didn't burn, Darby got nice and crispy on her back.

Probably one of the coolest sights was seeing dolphins (or maybe they were porpoises) and sea lions in the wild. Early on in the morning, a pair of dolphins swam up and down the coast for maybe thirty minutes. They got REALLY close to shore, maybe within thirty feet, so we got a nice good view of them. Later we walked out to the end of the wharf and saw the sea lions sleeping on the rafters underneath.

After doing a few rides, everyone was tired and hungry so we fought traffic to get back to the bay area for dinner. Minus the burning sensation, it was quite the nice day.