Day 9 -- Malibu to San Onofre

Sunday, Aug 19, 2007

I haven't had any injuries on the trip so far, but that was about to change.

Another early wake-up day. "Ronin," a surfer from the Early Retirement forum, said he might be able to get away and meet me at Bolsa Chica State park at 9 AM. So I had breakfast on the road, just south of Malibu.


I've talked about traffic, and today I was riding through the belly of the traffic beast, Los Angeles. But, as careful planning *cough* luck *cough* would have it, it was early on a Sunday morning and I breezed along the LA freeways at the speed limit.

Note that "at the speed limit" in LA means about 10 MPH slower than everyone else; it makes you feel like a rock in a stream. I made some poor road choices, based on my map of all California, and spent a lot of time on the PCH, which meant traffic lights and lots of them. Quick note: Gas was only $2.69/gal in Long Beach compared with $3.21/gal at home.

Bolsa Chica beach is three miles wide with tons of parking. I pulled into the rendezvous spot at 8:50, but it turns out Ronin couldn't get away.

This beach is a lot like the ocean beaches I grew up with on Long Island (e.g. Jones' Beach). The people and their belongings have been supersized, however. They bring tables, canopies, big chairs, and fancy Weber gas grills instead of a beach blanket, umbrella and small charcoal grill.

But most importantly, I finally got some bigger waves! Here's a four-foot wave, and I saw some that I estimated at 5-6 feet.


There was a path by the parking lot that was used by tons of cyclists, more than one with a small dog in the front basket.


I surfed for a few hours with my wetsuit on, and I was pretty hot. That is, I was warm in the suit. Had some great fast drops, and a few medium length rides.

I then stopped for a lunch of yogurt and orange soda, and decided to surf another session with no wetsuit. I had to move a few miles down, since there's no mid-day surfing allowed on parts of the beach.

I went out with just my board shorts on, and it was a great feeling. Much easier to paddle than with a wetsuit. Turns out, and this wasn't really a surprise to me, that I can't reach all the areas of my back when applying sunscreen. I'll have to figure out how to do this in the future. I'm guessing that asking a stranger to do it won't work.

One characteristic of this beach on this day was the relatively steep shoreline:


As a result, the waves would roll up the shore, then back down, creating a wave going out to sea. If you've seen The Endless Summer, you might remember a beach called "in and out" at which you could actually surf the waves moving outward, and when meeting an incoming wave, be popped up into the air. Which brings us to...

Injury Number One
I had just stood up on one of the bigger waves, going down the face, when I hit one of these backwash waves. The result was that I instantly found myself five feet above the board, with my butt higher than my head. I had plenty of time to think, and what I thought was "This is not going to end well." Or to quote George of the Jungle "This going to hurt George real bad."

But I don't remember what happened when I came down, other than thinking "That wasn't as bad as I thought it would be." It's not that I hit my head, it was just a kind of amnesia that happens a lot to me when surfing. I have a big wipeout, and I can't remember how it happened. Like waking up from a dream, and not being able to remember it.

Anyway, I didn't notice any pain, and I had a good laugh about it with another surfer that saw the whole thing.

On the very next wave, the same thing happened, but I was thrown up and to the side, so there was no danger of hitting the board. I did a faceplant in the water, however, and it felt like doing a belly flop off the high diving board. At that point I decided "I'm outtahere" and headed to the beach. As I was walking to the car, I heard someone saying "Hey, did you see that guy get pitched up by the wave?"

It wasn't until a few hours later that I noticed that my ankle was sore and it hurt to bend it. This got worse, until it was hard to walk, and I had a lot of swelling down there. I'm guessing that I either bonked it on the board, or hyperflexed it coming down. It felt like some of the sprained ankles that I've had in the past. In any case, that's why I'm here in the library this morning (day 10) instead of surfing.

But I've iced it, it's getting better, and I plan to surf at San Onofre this afternoon. But back to day 9...

Laundry Day

Well I was out of T-shirts, and passing a laundry on the PCH in Dana Point, I zipped in to take care of the washing. This involved mostly waiting around for the washing and drying.


An important thing to note in this photo is Bert and Ernie on the fire engine, calling to me. This brings us to...

Injury Number Two

I know now that "This will make a good picture for the blog" is a dangerous thing to think. It was in getting off this ride that I had a close encounter with the white post that you can see in the bottom of the picture.

Actually, this injury wasn't so bad, just some blood, but it makes for a good story.

Campsite

Got into the San Onofre State Beach San Mateo campground in late afternoon, and the pre-assigned campsite wasn't bad. It had excellent hammock trees, and a good spot to finish the drying of the laundry.



The partying was tamer here, and I got a good night's sleep.

Well, it looks like I'm up to date on the blog, thanks to Injury 1. Standby for San Onofre surfing on day 10. BTW I've surfed every coastal day on this trip so far, which means eight surfing days in a row!

Day 8 -- Malibu

Saturday, Aug 18, 2007

Here's a shot of the Malibu pier when I arrived and got a good parking spot at 5:50 AM. Remember to click on these pictures, since they look a lot better at their full size.


The contest wasn't scheduled to start until about 10, so I had plenty of time for surfing. I wore my wetsuit since it was so early, and I watched the sun rise over the hill you see in the background as I was waiting for my first waves.

There were only three other guys out there -- probably would have been 50 or more if the waves were larger. I got a bunch of good rides. There were some three foot waves at the start, but size decreased over time. The waves were just perfect, though, and could be ridden for a long way. Again, it was very shallow and I had to be extremely careful to fall flat.

The water was clear here -- much clearer than any of the earlier spots. On one wave, I could see a large (15 inch?) fish fleeing in front of my board as I rode in.

I surfed until 9:30, and stopped because I was meeting "Yakers," an Internet buddy from the Early Retirement forum, and his wife at 11:00. I needed to shower off the wetsuit rubber smell, and do some errands (e.g. daily ice run).

I had a fantastic lunch and visit with Yakers and his beautiful wife. I'm disappointed that this picture doesn't do her justice, and doesn't show off the dimples she has when she smiles.


The restaurant was the Paradise Cove Beach Restaurant.

Yakers works for NASA at the JPL in Pasadena, and his wife is a retired school teacher. I enjoyed hearing about their vacations, and future trip plans. In a week or so they'll be off to the Burning Man Project.

Here's a shot on the way home to give you a feeling for the many beaches in and around Malibu:


After lunch I drove into Santa Monica to update the blog at the public library. My sleep deficit was catching up to me, however, so I saved my energy for the commute back to the campsite, and only worked for an hour or two.

For dinner I had two of the fish tacos from the lunch.

The parties continued that night, but without my dose of caffeine, and my 33 decibel earplugs I got a good night's sleep, getting up at 6 AM so that I'd make a possible rendezvous with Ronin (a surfer from the ER Forum) at Bolsa Chica beach (just south of LA) at 9 AM. See tomorrow's blog for details.

Day 7 -- Santa Barbara to Malibu

Friday, Aug 17, 2007

Wanted to get an early start for the trip to Malibu, since the Malibu campground had choose-your-own-campsite (the only one on the trip). So I had a pre-dawn breakfast of eggs and sausage:


I use "egg substitutes" instead of eggs, since they're easier to transport (nice little container instead of breakable eggs). Not quite as good, however.

The drive to Malibu was picturesque, and I continued to have perfect weather.

I arrived at Surfrider's beach, the famous Malibu surfing spot. The waves were extremely small, but there was a contest going on anyway.

When a contest happens, the organizers close the spot for everyone but the contestants. This is not often popular. As someone I spoke to put it "I travels all zee way from France to zurf here, and I cannot do eet."

But, you can see that this beach is for surfing, and for surfing only.


I generally didn't have a good feeling about Malibu because of the

• Traffic
• Parking
• Exclusionary Feel

The main problem with the traffic is that the roads here aren't made for, and can't be modified to accommodate, lots of cars. There just isn't enough room between the cliffs and the oceanfront homes. Sometimes you get into what I call "No-U-Turn" syndrome (NUTS). You need to turn around, but there's No-U-Turn allowed, so you make a left, but that street also has No-U-Turn. Adding gridlock traffic is what makes this bad. I won't bore you, but once a state beach parking lot was blocked, and it took me 20-minutes of NUTS before I could get back to my original location. This literally involved driving from Malibu to Santa Monica (and up the famous California Incline, seen in many movies):


The lack of parking was worse. If you want to stop the car and check out the waves, you often just can't do it. A Paris-Hilton-type flipped me a triple bird from her silver Mercedes convertible, and I think it was because I was slowing down to check out the swells.

The parked cars line the Pacific Coast Highway, and all parking lots are fee-based, and expensive:



The lots fill up early even at these rates. State Beach parking is around $10, with the management often outsourced to "Pay and Display" companies.

The final thing about Malibu is the exclusionary feel. I can understand that movie stars and billionaires don't want tourists from Humboldt county looking in their windows, but it's annoying to have a lot of the nice places "off-limits" to normal people. It's fortunate that California mandates public coastal access at least to the average high tide level (click on the image to be able to read the sign):


I planned to take a break from surfing for this day, but when I took a look at the break at Leo Carillo State beach (pronounced "Koreo"), I couldn't resist. I took this picture at low tide, after I came out. Click on this to see a better view, and note the kelp beds.


You can't get a feeling from it from this photo, but the wave would break right next to the big rock you see at the right, and form a nice "right" that could be ridden for a long way. There were usually 4-6 people waiting for the break.

Parts of the movie "Gidget" were filmed here. The scene in which three guys take off on the same wave was filmed right at this break.

The rocks you see on the shore extend out into the water, and as you surf in, it's very shallow (1-2 feet deep) and sometimes I'd hit my fin on a rock. You have to be very careful when you fall that you land flat on the water or you will die. Got a few good rides on 3 foot waves. Small, but nice shape.

The kelp is sometimes a problem. It comes right up to the surface, so occasionally you turn and start paddling to catch a wave, and find that your legs are tangled in the seaweed and you can't move.

Also, you have to walk through 60 feet or so of these rocks when you go in and out, carrying your surfboard with waves washing around you. I walked out at a place where there were a lot of sharp mussels, so I got a few cuts on my feet, but at least it's not coral! Wish I'd worn my booties.

Camping

I'd picked out a nice campsite at Malibu Creek State Park, so I returned there after the surfing. This spot was 7 miles inland, so it was pretty hot and dry. In fact, Malibu itself was very hot.

Here are some views of my site (before the campground filled to capacity):



Click on this one for a bigger version:


Unfortunately, Malibu Creek State Park is Party Central for Los Angeles. This party, across from my campsite continued until 3:15 AM.


To give you a feeling for the party, they had a ski (snow ski) with 4 shot glasses glued to the top. I guess this allows four people to take shots at the same time.

I made the mistake of drinking an orange soda with dinner. I realized at 3 AM that it contained caffeine. So I only slept from 3:30 to 5:30 AM, when the chihuahua next door started barking.

But at least that let me get on the waves in Malibu before the sun came up (see tomorrow's blog entry).