Birthday Girl

My birthday, January 11th, dawned bright and beautiful (kind of like me). ;)
I stepped out into the sunlight and the crisp, cool air and perambulated about Redwood City taking in the sights. Little did I know what this seemingly innocuous day would bring.

Camera at the ready as usual - here is what I saw:

Proof that I'm still in Mexico:

I'd like to point out that this gorgeous bloom graces us with her presence in January.

Very clever. I think I should be offended but I'm too busy laughing. 

And then, my neighbor intercepted me, dragged me kicking and screaming to a party and this is what ensued...

A belligerent man demanded to know where the Crown Royal was hidden. 

The girl who broke her foot dancing but continues to dance - with a boot!

And a dog that got so excited by the bedlam and inspired by the musical intonations of TLC that she joined the din and began singing as well. 

Think it ends there? Nope. Belligerent man stopped being belligerent and started...

... well, you can see what he did. Heaven help us all, no one warned me there would be a stripper. I requested that next time I be permitted to choose the age group of my entertainment. I managed to escape this debacle unscathed physically but I can't say the same for my mental or emotional state. 

Here's to my year as a 36 year old! Older is definitely better. 

Elephant Seal Fight to the Death!

Today at Ano Nuevo State Park, I decided to tempt the fates and traverse the sandy dunes of elephant seal territory. The sky was a bit overcast, mild temperatures, with a slight wind blowing the scent of the salt sea up to us on the cliffs above the beach where elephant seals had come to give birth to their pups. After the pups are weaned, the female elephant seals will mate with the alpha male that effectively owns the group she is part of (a harem). He earns the right to mate with his group of females by fighting violently with many other males, quite bloody battles, we're told. From our initial vantage point, we could not see elephant seals but we could hear them bugling. The sound is so powerful that it travels for a mile. The gulls soared up from the beach into the sun and I stopped to admire them. 

We rounded the bend and reached the site where we picked up our docent, Nancy. We have to be very careful walking through elephant seal territory as the males can get up to 16 feet long and can weight up to 2 1/2 tons!! However, our docent is highly trained in seal-fu and here she is showing us her skills. I lost all fear when I saw her form.

 Before we arrived in elephant seal territory, Nancy gave us all sorts of information about the natives who used migrate to the coastal areas for winter and then return to the mountains in summer. The Ohlone, the natives of this region, would burn their homes before they returned to the mountains - extreme spring cleaning because of flea infestation. Fantastic. Which had absolutely nothing to do with elephant seals. So back to them. The gents arrive in December at Ano Nuevo and the ladies follow shortly thereafter. The ladies give birth to their pups, nurse their lazy butts for 28 days and then kick 'em to the curb.

 As mentioned before, the seals mate and then a year later, pups are born. What? Pregnancy for a year?!! Nope, some weird science for you, turns out the ladies don't eat the whole time they are on land - several months - so their malnourished forms can't sustain an embryo until after they are out at sea and feeding. Gestation for an elephant seal then only lasts 7 months.

Above I am standing in front of an old lightkeeper's house and a couple of elephant seal harems with lots of pups you can't see. New Year's resolution - buy a new camera. So after all the excitement of evading giant males that can move at up to 8 miles per hour, we took a casual stroll on the beach to relax and let the adrenaline wane. 

We rounded a bend and what do we see?! An elephant seal! And we are alone - no seal-fu master to protect us, just two wandering ladies, with zero seal-fu training. We gave this fellow a wide berth, skirting carefully as close to the water as possible and as far away from his giant head as we could! He didn't even lift his head up though, so we feared him for nothing.

Then there were some bird tracks but I'm not afraid of those thanks to years of training in bird-fu. 

So, nobody died today. Win!

The Ladies Who Lunch

Today the celebration of Rachelle's birthday week got into full swing. The state of California parks system stomped all over my plans to see elephant seals today *shakes fist at the sky* so we decided to step outside of the ordinary day of hiking to lunch and catch a film. We began with lunch at Scratch in Mountain View. 

This is a house made lemonade with fresh squeezed lemons and agave nectar. OMG, best lemonade I've ever tasted. Hands down.

 Then this ooey gooey plate of mouth-wateringly delicious grilled cheese for grown-ups arrived.

I'm still reveling in the fact that all bathrooms have seats on their toilets (after 9 months of maybe you'll get one if you're really, really lucky in Mexico) but this bathroom had lovely orchids too. Ambience in the bathroom scores points with the ladies, you know. 

Then we headed to the theater to see Les Miserables. Nothing to photograph there but here are some lovely sights from the center of town.

I have tickets for the seals tomorrow so I shouldn't have my plans ruined again! However, if they are, someone is going to pay dearly...

A Day of Whimsy

Wunderlich, a San Mateo County Park. Sounds downright fascinating, doesn't it? Well, wunderlich is German for whimsical and I let my imagination run wild in this park. Everything was mossy and vibrantly green from all the recent moisture and I imagined I was walking through the Shire, and that a hobbit would emerge at any moment from a hidden doorway in a tree, kind of like me!

They have stables here for horses that I'd be pleased to live in. The stables, not the horses. "Where do you live?" "Oh, in horse condos." "Really? That's nasty." "No, in Woodside." "Ohhhhhh, damn, girl, you must have some serious cash!" An imaginary conversation I had with myself in the land of whimsy. Also, check out the lovely nod to Chinese labor that they gave in such poetic fashion. I'm sure that makes up for all their misery. You can see the wall lining the road in the photo to the right. 

 

I have no idea what this dilapidated building is about, but it virtually begged for a photo, so I obliged. Fortunately no orcs emerged ready for battle.

Here I am , consoling a fallen tree in my path --- OR --- gloating that I felled a tree with my bare hands? You decide. 

Along the way, I enjoyed the work of a spider caught between two limbs and catching the rays of the sun in sparkling splendor...

...and the potentially dangerous, potentially enjoyable fungi along the way - I chose to merely enjoy the view unenhanced by its psychedelic potentiality. I so did NOT take that nibble on the left side... 

And the day ended with a majestic pink sunset! 

How do I top 2013?

I spent nine months in Mexico in 2012. At some point I will do some blog posts to showcase some of those photos and tell about the many adventures I had while there. I truly can say that my life has been changed irrevocably for the better as a result of my experiences. Well, now it's 2013. After spending all that time living in another country, how am I going to top that?

Life brought me back to California, but there are more places that I simply must visit! This year I plan to add a pin to three more countries. I'm not sure how it will happen yet, but I firmly believe that if we have a dream, we can achieve that dream.

First on the list is China. There is a photo just waiting to be taken of me on the very edge of the Great Wall of China where it meets the Pacific Ocean. The following are NOT my photos, though I promise to have some of my own before the year is out.

This year I already have a trip to Peru planned. Macchu Picchu beckons - and so does this llama!

The last travel experience to a land far, far away for 2013, at least that's on my list so far, is Istanbul, Turkey.

I honestly have no idea how I'm going to accomplish all of this, but I have faith that it will be done. 

Today I woke up with the memory of my childhood friends Jennifer and Christopher and decided that all persons today should have names that end in -fer. Thus, I became Rachefer, auntie became Kathyfer and so on. We managed to squeeze in two parks today. Don Edwards and Coyote. 

This orange lichen warranted a picture - and you thought a photo of lichen on a rock would be lame. Ha. 

Basically we wandered over bridges, past lots of birds and adorable little buildings.

This is NOT snow. Seriously! It's caused by weird proteins in the water that get whipped up like egg whites - really! Want me to post the picture of the sign that said so?

Jesus birds, that's what I call 'em. They walk on water, for reals! Ha, not quite, the pipe continues just beneath the surface.

Uncle Charlifer met up with us after for the walk over to the Peruvian restaurant I'd been salivating about forever, well, ever since I found out about it -- yesterday.

 My favorite Peruvian dish -- lomo saltado! Get in my belly.

Bedwell Bayfront Park

When someone says, "Hey, let's go to a former landfill site!!!", I don't usually get amped for the experience. However, I trust my aunt so I let her lead the way. First she took me out for errands, wow. I thought I'd be bored, but look at his adorable neighborhood!

After visiting the post office, grocery store and doctor's office - none of which captured my photographer's eye, we hit the landfill. Beautiful day and not too shabby of a cleanup job! They closed and capped off the landfill site in the 80s and it's turned into quite the lovely spot.

Pretty little wildflowers - in January - which is why I don't live in Rhode Island anymore! 

Aunt and uncle strolling romantically down the windy path....

Then the sun was getting close to setting so we finished up with this...

Some quick photos on a rock, because photos on a rock are cool...

...and then I came home to cook up a vegetarian lasagna. But apparently, hockey skates were the appetizer, because they were already in the oven and ready to serve! (I'm still unclear what that was about...)