San Diego, CA - Ocean Fix

We’re back in San Diego for a month. An ocean fix is part of the plan. We haven’t seen the ocean since we last saw it in Alaska back in August. We arrived here in the afternoon, set up and walked along Mission Bay. Next day we headed over to the ocean, the Pacific. Whoo-eee. Beautiful sunny day, warm, and just perfect in every way. Of course, if there is a beach, there are lifeguards who put their lives on the line every day. Good memorial to some who died in a rescue back in 1918, when some sailors who got caught in a rip tide off the coast here. Police Lifeguard, Louis Chauvaurd made several unheeded warnings to the soldiers and rescued several before he fell exhausted.

Many citizens and soldiers were called to make rescues and another lifeguard, Henry Hanson, saved the lives of 5 swimmers before losing his own. Over 60 lives were saved. This memorial was erected to memorialize the rescues and those who died in the attempt.

There are lots of beaches along the San Diego coast and we were on Ocean Beach.

It is a bit cool and still early in the morning so the beach isn’t packed

but there are lots of people walking around, especially on the pier in back of me.

Surfers trying out their skills on the waves.

Although, it seems to me that surfers spend more time waiting for the perfect wave than actually surfing it.

Great views from the pier.

And, out on one end of the pier is part of a large yoga rally.

Others are tide pooling as the tide rolls out.

Next we wanted to get our daily walk in and what better place to do it than along Sunset Cliffs. However, the cliffs around here are mostly sand and pretty unstable. There are many places along our cliff walk where there are signs that say ‘UNSTABLE CLIFFS, STAY BACK.’ And, you can see in this picture why that might be the warning.

Along these unstable cliffs are lots of homes perched on the edge. And, back in January, when the southern part of California was receiving more than 167% of the average precipitation by that time, a large chunk of these cliffs fell off and this is the result.

One only has to look back up the into the hills in back of this cliff to see what the problem is. This cliff is at the bottom of a larger cliff in back.

Because the cliffs are being eroded, the trails along these cliffs have been diverted, usually into the street at the side. You can see another of the DANGER signs off to the left.