Busy Saturday. Sea Cliffs and Swimming Pool
It's been a busy Saturday. Hawk and I got up early today to go to the beach in Santa Cruz. We've been saying we'll do that for the past few weekends but it's never worked out. Either we say we'll get up early then sleep in 'til 9am or later, or the weather's looked too cold and cloudy over at the coast, or both. Today the weather forecast wasn't looking that amazing for Santa Cruz- while it was forecasting 88° and sunny here- but we decided to do it anyway.
Getting an early leave on for the beach was critical because traffic jams going over the mountains on Rt. 17 have been crazy the past many weeks. Last weekend traffic delays made a trip that would normally take about 45 minutes stretch to 2 hours. We noped out of that. Today we were rolling at 9am and even then traffic jams on Rt. 17 set us back 10-15 minutes. WTF is everyone going to the beach so early for? Especially on a day when the forecast there has it cold and foggy until noon?
Maybe, we figured, they're like us and want to beat the crowds. We worried that the hundreds of people driving with us on the mountain pass would be competing for scant parking in Santa Cruz near the beach... but alas, thankfully, they were not. Traffic all but disappeared by the time we got to our favorite parking spot on West Cliff Drive, with a rocky cliff 10' in front of us and the pounding waves 25' below that.
The fog was already burning off when we arrived. We started walking east from our parking spot, heading back toward downtown. We didn't walk that far, as it would have been several miles each way; just to the lighthouse and back. But still, that was a solid 3 miles round trip, maybe more.
After the walk we were ready for lunch. We found a hole-in-the-wall Mexican restaurant downtown. It was... definitely hole-in-the-wall. And crazy popular. Like, with not much seating and 2x-3x as many customers as could fit. Our timing was good and we got a table.
The drive back over the mountain was free of traffic. Seeing the lines of cars laboring up the opposite direction we joked about "reverse commute direction" several times. But seriously, I'm glad we weren't stuck in that mess, creeping along uphill, with temperatures that reached as high as 93° in some spots. (Back at the beach it topped out at, like, 70°.) Oh, did I mention we did the drive in our convertible? Man, tooling along through a mountain pass with fir trees on all sides, a blue sky overhead, and lots of fresh air is exactly what convertibles were built for. ...Okay, that plus the above except with mountains-and-ocean vistas... which we also got today! 😂
Back at home we had a couple of our friends come over with their 10 year old son today to use the pool. It was definitely pool weather out, with temps in town climbing past 85°. We splashed around in the pool for quite a while, took a short dip in the hot tub, then dried off while relaxing in deck chairs.
Our friends suggested dinner together around 5:30, but by then we were spent from the day's double-header. We bid them goodbye and spent a while relaxing quietly indoors. I made a simple dinner of mac and cheese and garlic bread. Now we're taking it easy again. Maybe we'll be rested up for another day outdoors tomorrow!
Getting an early leave on for the beach was critical because traffic jams going over the mountains on Rt. 17 have been crazy the past many weeks. Last weekend traffic delays made a trip that would normally take about 45 minutes stretch to 2 hours. We noped out of that. Today we were rolling at 9am and even then traffic jams on Rt. 17 set us back 10-15 minutes. WTF is everyone going to the beach so early for? Especially on a day when the forecast there has it cold and foggy until noon?
Maybe, we figured, they're like us and want to beat the crowds. We worried that the hundreds of people driving with us on the mountain pass would be competing for scant parking in Santa Cruz near the beach... but alas, thankfully, they were not. Traffic all but disappeared by the time we got to our favorite parking spot on West Cliff Drive, with a rocky cliff 10' in front of us and the pounding waves 25' below that.
The fog was already burning off when we arrived. We started walking east from our parking spot, heading back toward downtown. We didn't walk that far, as it would have been several miles each way; just to the lighthouse and back. But still, that was a solid 3 miles round trip, maybe more.
After the walk we were ready for lunch. We found a hole-in-the-wall Mexican restaurant downtown. It was... definitely hole-in-the-wall. And crazy popular. Like, with not much seating and 2x-3x as many customers as could fit. Our timing was good and we got a table.
The drive back over the mountain was free of traffic. Seeing the lines of cars laboring up the opposite direction we joked about "reverse commute direction" several times. But seriously, I'm glad we weren't stuck in that mess, creeping along uphill, with temperatures that reached as high as 93° in some spots. (Back at the beach it topped out at, like, 70°.) Oh, did I mention we did the drive in our convertible? Man, tooling along through a mountain pass with fir trees on all sides, a blue sky overhead, and lots of fresh air is exactly what convertibles were built for. ...Okay, that plus the above except with mountains-and-ocean vistas... which we also got today! 😂
Back at home we had a couple of our friends come over with their 10 year old son today to use the pool. It was definitely pool weather out, with temps in town climbing past 85°. We splashed around in the pool for quite a while, took a short dip in the hot tub, then dried off while relaxing in deck chairs.
Our friends suggested dinner together around 5:30, but by then we were spent from the day's double-header. We bid them goodbye and spent a while relaxing quietly indoors. I made a simple dinner of mac and cheese and garlic bread. Now we're taking it easy again. Maybe we'll be rested up for another day outdoors tomorrow!