Pirate Beach

JWise Photo of the Day, Travels

The Pacific Ocean as seen from the 101 freeway near Ventura, California

Aaarrrrgh, there be pirates on that thar beach. This visit to Santa Barbara is for spending time with family, leaving no time for frolicking in the surf. Speeding by, looking out the window is the closest we would come to the Pacific on this trip to California. It’s a good thing we enjoy the company of my great aunt Ann and uncle Woody, along with my cousin Nancy, her two children Theresa and Daniel, and my great aunt Jean, who is also Nancy’s mom. We talk, eat, talk some more, barbecue, reminisce, sleep, and start it all over again the next day.

Another Labor Day Weekend

JWise Photo of the Day, Travels

Driving west on Interstate 10 from Arizona to California

We know the sites along the freeway by heart now. Interstate 10, the road that starts at mile marker zero in Key West, Florida, seems like a short extension of the highway leading from Phoenix to a strip mall just slightly farther away than where we shop in town. We drove to Southern California yet again. We could not be more familiar with the 10 by now; as I have stated before, we may have driven this freeway more than 70 times. About thirty miles from the 10’s terminus in Santa Monica, we veer north on the 101, passing through downtown Los Angeles to points further north en route to our destination in Santa Barbara. It is Labor Day weekend in America and the last three-day weekend of summer, which typically makes for crowded roads. Not this weekend, though. Although getting out of Phoenix was time-consuming, the rest of the drive was a piece of cake. Maybe everyone else is weighed down with high mortgage payments and high gasoline, electricity, and food prices, so they can’t afford any leisure travel. For whatever reason, we made near-record time of only 8.5 hours to drive the 507 miles from our house to Santa Barbara, with two stops for gas and one for dinner in Los Angeles.

Pelican

JWise Photo of the Day, Travels

A pelican touches down but doesn't dive just offshore at El Capitan State Beach north of Santa Barbara, California

I had to post one more photo I liked from the weekend due to the optical illusion in the image. It appears the ocean is simply dropping off to a lower level while the pelican, who just aborted a dive and only touched the water, is returning to flight. Actually, the dark area of water is a cresting wave just behind the breaking wave that is about to roll over into white, foamy surf.

Farmers Market

JWise Food, Photo of the Day, Travels

Goleta, California farmers market

Every visit to Santa Barbara now includes a stop at the Farmers Market, and with summer upon us, the pickings couldn’t have been better. The smell of the fresh garlic in this photo is what lured me to this veggie stand. A couple of stands down the line, fresh peaches were a big pull on my senses, too. Stone fruit was in abundance this weekend, as were strawberries. One local farmer had brought in fresh, super sweet organic blueberries; I left with nearly a pound of them. I also picked up almost five pounds of the fingerling potatoes above and three heads of that aromatic garlic, along with four or five bags of other fresh goodies.

Dolphins In The Surf

JWise Photo of the Day, Travels

Dolphins in the surf in Santa Barbara, California

No frolicking, no jumping out of the water doing backflips, not much action at all, just a casual swim up and then back down the beach. I’m not talking about Caroline and me, but the dolphins in the photograph above. A small pod of bottlenose dolphins was out meandering along the coast at El Capitan State Beach as casually as could be and just beyond the rolling surf. It was a moment I wished I were one of the surfers sitting between us and them so I might have an even better view, except for that first moment spotting them, thinking that dorsal fin belonged to a shark that was about to eat me.

Caroline Wise and John Wise in Santa Barbara, California

The first part of our day was spent with my great aunt and uncle at home in Goleta, but sometimes it’s nice to get out for some John and Caroline time.

Santa Barbara, California

What a luxury it is to be so close to the sea, what a shame it is that so rarely are others out here with us who live right nearby.

Very Berry

JWise Food, Photo of the Day, Travels

Berries from the farmers market in Goleta, California

As the Beverly Hillbillies said, California is the place I oughta be. These tasty organic berries screamed buy me when we were last in California. Farmers’ markets alone should drag us the 350 miles west to live in the Golden State, but there are also Ramen shops, ethnic shopping areas, films that only show in New York and California, beaches, boba tea, Disneyland, Magic Mountain, Knott’s Berry Farm, Universal Studios, San Francisco just up the road, Redwoods, museums galore, organic handmade cheeses, the Monterey Aquarium, Highway 1, real Chinese food, Death Valley and so much more. More, such as traffic, lots of traffic, rents requiring slavery to your dwelling, big fires, and earthquakes, but where else are you going to find imagawayaki, Little India, a Vietnamese shopping mall, body surfing, yellow raspberries in April, and Japanese gardens all in one day?