N: 34.40540 W: 119.69432
How did I end up here?
I hung
around Ewok Village until around noon before departing my dear friend and
heading down the hillside to the local store called Berry’s where I ordered an
egg salad sandwich with sprouts and cream cheese for the road ahead.
I called
my Mom and checked in telling her I was heading off to Yosemite to see some
more beautiful country. She panicked and
said people were being killed in the National Park and to stay away.
Unsure of
what she was talking about I called my Ewok friend and asked him to search the
web while I chowed down on the delicious sandwich. He informed me that there was a deer mouse feces
epidemic from people who stayed in the cabins and that there had been two
reported deaths.
I finished
my sandwich with a hearty thank you to my friend atop the hill and the
wonderful woman who makes a fine, tasty sandwich at Berry’s, called another old
sailing buddy in Santa Barbara and confirmed a hang out place until my next leg
of my journey, before I called my Mom back and gave her the new plans.
I drove
south on Highway 101 across the Golden Gate Bridge, through a mild early
mid-day commute through downtown San Francisco and onward to San Jose, San Louis
Obispo and Santa Maria until I arrived just shortly after sunset in Santa
Barbara.
I was
genuinely surprised when I saw my buddy and his partner were expecting a baby
in a couple of weeks. I am happy for the
both of them as they have been together since I first met them in 2004. They have a houseboat that he is still
constructing on the inside and she is still working part time until their baby
girl is born.
We talked
for a couple of hours but unfortunately the expecting mother, who has a cold needed
to end the evening so I wandered off to my van parked in the parking lot and
quickly fell asleep after such a long eight and a half hour drive, one of the
longest stretches of roads I have yet to travel in a single day.
I awoke to
the person who pulled up next to me, struggling to fit between the vehicles as
they bounced my van around shoving their way past. I woke upset which quickly turned to laughter
as realized the person must have been quite large to shake my van that hard.
I made tea
and opened up my sliding door to look out upon sunny skies and palm trees. The contrast from the Ewok Village to the
view I was looking out upon was so stark in opposites I was unsure if I was
dreaming or if it was real.
Giant
Redwoods and evergreen smells turned to ocean breezes and swaying palms; hippy
clad mountaineers changing into manicured designer clothed runners and
bicyclist; frozen dinner filled refrigerators traded over for fine expensive
dinning houses along the old wooden wharf, while boats of every description
come and go from the marina with most in pursuit of money.
I watch
the people who have distinguished differences in lifestyles all trying to
pretend the other sector doesn’t exist.
From the fishermen on their commercial rigs to the water taxi driver and
the various landscaping and maintenance crews that pepper the grounds of the
Santa Barbara Marina, to the rich and elite who walk the piers oblivious as to
how the whole of the marina works nor survives the day to day onslaught of
tourist and people like themselves who only visit for a few hours.
This place
is filled with a ton of wildlife, which always surprises me when it is so close
to any city yet, they cohabitate with the sandal cladding humans that have
encroached upon their territory. Unlike
the northwest, here there are pelicans and they are entering into the mating
season which causes the male species to turn different colors which include a
reddened beak and speckled feathers.
The
cormorants here are so used to the fishermen along the wharf pier that they
allow themselves to be petted in exchanged for a morsel of the fish guts while
brown seagulls swoop overhead jealous of their upper food chain friend. There are great blue herons that squawk as
they fly overhead while their smaller counterparts called ‘night herons’
twitter and make a funny ‘gawk’ kind of noise.
In the
water are many star fish to be seen clinging to the large rocks that form the
barrier walls of the marina while small mackerel, sardines, and anchovy swim
around in schools hoping to not be eaten by the various sea lions and seals
that wander into the close area, their smorgasbord awaiting them.
Last night
while the fish were jumping hard, my friend took out his fishing pole and began
instantly catching the fish, only to release them back into the salty
water. Hearing that I had never fished,
he handed me the pole and within moments I had caught my very first fish,
followed by two more. The one mackerel I
caught was big enough to keep and then he proceeded to get an even bigger fish
a little later, both to be our dinners, or so I thought.
Pregnant
women near their due date are allowed their way in ALL matters and what
mattered to her was Chinese food. We
ordered delivery service (I laugh at that, Chinese food delivered to a marina…)
and within a half an hour the hot and tasty food arrived, only to be snubbed by
the sick Mom-to-be as she no longer felt like Chinese food.
My friend
and I consumed our two-thirds worth of food and put the leftovers in the
refrigerator in case there happened to be changed minds in the middle of the
night.
We talked
until about ten and I once again found my way to my van and instantly fell asleep
and did not wake up to any rude person shoving my van. After sitting for a spell with Herbette, I
decided I should get out the map and see where my next leg of my journey will
take me.
Until I
continue ‘Traveling Thru The Tonda Zone!’
~Peace~
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