Playing tourist
Jun. 18th, 2007 23:12![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
torquillAll in all, a wonderful day.
I got a slow start, but sometime before 1pm I climbed into the car and headed out to the coast. I took 92 out to the edge of the continent, then turned north. Shortly after that, I started trying beaches.
Venice beach wanted a park fee, but just north of that Naples and Roosevelt beaches were free for the day, which suited my lack of ready cash nicely. I started at Naples and ended up walking the full length of the cove to Roosevelt and back, playing tag with the surf and thinking. It's amazing how childhood skills come back -- my mom always loved the ocean, so we would do a lot of playing at the beach as kids... I haven't lost the art of gauging waves so that you get your feet wet without being swamped, and it didn't take much to remind me of the old lesson, "never turn your back on the sea". (There was a young man fishing out there, who reeled in his line, turned to walk back up the beach, and immediately got his thighs soaked by a monster wave. Never take your attention off it, even when you think you're out of reach.)
I made my way in a leisurely fashion up the coast after that, pausing for a bit of time at Montaro beach, which I don't remember visiting before. Very scenic, with a little bit of beachcombing (rare on this part of the coast). I even picked up a tiny, intact sand dollar, which is something that I never saw on the beaches we used to go to.
I got up to the Castro without incident, and spent about a half hour finding parking.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mikz let me into the apartment while he got himself together after a shower, and we walked out to get decent Mexican food and a little bit of wandering. It was brisk and windy, and the fog was coming in and making everything a little damp.
As a result, and with the added incentive of coming to the end of a two-hour parking limit, we got into my car and went out driving. He took me to Cliff House, which I had never been to, and we tried not to freeze while we watched the flocks of pelicans making interesting shapes as they wheeled above. Then to the Presidio for my first visit to Baker Beach in nearly twenty years. We drove and talked -- he wasn't feeling particularly talkative, so I ended up running through some of what I had been thinking about while strolling the beach earlier.
Up some fairly steep hills, and down again, and before I know it (I was busy dodging cable cars) he's sent me down the brick section of Lombard Street. Steep narrow hairpins in a manual, behind a minivan who's going at five miles an hour... that took some concentration. We kept going and ended up at Coit Tower, which I hadn't been to since Steve Mikkelson took me out on that bittersweet test date so long ago. Down more steep hills -- I swear I've leveled up on my "stick shift" skill tonight -- and up to the sharp turn next to the stairs to the Tower, down through North Beach (I really should have another coffee at Caffe Trieste sometime in my life), and through the financial district, then finally back to the Castro. If I have to go down Market Street, it's immensely preferable to do so at a time when there's hardly anyone around...
We were both somewhat tired when we parted, but all in all it was a very nice time. We hang out well together.
On the way home I caught the correct on-ramp, the one that isn't a blind merge deathtrap. As I crossed to the other side of the hills, I discovered that the music CD I had picked at random had the track I had been seeking for a while... it has what I think of as the "mad mountebank" quote, a beautiful line that had the misfortune to be born in the middle of a script for "The Last Temptation of Christ". It's placed amidst what is otherwise unremarkable, average quality house music, yet that one line was enough to stick in my head and make me wonder where it was later. It's not really easy to search through 54 hours of random trance music unless you set out to do so methodically, and I hadn't been that organized.
So it's been a very good day. My mood during the latter half has ranged from mellow to happy to giddy, with an underlayment of contentment. I think I'm dealing with life pretty well, so long as I don't get blindsided by any more titanic curveballs in the immediate future. I'm enjoying the breather.
I got a slow start, but sometime before 1pm I climbed into the car and headed out to the coast. I took 92 out to the edge of the continent, then turned north. Shortly after that, I started trying beaches.
Venice beach wanted a park fee, but just north of that Naples and Roosevelt beaches were free for the day, which suited my lack of ready cash nicely. I started at Naples and ended up walking the full length of the cove to Roosevelt and back, playing tag with the surf and thinking. It's amazing how childhood skills come back -- my mom always loved the ocean, so we would do a lot of playing at the beach as kids... I haven't lost the art of gauging waves so that you get your feet wet without being swamped, and it didn't take much to remind me of the old lesson, "never turn your back on the sea". (There was a young man fishing out there, who reeled in his line, turned to walk back up the beach, and immediately got his thighs soaked by a monster wave. Never take your attention off it, even when you think you're out of reach.)
I made my way in a leisurely fashion up the coast after that, pausing for a bit of time at Montaro beach, which I don't remember visiting before. Very scenic, with a little bit of beachcombing (rare on this part of the coast). I even picked up a tiny, intact sand dollar, which is something that I never saw on the beaches we used to go to.
I got up to the Castro without incident, and spent about a half hour finding parking.
mikz let me into the apartment while he got himself together after a shower, and we walked out to get decent Mexican food and a little bit of wandering. It was brisk and windy, and the fog was coming in and making everything a little damp.As a result, and with the added incentive of coming to the end of a two-hour parking limit, we got into my car and went out driving. He took me to Cliff House, which I had never been to, and we tried not to freeze while we watched the flocks of pelicans making interesting shapes as they wheeled above. Then to the Presidio for my first visit to Baker Beach in nearly twenty years. We drove and talked -- he wasn't feeling particularly talkative, so I ended up running through some of what I had been thinking about while strolling the beach earlier.
Up some fairly steep hills, and down again, and before I know it (I was busy dodging cable cars) he's sent me down the brick section of Lombard Street. Steep narrow hairpins in a manual, behind a minivan who's going at five miles an hour... that took some concentration. We kept going and ended up at Coit Tower, which I hadn't been to since Steve Mikkelson took me out on that bittersweet test date so long ago. Down more steep hills -- I swear I've leveled up on my "stick shift" skill tonight -- and up to the sharp turn next to the stairs to the Tower, down through North Beach (I really should have another coffee at Caffe Trieste sometime in my life), and through the financial district, then finally back to the Castro. If I have to go down Market Street, it's immensely preferable to do so at a time when there's hardly anyone around...
We were both somewhat tired when we parted, but all in all it was a very nice time. We hang out well together.
On the way home I caught the correct on-ramp, the one that isn't a blind merge deathtrap. As I crossed to the other side of the hills, I discovered that the music CD I had picked at random had the track I had been seeking for a while... it has what I think of as the "mad mountebank" quote, a beautiful line that had the misfortune to be born in the middle of a script for "The Last Temptation of Christ". It's placed amidst what is otherwise unremarkable, average quality house music, yet that one line was enough to stick in my head and make me wonder where it was later. It's not really easy to search through 54 hours of random trance music unless you set out to do so methodically, and I hadn't been that organized.
So it's been a very good day. My mood during the latter half has ranged from mellow to happy to giddy, with an underlayment of contentment. I think I'm dealing with life pretty well, so long as I don't get blindsided by any more titanic curveballs in the immediate future. I'm enjoying the breather.
