Home»HIKING/SWIMMING/M-CYCLING»01_14_11_MileRockBeach_non_swim

My swim buddy and I decided to explore a little of the true Ocean Coast outside the Golden Gate. We hiked down from the Palace of Legion of Honor to Mile Rock Beach. For a January day - the weather and light was spectacular. Even though we had all our swim gear - we listened to the voice of reason (as hard as it was for some of us) - and did not attempt navigating our way into the crashing surf and treacherous rocks.

Hard as it was to let go of my first goal: swimming; I derived an incredible amount of satisfaction hiking up an adjoinng cliff and spending some quiet time contemplating the beauty and the motion from above. Leaving it be... and not needing to be IN it. I had no pen or paper with me... so I tried to imprint the scene on my mind, and made a scratchboard rendering of what I remembered the next morning.

As we hiked back up to the museum and to the car - light, humidity, scenery - even biomes changed astoundingly. We found ourselves in a fog bank out of which Monterey cypress shapes and statuary emerged mysteriously... the animate trees looking still and inanimate... the inanimate statue of El Cid looking quite alive... as if he was about to gallop out off the pedament and disappear into the bushes.

Thank you, Greg, for the pictures.