Romanticizing 60
I left the house at 9:15 this morning and skies are overcast. It’s about 58 degrees out. All in all a nice mellow morning in Dana Point. I’m a bit rushed today because I need to be back for an 11:30 meeting. I don’t anticipate being late but I just can’t get distracted or sidetracked. It’s gotta be straight to the water, swim, and then straight back and don’t lollygag in the parking lot looking at my pictures.
As I pass Doheny, the most noticeable thing is the number of surfers in the water. For a week day morning, there are quite a few. The surf looks good and I’m sure that’s why. We are coming down from probably the largest south swell so far this season. It’s not as big as the last couple days but still active. There is something about Doheny where even though the waves can be smaller, they always look rideable - at least when they are there. They rarely seem to close out. Strands is a different story altogether. It seems to close out quite a bit.
I’m wondering just what the size will be. Surfline says 3-4 which is perfect for fin-less swimming but the question is if that is really accurate. Lower Trestles is still well overhead. I saw surfers on the webcam but they are not catching anything. It looks tame enough and I’m not NOT going to go with a 3-4 foot rating. Walking down the stairs, I watch the faces roll in and at first they look big but when they break they suddenly look much smaller and not worth stressing over.
When I get to the beach, the tide looks higher than posted. It’s in the low 3’s but the water comes almost up to the bluff. It does look like there has been some sand shifting since my last swim. There are lots of rocks scattered about the shore. The rocks at the bottom of the cliff have been completely rearranged by the construction here so I have lost my familiar “marker” rocks that tell me how far the sand has risen or dropped. Boy, the rocks near my starting point are now completely different. I don’t recognize one of them.
I head into the water and I feel like we have regressed to late February in the sand and rock department. There is an initial drop into a rocky trough. I take a couple steps and don’t feel like I am rising out of it so I just start swimming. Soon I feel my fingers brushing a sandy floor but I just keep swimming because I don’t want to lose my momentum getting through the shore break. The water temperature feels pretty manageable. Over the last couple days, I have been watching the buoys inch there way into the 60’s. This morning at 6:00 all four of the buoys I watch from Oceanside to San Pedro were reporting 60 to 61 degrees. We are definitely heading in the right direction.
I swim south and I can feel the swell moving under me. As I approach the south end of the beach, I notice that this seems to be the place to be for surf. There are a lot more surfers at this break than usual and much more than at the usually more populated mid beach break. I can see the waves breaking pretty far offshore and I stop probably about 50 feet short of my usual turnaround point because I’m seeing a lot of foam on the water here and I’m not that far from the surf crowd.
I take a few pics and then proceed north. This water is feeling colder than I expected. What did I expect anyways? I don’t know but I don’t think my expectations were grounded in reality (typical). Somehow I romanticize that 60 degree mark and forget that 60 is not warm. It’s not super cold either. It’s just cold. I think back to last summer when we were in the middle of a deliciously long 70+ degree run. The temp dipped to 65 one week and it felt so cold and I wondered what was happening to me and how was I possibly going to cope come winter when the 50’s creep in. Well I guess I coped just fine?
About half way up the beach I can see this super dark patch of clouds in my rear periphery and I stop to take a look at it. I sure love to feel the sunshine but I love to look at the clouds.
I continue onwards and try to just relax my mind and body in the cold which really does seem to take the bite off. The more I think about the cold, the colder I seem to get. It’s really not a matter of NOT thinking about the cold because that’s not going to happen but rather befriending it and sort of psychically leaning into it.
I get to my northern turn around spot and try to press on just a bit further to make up for swimming short on the south end. Things are definitely far less intimidating right here. I can see surf breaking inshore and it’s larger than calmer days but it’s still benign. I feel like I am hearing voices but there are are no surfers nearby or at least not near enough. Then I see a largish fishing vessel not far northwest of me and figure that is where the voices must be coming from. I can’t make out words or I should say I can not make out the pronunciation - I do hear words and the spaces in between.
I finish off the swim and can see the tractors have made their way down to start the work day. I’m sort of relieved because I was beginning to wonder if I read the tides wrong and maybe it was on the rise instead of falling. The tide is falling. I make my way into the surf and then a nice sandy bottom and finally I have to negotiate that rocky trough and I keep falling over but eventually make it to shore pretty much right where the tractor is working.
I head up the stairs at close to a run/jog. I have no idea what time it is and really hope it is not far off from 11:00. Sure enough I get to the car, start the ignition and the clock reads 11:00. No picture party in the car today. I make it home with time to brew coffee.
