Some pics from the Central California Coast

One of the first things I noticed about southern and central California coast is the PLANTS! WOW! Things we grow as housplants grow outside like weeds there!!! The Bird of Paradise is used like we use roses, it's in every flower bed, and they were all in bloom! Absolutely magnificent! And Ice Plant is everywhere, it really is a weed! The ice plant is a ground cover that blooms bright pink and bright yellow. It's very pretty.

This is John and Martin. These two grew up together in Southern California as surfer buddies. John is so cute! He started sharing stories about their early years, surfing, drinking, and sleeping in the ice plant, (the official ground cover of the state of California), and I was laughing so hard I almost wet my pants.
This is John's house, it's a tiny shack right on Morrow Bay. It's about 30 X 40 ft. - and surrounded by HUGE houses. I LOVED his little house, it reminded me of the shack I lived in on the hill. And John was so generous with surrendering it for us to stay in.

This is me with John's girlfriend, Annie. Annie and I had so much in common it was just scary. I think I found a kindred spirit.
We both work in horticulture and are plant geeks. We both love and grow orchids. I swear we have the exact same house plants! We dress the same way. We have the same dreams and goals. We both own a parrot. Much of our past has been similar.
We even had our new laptops die at the same time. We both got them from Best Buy, had the extended warranty, and had them in the shop at the same time. And after taking this picture, I realized we even had similar shirts on, blue and white scenery.

We are both even bird nerds!

Martin wading in in a really big tidal pool.

Martin and I on a cliff overlooking the magnificent Pacific.






We got to enjoy several types of wildlife, like this groundsquirrel that is a professional freeloader. We also saw a coyote, sea otters and harbor seals. We also watched Pacific White Sided Dolphins surfing the waves with human surfers. It was sooooo cool! I wish I could have caught that on film. On the other hand, it was pretty easy to photograph these elephant seals as they basked in the sun.

And this little girl seemed pretty interested in us.

And this is the group of neighbors that got together for lunch. Me, John, Pam & Hans (Hans is very german, cute accent!), Daniel and Jacqui, (kiwis from New Zealand, both had cute accents.), Lori & Jason, and Martin.

Coming up:

Our visit to the J Paul Getty Villa Museum.
A-frickin'-mazing!!!