October

 Upon reflecting on what we've been doing this month, I decided that I would show it in pictures...

As you can see, we've been spending all our free time taking pictures. Besides the Big Morongo trip, we haven't really gone anywhere. All these pictures are from the yard around our house and does not even show all the species of plants and animals we have viewed or taken pictures of here. They are merely some of my favorites from this past month.

We have set up a little watering hole/bird bath out front for the birds. I cleaned up the planter area next to our driveway a bit. I pulled out the weeds and put in some ground cover to try out. It is frustrating though because I can't seem to get rid of the bermuda grass that keeps invading and trying to take over the area. Hopefully the new ground cover will eventually help control that once it gets established but I will probably have to get a little more once I am sure that it just won't die on us. It seems to be holding up okay so far, although the snails did a number on one of them. We put in a little feeding station for ground feeders (birds) and some sticks that they might want to, hopefully, use to perch on. The other frustrating thing is the gophers that keep making tunnels through the area. Sometimes my watering wells will collapse because the tunnels are too close to the top soil in that area. Also, the roots of the bermuda grass seems to use it as a highway to re-spread back through the planting area. Every few days, you can see new grass coming up and you can dig it up and follow a line of roots following the tunnels. Christian has tried to set traps but they have thus far been able to circumvent them.

Christian has also been trying to tame the trees around the property, especially the pomegranate. We keep hacking it to bits in the hopes of getting rid of it once and for all, but by the time we fill up the green trash can and wait for it to be emptied and have time to continue our work, it has grown back by quite a bit. The upside is that I was still able to harvest enough pomegranates to make a batch of jelly this month. 

Christian is also putting in a hedge on the side of our house where the donkeys keep trying to sneak in. The originally lined our driveway with some fencing in order to keep them out but now they are going around the cars parked on the street, crossing the neighbors yard and stepping down into ours in order to reek havoc in our yard. Why?! All I know is that it keeps nearly destroying our dwarf orange tree. I don't think we've been able to get oranges for at least four years because of them. I thought we had our yard protected this time but it managed to get in several times now to poop in our yard, eat some grass and destroy my orange tree once again. We even put up some cinder blocks on the lowest part of the yard that we believe it has been crossing over to get in. It knocked it over once getting in and out of there still so Christian has put more blocks to raise it up some more to deter them. And now we have expensive baby shrubs that we are trying to raise up to be a nicer and more permanent solution, we have to reinforce the cinder blocks so that they don't know the cinder blocks over again and smash our baby shrubs.

Shortly after we did that, I went out one morning to water and found the donkeys in our driveway, munching on the Mexican feather grass on the side of the driveway that sticks out of the fence. I chased them away and found a lone donkey in our neighbors yard, looking in mournfully at our temporary, make-shift barricade that it hadn't found a way yet to circumvent. It eventually walked back out to the street to join the donkeys I chased away into one of the other neighbors yards which is more accessible to them.

Big Morongo Canyon Preserve

This month, Christian and I decided to check out the Big Morongo Canyon Preserve as it is not too far away and is supposed to be a popular migration stop for birds. It is on the way to Joshua Tree, but tucked away in the little town. When we arrived, we were a bit skeptical because there were quite a few cars in the parking lot and camp area.

As we walked in though, you can tell the place is kept fairly nice. The area was beautiful but we were still a little wary of what we would find going in as we heard a lot of noise of machinery or a loud vehicle in the distance. Christian got a neutral density polarizer for his camera and wanted to try it out for his videos.

They have a little nature center just inside of the preserve. There isn't a whole lot in the office but outside of it has an area set up to feed and attract the birds and animals. It was actually quite nice and inspired us to maybe incorporate a few things in our own yard. We immediately started spotting various birds in the surrounding area.

While we have taken pictures of various birds over the years, we are mainly just enthusiastic photographers, not birders so when some of the other birders there were asking us questions or talking amongst themselves, we had no idea what they were talking about for the most part. We are obviously aware of some of the popular birds we've run into over the years, we didn't know about some of the not so common birds that have not been so easy to spot while we were out hiking, like the Tanagers, Towhees or Thrashers. We know a quail when we see it but is it a Gambel's Quail or a California Quail?

I've been taking pictures of birds a lot lately. First, when I went out to the Bolsa Chica Ecological Preserve with Caitlyn this summer because she also loved to take pictures of birds. A few years ago, we attempted to take her to the Salton Sea for this purpose, but it was in the middle of summer and the water line was very low and was very disapppointed with what we found there. Once Christian got me my new insane zoom lens for my birthday, the excitement for bird photography was renewed and multiplied.

In an effort to learn more, we talked to the people at the nature center about whether they had a field guide for birds in our area. They did not really have anything that specifically targeted our area and they suggested an app called Merlin or eBird. Looking into all this made us fall into the rabbit hole of "birding." 

It was vey relaxing and even somewhat therapeutic to sit there watching the antics of the little birds around us. I was jealous that big groups of hummingbirds seem to be able to coexist together at the nature center. They didn't have any crazy, super territorial hummingbirds which guarded the feeder and chased all the rest away constantly like I have here at home.

However, there was a Cooper's Hawk that flew into the area every 20 or 30 minutes and all the little birds would scatter and hide. The second time that one flew in, we finally dragged ourselves away to explore more of the canyon trails.

A couple of the trails were closed off because of damage from heavy rainfall earlier this year but the trails are slated to be fixed by the end of the year. The canyon was fairly well maintained and kept pretty clean. When we got farther down the trails, it was pretty peaceful. We didn't have the whole place to ourselves or anything. People were still wandering about on the trails here and there but it wasn't too bad. It is definitely worth returning here. In fact, by the time we whipped back around to the nature center, we were already making plans to return in another month or so when the cottonwood trees changed into their fall colors!

And as we continue down the rabbit hole of birding, after all the new pictures of birds we've collected, we ended up starting a "life list" to help us keep track of what we've captured. We got a handful of "lifers" and our life list is steadily growing.

A Plethora of Pictures

We spent the rest of the month playing around with, testing and practicing with my new lens. In order to get good and reliable shots, there is definitely more to it than just putting it on and taking pictures.

First, we decided to expand our little database of flora and fauna around our home and neighborhood to the university. We actually wanted to go to the botanic gardens. We haven't been there for many years. However, when we got there, we found that it is no longer even open on the weekends! Instead of just turning around and going home, we figured that maybe we would take a look around campus, since we were already there.

We still found plenty to take pictures of on campus. We were lucky that the students are not yet back in session so the campus wasn't too crowded. We were going to wrap it up and head home for lunch after visiting the silk floss trees but got stuck there for quite a while taking pictures of all the little humming birds and butterflies.

The next weekend, we decided to see what it was like at Fairmount Park. There is a man made lake there with lots of aquatic birds but the park has a serious problem with homeless people, especially after they kicked them out of White Park downtown. And yes, they still have a lot of homeless people there and it didn't smell that great with lots of trash and crap everywhere, but there were still lots of people out taking walks, fishing, on the playground, etc. There is also still a lot of birds there, although, I did hear that there was a problem last year with a lot of ducks dying or getting sick from some kind of algae problem. 

There were lots of opportunities for pictures but as it got later in the day, it got more crowded and annoying and it got really hazy, so the pictures were not as good and clear, so we called it a day and came home for lunch and so we can download our pictures and see how they came out.

On my actual birthday, Christian took me out to Diamond Valley Lake out in Menifee. It is supposed to be a good place to see birds. The place had a lot of potential, but was ultimately a bit disappointing overall. The place is huge and is quite nice, but there were a lot of problems with the place. First, they charge for everything, we thought they would just charge for using the boat dock but they also charge for just walking out on their trail. 

The shoreline was just littered with trash. There were not really that many birds around. What birds there were, were chased away by fishermen in boats. I don't know why they launch their boats out into the lake, only to drift around the shoreline relatively close to the launch. We had to walk quite a ways down the trail to get any amount of peace. The people on the trail were also loud and annoying.

 We did manage to get some great shots, but I don't know if we will ever return.

We like a lot of the little birds but they are hard to find and usually quite fast. It is easier to get pictures of the bigger birds in flight. We only found four different kinds of waterfowl. The most prolific of which, was the Coots. There were a few Grebes here and there.

And once in a while you would see a Cormorant and Egret here and there but many were too far away to capture. The Cormorants were hard to spot as they swam like submarines with only their neck and head bobbing around!

We did manage to capture a couple of them though. I was especially excited about the Egret as we saw him catch a fairly big fish for his supper but I had a hard time getting my camera to stay focused on him. It went out of focus just as he dived down to get a fish and then when he flew across the lake for a better place to have his meal, I had problems finding him in my viewfinder and focusing on him as well. I did manage to catch him on his return flight to fish again.

All in all, it was a pretty successful outing, although, not exactly pleasant. It did get a bit more peaceful if you hiked quite far out and also later in the day (when it was getting too hot to be out) some of the fisherman left and it became a bit nicer but we were hot and tired by this time too.

We are trying to decide what are next outing will be, but at the end of the season and it being so hot and dry everywhere, our options are limited. But meanwhile, besides my hummingbird friends, there are still plenty in our own front yard to take pictures of if you are patient and watchful.

Thank you, husband for the awesome new lens!

Hello Friends!

After the somewhat disappointing results of my pictures from the Bolsa Chica Ecological Preserve, I went back to doing some additional tests in my driveway. The lens proves that it is still sharp as a tack while hand held. The only blur I get is if I did not use a fast enough shutter speed to capture my fast little friends or the depth of field was too shallow.

Some of the above pictures may look similar to ones I've taken before, but there is definitely way more detail and sharpness in these. 

The pictures below are my favorite hummingbird pictures of all time, so far. I got a little hummingbird in our oak tree. A much more pleasant backdrop than the artificial feeder in front of my ugly window. It isn't necessarily my favorite hummingbird, but definitely my favorite overall picture of a hummingbird. 

This, unfortunately, is enemy number one.

He's so mean! He frustrates me to no end. He chases all the other hummingbirds away all the time, trying to claim the feeder as his own. I will get two other hummingbirds to feed at the same time when neither is him. The most I have seen is three, but it is rare and I have yet to capture it on my camera. More often than not, it's this little booger hogging it all up by himself. The other hummingbirds have to sneak in to get a sip or I have even seen a hummingbird come in to distract him and after he chases them off, another will swoop in for a drink. It's so sad.

September

September came way too quickly. It was time for the girls to start thinking about packing to return to school. They seriously dreaded it for more than one reason and put it off until the last minute. Christian spent every spare moment double checking to make sure that their cars are in good working order. Emily had to do one last oil change after all her commutes to her grandmother's house and work, shopping trips, and trips to the beach...which seemed pretty crazy since she changed it with her cousin shortly after starting her internship. She also had to change her transmission fluid as we know it got overheated on our one trip out to Pleasant Canyon.

Both of the girls also had to wash and wax their cars before heading back. We've been able to maintain the paint of our twenty year old cars if we do at least one good coat of wax on the cars once a year. There is significant damage if we don't get to it at least once a year. We probably had to do it at least twice a year before the new ceramic waxes.

Christian got me my birthday present early this year so that I can play with it while the kids were still in town. He got me a new zoom lens for my camera since I can't really use my old lenses with my new camera. He went a little nuts and got me a honkin' big lens! It is not very practical and very large and heavy. I wanted more of a range for my zoom lens but I don't think I ever considered this much of a long range!

I was thinking that he went a little overboard until I saw the images that came out of the camera. We walked around the neighborhood and took samples of the flora and fauna.

And wow, is it a game changer. It's like we've been using Temu lenses all these years! While my new lens is pretty fancy, it is still not an L lens so I don't even know what those would be like! I don't think we will ever be happy with a normal lens again...which is a bit of a problem, to be honest.

While Christian was a work, the girls and I took off on a quick trip back to the Bolsa Chica Ecological preserve for more pictures of birds with my fancy new lens. It was a bit of a disappointment really as there were not as many birds around as the first time Caitlyn and I came here. I also had some serious issues with motion sickness after tracking the birds in the electronic viewfinder. The slightest movement makes a big difference when using such long lenses. 

I still thought I got some pretty good shots and was excited to see them. We made it back home before Christian got back from work and was able to download them to surprise him with what we managed to get. The pictures were a bit disappointing, to say the least. If I got some of these shots last time, I would still be pretty happy with them, but the focus was a little off or soft on every single picture and I could not understand what the problem was since I took some in my driveway earlier that morning that was as sharp as a tack. 

I was especially excited to get pictures of the blue heron which we could only see as a speck in the distance last time. Christian made some changes to my auto focus settings to help but we think that the thing causing me the biggest problems was my use of a monopod that I was using to help "stabilize" my shots and help with the fatigue of holding the big heavy long lens. The pictures in my driveway and neighborhood were all taken while entirely hand held. The details should have been amazing, but they just were not.

But alas, playtime was over and the kids had to get ready to go in earnest now. It was so sad. They headed out on a Tuesday morning. They were very eager to get to their apartment as early as possible to claim one of the better situated rooms in the apartment. They were each getting private rooms for this last stretch of school. It would cost a little more but both of them wanted some space and when Emily returns, she won't be able to share with her sister anyway. With the nightmarish experiences she has had with bad roommates 

so far, she didn't want to share a room with anyone besides her sister. They stopped by Mesquite to visit with their Aunt Aron. She caught up with them over dinner, after which, they continued on the short distance to their cousin Austin's house where they planned to stay the night. Coincidentally, Austin and his family were actually going to be in San Diego during this time but he invited them to stay at their house anyway. That was super nice of them since their house is better situated for the girls' long drive to Rexburg. Aron is not that far away but 45 minutes makes a big difference over a 13 hour trip. St. George is a lot closer to us than Rexburg, so their second day of driving is always the worst.

They usually leave on or before the crack of dawn to get to Rexburg in time to check in to their rooms during the check in window. Because they were fighting for a decent room, they had to get there even earlier. So the plan was to get a decent night of sleep and leave at a more reasonable time on Wednesday and get to Rexburg before the sun goes down. They planned to unload one of the cars into the storage facility and car camp out in the dunes. That way they could get up in the morning to check in first thing in the morning. They tried to get the manager to let them check in early and pay for the extra day or days but the manager was unwilling to let them check in early, even though the apartment was basically empty already. All this was to basically avoid either of them from ending up in the dreaded room next to the kitchen because it is extra loud in there as people are banging away in the kitchen at all hours of the night and day.

I love the ability to track their progress as they go up. It really helps to know where they are. When they used to drive together, at least one of them can respond to a text and keep us somewhat updated but when they started driving separately, that made the information pretty scarce. Anyway, they were about 30 minutes or so outside of Provo when I was checking their progress and looking at the traffic ahead of them when I heard the news that Charlie Kirk had been shot. The UVU campus is just above Provo near the freeway where the girls would be traveling up. That was pretty stressful. So I frantically checked for updates on whether they caught the shooter, Charlie's condition and what nightmare the girls will have to drive through on their way back to school. The girls had actually pulled off to make a rest stop at a gas station when all this came about. By the time they got back on the road, the traffic accident in Provo mostly got cleared up and they drove through Orem without incident. Unfortunately, Charlie did not make it.

The next drama came when they arrived in Rexburg that evening to find that it was oddly quiet and empty. The girls double checked their schedule and found that in their hurry to make it up there in time to get a decent room, they got their dates wrong. Okay, Caitlyn was the one that apparently got the date wrong and Emily just went along with it. She thought she read that the check in day was on the 11th, but it was actually on the 12th. I thought it was weird and questioned them on it and they said that they checked and it was on the 11th, so we just proceeded with that in mind. So the long and the short of it was that they had a whole extra day in Rexburg with nothing to do and no where to stay. Basically, they spent the day homeless. Luckily, with all their camping experience, it wasn't such a big deal but they were kind of pissed about it and we were just worried and uncomfortable that they had no where to stay. They spent most of the day just hanging out on campus for the WiFi.

The next morning, they cleaned up, grabbed some breakfast at Maverik and headed into town. Luckily, they were running early and stopped by their apartment and found that it was open. They went in and claimed a room ahead of time. Shortly after, the rest of the roommates all showed up to claim a room as well. If they waited until the actual check in time or if they arrived in the afternoon as they normally have been doing, one of them would definitely have been stuck with the dreaded kitchen room. They were so relieved!

Anyway, they were better able to relax once they got their rooms situated and took their time with everything else. They had to move all their stuff from the storage facility, unpack everything, go shopping for the week, get their books and everything they needed to do on campus that weekend so that they would be ready for school on Monday morning. It turns out that they seem to have pretty good roommates this semester, for once...at least they all seem normal so far. So they spent some time getting to know their new roommates as well. I hope it works out well for them.

However, after the first day of school, Caitlyn wrote to us all upset because she doesn't feel prepared for the Web Services class she has to take. She has maintained a 4.0 gpa throughout her college career. She only has 18 units left before she graduates, and one of the remaining classes she needs to take requires knowledge that they didn't prepare her with! We were so pissed and flabbergasted, we didn't know what to tell her. This is actually the second time she had to drop this class. The first time she attempted to take it, the curriculum was seriously outdated. That is a big deal when you are dealing with software. She wrote to the department to complain and hopefully get them to look into it. Apparently, they did update the class this time but it heavily relies on knowledge of JavaScript which she feels that they barely touched on in her other classes. They used to have a class just on JavaScript, but got rid of it a little while ago.

She is so close to graduating and is so sick of school that she doesn't want to change her emphasis because it will require her to take a bunch of additional classes but how is she supposed to get through her remaining classes with this glaring hole in her knowledge?! After some discussion and contemplation, we referred her to some alternative sources. She is going to drop the class and teach HERSELF JavaScript so that she can continue and finish her requirements to graduate. We are so NOT happy with BYU-Idaho. She also is losing a lot of financial aid because she will not be going to school full time and she will have to probably now have three semesters of being at school part time instead of two semesters left in order to graduate. She had actually already planned not to be in school full time in her last semester as she will have to work on a senior project in order to graduate so she definitely doesn't want to cram everything in next semester in order to finish. The whole situation sucks and we are none too happy about it but at least she has a path forward now.

The bad news continues though as Christian's dad suffered another seizure. Actually, multiple seizures! He had a seizure at home, they called an ambulance, he had another on the way to the hospital and then a third  after arriving to the hospital. We can't seem to get any clear information from them as to why, since he is on anti-seizure medication. While at the hospital, they are again registering his irregular heartbeat and before he could be released again, he has another series of strokes.

He is now back at home, but we still haven't really gotten any real information about his health or condition.

August

August went by fairly quickly. Christian had to go back to school at the beginning of the month already. Of course, shortly after returning to teaching, he got sick. It didn't help that his classes were packed to the gills. There were not enough seats in the classroom with how many kids they tried to pack into his classes. I think one of his classes had like 46 kids in it, which is absolutely insane. When the kids went to the restroom, they took their seats with them so that no one could steal their seats! He was home for a couple of days during the second week of school. 

I usually manage okay when he gets sick, but I ended up getting sick shortly after he went back to work. 

Christian has been slowly dismantling the TJ transmission after the gears in the oil pump broke. It is pretty slow going as there are tons of little pieces involved and we've found that you need a bunch of specialty tools in order to get it apart correctly. We ordered some. Christian was able to make others. We already know that we can't rely on the service manuals to give us all the information we need so he's been searching that out.

Emily finished her curtain project and went on to 3D print some other projects she made.

Caitlyn decided to make a curtain too...a noren (privacy curtain) for her apartment which will still allow her to leave her door open for friends and air.

Caitlyn finished her internship mid-month. It seemed so short...especially since she missed out on a week of it because of jury duty. She enjoyed the experience though and learned some things. She also got along well with the other interns. Plus, it was a nice summer job to make a little money. She took advantage of the gym and trainer available after work most days. Overall, it was a really good experience.

Emily's internship didn't end until nearly the end of the month...and technically, it's not exactly over. They asked her to continue working on a part time basis from school. They got her a laptop so that she can do it remotely. She got to work all Spring and Summer so she was able to earn a decent amount to help her continue school. They got rid of one of the school grants she was getting so the extra income will definitely be needed. She didn't have much of a summer because of it, but we still really enjoyed having both of them home for a while.

Marian got together with the girls and took them out for dinner on Caitlyn's last days of work. They girls also went out with their cousins a few times while they were staying out there.

We managed to go to the beach a bunch of times. The girls went twice more this month. Once with some friends and I went one more time with them. Caitlyn even got herself a boogey board! Unfortunately, the girls didn't apply sunscreen early enough and didn't reapply often enough as they came back pretty sunburnt.

Unfortunately, the surf conditions were not good on our last trip to the beach. There were yellow flags out all along the Southern California beaches and surfing/boogey boarding was not "advised." We also went back to Aliso Beach specifically, so that Emily could skim board but they didn't allow her to do it. They said that she could only do it at this tiny area near the rocks, which is the worst place possible. There were like a dozen other skim boarders all over the beach where we were skim boarding the first time here and the lifeguards didn't say anything, so we were pretty ticked off about the whole thing.

And although the lifeguards said that going in the water was not "advised," what they really meant was that it wasn't allowed, since they harassed anyone going in anyway. It was a pretty disappointing last trip to the beach.

Since we didn't want to drag the skim board and boogey board very far and there wasn't much else to do at the beach, we eventually left and stopped by the Laguna Niguel Botanical Preserve and went for a short walk around the area.

We didn't go too far since all we had were our flip flops on from the beach. We did not bring any real shoes. 

Christian has been getting both of the girls' cars ready for them to travel back to school. Both of their vehicles needed to have the transmission fluid changed out. Their transmissions run too hot so the oil is burnt. The XJ will need a transmission cooler and a bigger radiator in the future. It will not be cheap, so hopefully it will be fine until Caitlyn graduates and gets a job to help pay for it. Christian looked over a bunch of other things. Caitlyn changed her oil. Emily continued to work on beefing up our tire changer. Christian doesn't have enough time of the day to work and do all the repairs so Emily got to help by cutting the metal with the plasma cutter and welding some of the pieces together. It worked flawlessly!

We spent the last weekend of the month visiting with Terry. After suffering from his life threatening infections, having his gall bladder taken out, seizures and strokes, he is finally stable and at home recovering but it has all taken quite a toll on his mental and physical health. He can get around somewhat with a walker, he still has a catheter in and his memory is not as it should be. He has a nurse that comes around to check on him and help, but otherwise, the rest is left to Jackie. 

Christmas in July

The girls and I have slowly been going through all the outlet stores. We even went out to Barstow! That was a huge disappointment. It was a pretty sad little collection of outlet stores. Even though Caitlyn actually found something there, it was not worth going to and will probably never bother going back. We went through it so quickly, that as we headed home, we decided to stop back in at the Ontario Mills store as we were unsatisfied. 

Caitlyn found a bag there that she wanted and I ended up getting it for her for an early Christmas present. It was a Samsonite travel bag that she can use now as she is going back and forth from her grandmother's place during the week. 

Since we got the major part of Caitlyn's Christmas present early, we decided to go ahead and get Emily's present early as well so that she can play with it over the summer.

We got her a little portable photo printer. It makes little Polaroid-like prints from her phone.

I guess Caitlyn decided to get into the swing of things as well. While she was trapped downtown for jury duty, she went shopping and got some little gifts for us as well. She got her dad a fancy bar of natural soap, as he hates the chemical's that are passed off as soap these days and a little antique oil can. And she got me these really neat wildflower honey beeswax lotion bars.

Since the TJ is out of commission for the summer and our small attempts to go into the wilderness has been one disaster after another, we haven't really gone anywhere this summer. Christian has been toiling away at trying to figure out and fix the Jeep. The girls are busy working or doing schoolwork still.

We did attempt to go for another drive on one of the weekends. This time we took Emily's Jeep and headed out to explore Pleasant Canyon for the day. We removed the top off the Jeep for the first time. It was pretty hot out though and the road was pretty rough. We had water and our shamaughs though so we felt pretty good as long as the air was blowing across us in the moving vehicle. At some point, we had to get out and trim the trees as it was encroaching on the trail. It seemed pretty well used at first but became impassable for a full sized Jeep at some point.

There trail joins a streamed so despite being in the desert, there was a lot of vegetation here. The JK's transmission oil got a little too hot trying to drive this big heavy Jeep up the steep trail. Emily will have to change the oil again before heading back to school. 

At some point, we found a place that we could turn around on but first Christian decided to investigate what the trail looked like further on. The girls and I waited at the car and it got pretty hot when the wind wasn't blowing and we were not moving in the Jeep.

We later found that we missed a bypass that would have gotten us to the top of the mountain.

----

One weekend, the girls and I decided to head out to the San Clemente Outlets next. It is adjacent to the beach, so we thought we could hit two birds with one stone. On a whim, Emily ended up getting a skim board. It was much more affordable than any of us would have assumed and we were headed to the beach to try it out!

We headed to the San Clemente, North Beach. The parking was surprisingly fair and not too crowded. The beach was just down below but we discovered that the tide was in and the beach was thin and rocky. Emily didn't want to destroy her skim board on her first time out so we left it in the car and took a walk since we had already paid for two hours of parking. 

The beach was beautiful but we couldn't even get down the beach to the pier. We tried to get farther down by taking the walking/biking trail that runs parallel to the beach but found our way blocked at some point from a landslide. 

We stopped to watch some of the surfers. There seemed to be pretty nice waves out for surfing. Unfortunately, that's not what we were looking for. After watching some of the surfers for a while and taking some pictures, we found that we were almost out of time.

We went in search of a beach that would be better for skim boarding. The girls found that Aliso Beach was  a popular place to try and we headed over there. Parking was a bit of a nightmare though as it was already late in the afternoon and there was not a lot of options for parking as it was completely filled. We finally found parking up the road a little ways on the street.

We were excited but soon found that we might have made a mistake by going to a beach recommended for skim boarding. There were quite a few people doing it but that just made the girls super nervous about trying it for the first time. We watched a few of the others to try to get the gist of their method, but in the end, it is just something you have to try.

After some humming and hawing and walking a ways down the beach to where there were less people, Emily finally worked up the courage to give it a shot. It was a bit difficult at first but she persevered.

After a couple of hours, she basically got the hang of it. Caitlyn was a bit more timid about it but finally worked herself up to trying it once the crowds thinned out a bit.

The waves were a bit rough and she was afraid the board would get away from her and get sucked up into the ocean. She did't even have a full swimsuit to get wet in. Emily said that she would help her to make sure the board didn't get lost but Emily was pretty tired after a couple of hours in and out of the ocean herself. Plus, because it was now late, the ocean seemed to be a lot more violent. After a few tries, we called it quits for the day as it was more than we bargained for. It was getting late and the girls were getting hungry so we left in search of some dinner on our way home.