We'd neglected to bring the Chuck-It for the little dog, but lucky for us, we found a used tennis ball. I rinsed it off in the ocean and Like-The-Wind-Jax was ready to go. I can't tell you how many times South-Paw-Poppy threw that ball for the little dog. Even had her fetching it in the water. This made me nervous cause what if Power-Poppy overthrew the ball and it went too far out and Jax went chasing after it and got caught in a riptide and then I'd have to go in after her? Someone died not to long ago doing that. I'm getting all worked up again just thinking about it!
I decided I'd take my shoes off (even though they are new running shoes and are supposed to get dirty, I just couldn't stand the thought) and walk in the sand with my bare feets. Then I decided to walk in the water. I've never done that before. Sure felt good!
As we walked you could see what looked like the remnants of a pier or dock or something. Full-Of-Energy-Poppy said we should walk to those piers and check them out. So we did. Here's what they were covered with...
I think we saw Andrew Zimmern eating these on one of those Bizarre Food shows. I wasn't feeling that adventurous since who knew how long they'd been rotting in the sun. Probably why the dude has no hair.
Have I mentioned that it felt like we were having a heat wave? I think that's why putting my feet in the subzero water felt so good.
Way further down the beach there was an outcropping of rocks so Treasure-Hunting-Poppy said let's walk to the rocks. So we did. Because the tide was so low, there were all kinds of neato things to see and pillage...fossils and all kinds of pretty rocks and rusty metal junk. I should probably mention that we've pretty much walked to the outskirts of Pacifica.
By the time I got bored of pillaging we managed to collect about 40lbs of rocks that we wanted to carry back. Mind you, I think we were at least 3 or 4 miles from the spot we started at. So I put as many rocks as I could in the little man-purse (aka Murse) I was carrying and then put a bunch in some of Jax's biodegradable pooh-pooh bags and off we went. This will be a nice reference for the rest of the story:
Don't worry, neither of us (or the dog) became the poster-people for this sign.
As we walked back, More-Is-More-Poppy found a large piece of driftwood she just had to have. If only I'd taken a picture of her with her 3'X 1' ugly old piece of driftwood, that she wanted to repurpose as a shelf or something, and her 20lb rock.
We kept trudging along and then saw a couple of folks riding horses take, what I assumed, was a shortcut. Why-Take-The-Long-Way-Poppy thought it would be a great idea to try the shortcut. I agreed. So we did. As luck would have it, it wasn't a shortcut and the terrain was very steep, very sandy and VERY hard to walk in (especially in bare feet). Picture one of those old movies where some poor fool is sinking in the quicksand...yeah, that's us.
Seems like we'd been walking forever with our 40lbs of junk. I kept calling Poppy's prized rock stupid as I was groping for pieces of Ice Plant to hang onto and hoist my still fat body up the side of the cliff. In my frustration and heat exhaustion, I told her that she needed to get rid of either that F__king-Stupid-Rock or the driftwood! Stubborn-As-A-Rock-Poppy said she'd come this far and wasn't about to dump any of it.
Have I mentioned we're having a searing heat wave and neither of us has eaten or had anything to drink since earlier that morning and it's now 3:30? I very reluctantly had to put my new shoes back on cause my foot was bleeding. Boo!
We finally reach the top of the cliff, only, we're not really very close to where we started. Actually, were on the 4th hole of the Olympic Club golf course...Crap! I'm freaking out because (a) we're on a private richy-rich golf course; and (b) we've got a little dog and that makes it 10 times worse than if it was just us. I'm thinking I should pick her up, but I can't because I've got 20lbs of rocks that I refuse to give up. Oh, before we reached the top, Perspiring-Poppy decided to leave the Stupid-Driftwood behind.
Anyhoo, there were a few folks playing on the hole so I thought we could be kind of inconspicuous and follow them by walking the along the edge of the cliff, but that proved difficult since we were carrying a bunch of blue pooh-pooh bags, we have a little dog and a really big Stupid-Rock! One of the richy-rich guys, dressed as Tiger Woods, kept staring at us. I figured I'd pretend we were foreigners and speak in my Faux French accent, but since Mr. Wanna-Be-Woods is rich, he'd probably taken French in school and I'd get busted. So, I decided honesty was the way to go and told him we'd gotten a little off track and were trying to get back to the truck over the hill. He didn't spit at us or anything. Who knew rich folks could be nice?
By now, we reached the edge of the golf course and Fort Funston. The only thing between us and salvation was a chain link fence. Poppy wouldn't let me climb over it. I think she said I was delirious or something. So, we decided to head down the cliff and that's what I did...I went ass first down and got back on the trail. Poppy heaved her Stupid-Rock over the fence and then made her way to the trail.
We made it! Although, we were still quite a hike from the truck and Pooped-Poppy still had to hike up a little hill to get Stupid-Rock. After she did that, she offered to go get the truck if I stand guard with all our loot. What a fun 3 hour hike!
By the way, we'll be heading back sometime this weekend to get the Stupid-Driftwood.
Ugh.
well at least take a picture of the stupid rock so folks know what a treasure it truly is!
ReplyDeleteThat would be stupid!
ReplyDeleteUm, a close-up in the daylight perhaps?
ReplyDeleteBeggars can’t be choosers!
ReplyDelete