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Today was my first surf session in the Pacific! I booked a 1-on-1 lesson through Surf Diva, a San Diegan surf school that’s owned by two sisters.
Their shop is right in the heart of La Jolla, so after we got our boards and wetsuits, we walked a few blocks down to the beach.
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Last night we had dinner at a fabulous Mexican restaurant (El Fandango) in Old Town – the settling place for the first Europeans who came to California.
Now a neighborhood made up of authentic Mexican restaurants, boutiques, and museums, Old Town is considered to be the birthplace of California.
So we’re moving here, seriously. This has been the best 24 hours EVER.
After the Geff Experience, we checked into our gorgeous hotel overlooking Mission Bay (and Mission Beach beyond that).
I’m here! I’m here! I’m here! I’ve wanted to see San Diego for years now, and I’m finally here!
I’ve accompanied Ted out here for a week-long conference and we arrived yesterday. In the late 90s, I visited much of the California coast but I didn’t go this far south. This is unfortunate because I’ve been told by many that it’s my kind of place. The whole organic/locally grown movement, the wide variety of outdoor rec opportunities, and for so many other reasons, I would totally fit in here.
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Happy Valentine’s Day!!! What better way to spend a beautiful February day than to take off from work and go surfing?!
For the love-centric holiday, Ted and I gave each other the gift of neoprene. I gave him booties and a hood (as he already had gloves), and he gave me gloves and a hood.
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Today was one of the prettiest days we’ve had all winter. The skies had cleared from days of rain and the temperature had warmed up into the 60s. I had watched the swell charts all week and a hopeful bump on Friday remained a constant promise. So I was determined to kick off early and go surf.
Around 2:30, I skeedattled out of the office and grabbed my board and wetsuit. I decided to take Olive because I had been practicing my shortboard pop-up and was getting better.
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We just got back from a trip over to Jacksonville to visit Ted’s family and there have been reports that the surf was going to be on today. Between my new board and the booties my dad and stepmom gave me for Christmas, I was ready.
When we got to the beach, I saw a lineup unlike any that I’ve seen before. There were probably 30 guys in the water, many of whom were doing some seriously impressive “shredding.” This refers to the cuts that shortboarders make back and forth across a wave but there has to be enough wave in order to pull this off.
Today, there was definitely that.
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Oh what a MAGICAL time of year!!! My first Christmas as a surfer has been full of all sorts of sugarplum fairies (only these fairies were wearing board shorts) and it began on the 23rd when I arrived at Ted’s for our Christmas dinner.
I had just come from getting my fourth-ever pedicure (seriously, why pay for those when you can do them yourself…without the risk of a weird bacterial infection from the foot tubs) and went to set down my bag.
When I walked by the wall where he mounts his snowboard, I immediately noticed something different all together: a surfboard with decorations shaped like giant Christmas lights hanging from it!
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What a day to give thanks! It’s unseasonably warm for late November and the sky was the deepest, clearest blue today that you could ask for. The water temp is now somewhere in the mid-70s, so it was perfect for our new wetsuits.
Ted’s daughter came in town for the holiday and our family dinner at my parent’s didn’t start until 3:00. That gave us plenty of time for a morning session before we needed to get in the kitchen to prepare our dishes. So we loaded up our boards and drove down to the state park.
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I made it half-way through the fall without a wetsuit, and if it were left up to me, Thrifty Thelma, I’d see if I could push it to Christmas.
However, as the weeks went by, Ted noticed that I was shivering more and more during our sessions so to the surf shop we went.
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