Friday, January 22, 2010

STORMY SKIES AND TROUBLED SEAS

Our weather hasn't been this exciting for fifteen years.  50-60 m.p.h. wind gusts.  Heavy, heavy rain.
Really squirrely winds.There have been a couple of tornadoes, little ones, but as Rosy pointed out in her comments, we here in Southern California don't have any basements to go to for shelter. In addition, we have many, many mobile home parks. During a break in the storms Kay and I went down to the beach to see the waves.  It was almost time for sunset, so we really went to town on the sunset pictures.  This first one was taken before I turned the settings on my camera to 'sunset'.

 

What a difference that made to the photos!  The waves were 10 -15 feet but down in San Diego, they had 25-30 foot waves.

 
Got him!  Had a number of tries to catch a bird in the sunset  and nearly gave up.  They move too fast, but finally caught this one.  Sometime I will do a post on dramatic skies, because we got some good shots for that category.

 
 This was a good one of the sun shining on the water, but...

 

...I like the more subtle colorings of this one.


 
This is not snow.   Some foolish newsman, while covering this storm asked if this frothy stuff was pollution.  And the one being interviewed said yes!  Obviously neither of them are used to stormy seas.  This is spume!  It blows off the waves and floats around the beach and cliffs.  When we lived at Flamborough Head we often had this blowing all around  the cliffs and lighthouse.  Believe me our beautiful but cold, green waters off Flamborough were not polluted in my day.


 

 The winds blew over our patio chairs and the rains flooded the path to the bird feeder.



 

So I spread handfuls of seed on the picnic table, (which remained upright) and whoosh!  The birds came with a rush.

From what I can gather not too much damage was done in our area and I must say I like the break in routine.  Needless to say, Kay was not as appreciative as I.  She was hoping for more warm and sunny days.  But she has another week, so may be we can squeeze out a day or two of sunshine.


9 comments:

claude said...

Beautiful skies.
I saw on the TV what is happening at this time on California coats.
Ciffs which fall in the sea. Impressive !

Anne Vis said...

Great shots! From what I understand the foam is created by algae and to some extend a sign of lack of balance ...

Anonymous said...

I love watching the ocean (in safety) during a storm! Great pix as usual!

Morning's Minion said...

I've hoped your weather wasn't too damaging. I think that being on the edge of a storm sometimes brings out a bit of the wild adventurer in us--definitely interesting when things are stirred up a bit, but no one hurt or homes destroyed.

Patty said...

You got some great shots of the stormy weather. I'll be so happy to see a little sun again. They say we're to have temps in the 50's tomorrow. Right now it's around 47 but the house feels colder than when it's 15 outside. Thanks for you visit and have a great Sunday.

Cherdecor said...

I loved seeing all your sunsets pictures and pictures of the beach aaaaand your back patio.

ALMOST, but not quite, did I get to visit you. Alan won an award and in the past, he had to go to conference to get it. But this year, because of the slowing economy, they are not sending the winners to San Diego. I had plans of coming along to meet you and Wanda. All of that fell through this year. Maybe there will be better years in the future.

I would so like to meet you and Wanda and have a cup of tea together.

sandy said...

Beautiful photos of the sunset. You all at the coast got it a lot more severe than we did. Although, wow, the amount of rain here was incredible.

My birds would run out and eat too. As soon as I could when a break would come I would run out and pour some seed out on my patio table too.

kaybee said...

Well, the weather certainly has been exciting - just grateful for minimal damage in the county; but lots of fun seeing those waves and the awesome skies.

For my last week, though, I'd prefer 'warm' to 'exciting' !

LisaF said...

I love the stormy sky pics. The magnificence of the ocean coupled with the skies make us realize we are not really in charge of anything on this planet! :-)