As I said in the last page, I didn't go along to San Gregorio, so I don't have a lot of captions about what we were thinking or doing. But there are some good pictures here.

I've added my comments below.
    --Mark, Special Guest Journaller

later: I've been informed that I'm not allowed to be the navigator in Eco-Challenge, due to my inability to tell north from south. I blame the fact that the water is on the wrong side.
    --Mark

This is Sarah, with a view south on the beach. There were a lot more people there that usual, because it was Father's Day, and the first warm weekend in a while. Most of the little kids were swimming in the river; only a few braved the ocean proper.

My mom. The view here is southeast toward the bridge over the San Gregorio creek.

Dad, standing in one of the small caves in the cliff. At first I thought this was the larger one, but had filled up with sand since my last visit. (I was wrong.) Shortly after this picture was taken, Dad got distracted with picture taking and didn't notice how close he was to the waterline, so he ended up with wet feet for most of the hike.

A ways south on the beach, there is a mini sand dune, behind which hides a surprising amount of plants. We hypothesized that they get water dripping down from the cliff.

Side view of this area, with Sarah and Dad.

Photographic proof that I was there, too. The waves were more active that usual; we saw some which were 6-10 feet. Mom commented on how much more powerful the ocean appears than Lake Michigan, although there is not many explicit differences you can point to. [Except that's everything is reversed east-west from where I lived.]

The sand was covered with little purple jellyfish thingies. They dried up and got crumbly. Marissa says those were there on her previous visit, too, although the last time I went the debris consisted almost entirely of crab shells.

Then they climbed up on the cliff.