11.04 - Day 87 - Mission Viejo
Thursday 11th April - Mission Viejo, California (Day 87)
The weather is due to get cooler and wetter over Friday and Saturday so upon waking to clear skies this morning we make this our seaside day. After an early breakfast we drive along to Huntington Beach, about 30 minutes north-west - though as we approach it gets misty so that by the time we park the car a few blocks from the beach and get on the beach, we can barely see the pier just 200 metres away.
Hoping the sun will disperse the mist we loiter at the sea’s edge with sand ball throwing and long jump competitions. All the while a few surfers rise and fall on the sea, whilst small long beaked birds chase the receding waves trying to grab any morsels delivered by each wave.
After a while we stroll up to the pier, stopping to watch some of the many games of beach volleyball from those trying to make it easier with six-a-side to those making it harder using anything except their hands and arms. The mist is dissipating as we walk along the pier though the chilly wind soon turns us around and all the back to the borrowed car.
We arrange to meet Maggie and the girls on Balboa Island, 15 minutes down the coast a small island densely packed with two storey immaculate houses and pristine gardens. It’s almost artificially presented - where the properties are highly sought after; an estate agents window advertising two bed houses for $30,000 a month and no house for less than $4m. But it’s nice to walk along the waterfront between the houses and their boats and decide which we would pick.
Our next stop is Corona Del Mar tidal pools a few minutes further south where the compact expensive houses are replaced with sprawling very expensive houses. But we all get to use the same beach for free and for an hour and a half we explore the exposed rocks as the tide lowers for crabs aplenty and small fish, before digging in the gold and black layered sand.
Back in Mission Viejo we were treated to another tasty homemade meal before Daniel introduced us to a new (to us) board game called Sequence that is good, honest fun to play.