Isak Dinesen wrote, "The cure for anything is salt water: sweat, tears or the sea." He was right so off we went to Oceanside for a day with the magical elixir.

It wasn't warm enough to frolic at the beach so we decided it would be a museum day! "The California Surf Museum serves as an international repository and resource center on the lifestyle sport of surfing by capturing, preserving, and chronicling its art, culture and heritage for the education and enjoyment of current and future generations."
Ancient Hawaii developed the act of waveriding more than 600 years before European contact. When Captain Cook christened the Sandwich Islands in 1778, his ship’s physician Dr. William Anderson noted the act of waveriding in his ship’s log. He described it as what appeared to be a “supreme pleasure.”A Princess, three Princes, a Duke and a Hawaiian Royal Minister’s grandson would be the stately stars who introduced standup surfriding to Europe, Australia and the United States. It began in 1885, when three Hawaiian Princes attending college at St. Matthews Hall military school in San Mateo, fashioned surfboards from redwood and took them out in the waves at Santa Cruz Bay, becoming the first official surfers in the Golden State. Their surfing foray into the west coast waters was an historic event in California history, covered nationwide in the newspapers and magazines of the time.
Great grandson of King Kalakaua’s minister, George Freeth, was one of the finest surfers of his era. Invited by real estate and train baron Henry Huntington, Freeth’s public demonstrations of surfing along Southern California’s coast beginning in 1907, marked the inception of organized wave riding on the mainland United States. The rest they say is history!
We marveled at the exhibit, Expanded Timeline of Surfboards. What an amazing collection of surfboards chronicling the history of surfing.
It wasn't just photos of these incredible artifacts, the actual boards were there for us to inspect up close. Wow.




I was especially intrigued by Alan "Pal Al" Nelson's travel board. He built this board in 2000, designing it as a way to cope with the expense and challenge of air travel (he had a home in Costa Rica and surfed the world).
"The exhibit tells the story of Bethany losing her left arm to a Tiger shark while surfing in Kauai, how she survived that attack through the help of Alana Blanchard and her family, and the determination exhibited by Bethany to not only recover from the incident, but return to surfing a mere three weeks after the attack. But she didn’t just return to surfing – she returned to competitive surfing Her story and her positive outlook on life have caused her to be in demand as a motivational speaker. She has inspired countless people to overcome adversity and not give up on their dreams."
Lunch was al freezing at the Mission Pacific Hotel's The Cafe.
Heaters and lap blankets made dining outdoors perfect.
Museum Stop #2 was at the Seabird's Oceanside Museum of Art West for the current art show. Inspired by Diane Wilson’s novel The Seed Keeper, this exhibition explores the concept of seeds as both a material presence and a powerful metaphor—an archive of memory, resilience, and future. Presented in collaboration with the Oceanside Public Library as part of the community-wide program The Big Read, the exhibition extends the novel’s themes into a visual and spatial experience. In Indigenous worldviews, seeds carry more than sustenance; they hold stories, languages, ancestral knowledge, and responsibilities passed orally from generation to generation.



A brisk stroll introduced us to something either of us had seen in this Southern California beach- habitat restoration with beautiful wildflowers within its protective fencing.


This was my first time discovering the Oceanside Rock Garden. Based on the proclamation on this rock, "I was the first rock!", it has been here for almost six years. Wild.




Some creations made me think while most made me smile.

Whenever possible, I spend some of my birthday month in Tehachapi with Leslie and her mom, Barbara. Both have been a large part of my life since 1982. This past March, I was gleeful that my timing allowed me to, once again, carry on this decades-old tradition. In April, we lost Barbara after a rather sudden series of insurmountable medical challeges.

My 48th Birthday Month

Since we were going to be closer to her while we're in Temecula, I convinced Leslie that sorrow is best shared with an old friend. Long story short, she is here for three days of new, happy memories being made.She arrived with perfect timing to attend the musical Once Upon A Mattress.
And the icing on the cake was running into old friends, Mike and Diana, before the show began.
Once Upon a Mattress is a comedic musical from 1959 (music by Mary Rodgers, lyrics by Marshall Barer) loosely based on the fairy tale The Princess and the Pea. The story takes place in a kingdom ruled by the domineering Queen Aggravain, who has decreed that no one may marry until her son, Prince Dauntless, weds first. The catch: she keeps sabotaging every princess who comes to court, ensuring none passes her impossible tests. Everything changes when the boisterous, lovable Princess Winnifred (“Fred”) swims the moat to compete for Dauntless’ hand.
While not my favorite live production, the actors were talented and the evening out on the town was a wonderful way to commence the friendship merriment.

Karen graciously invited me to an afternoon of animal magic and I accepted. What an afternoon!

We began as we often do... Ogling the tigers.


The San Diego Zoo Safari Park breeds critically endangered Sumatran tigers through a collaborative partnership with the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) Species Survival Plan (SSP). This breeding program carefully pairs specific tigers to maintain genetic diversity in the zoo population.

We were informed that this was the first time the Park has put tigers, who are procreating, out in the public. This couple, Jillian and Dumai, had a male cub born in 2024. Hopes are high for another cub soon. We felt a bit like voyeurs as we, and the masses, followed the pair to watch the magic happen (the 13th attempt at impregnating occurred while we were there).

It was exciting to see the newest addition to the African fox family. This adorable animal is known for its enormous ears that are over 5 inches tall.

Baby bat-eared fox kits weigh just 3.5 to 5 ounces at birth and are fully grown by 6 months.
We spent quite a bit of time delighting in the new litter of four male cheetah cubs born to first-time mother Kelechi. The brothers, named Nyasi, Owadgi, Ohani, and Nkala, were napping for the most part but any movement (a stretch, a yawn, etc) was oohed and ahhed at my the observers. Hysterical.




The remainder of our visit had us enjoying just exploring and being out and about together.