More Pictures from our winter at Gaviota

These first 4 pictures were taken after one of our visitors told Gail that there was an injured Sea Lion under the pier.  Gail called the Mammal Rescue team and they sent out the fellow in the white shirt to pickup the Sea Lion.  After capturing him our expert told us the Sea Lion was blind in the left eye from an injury, had a small cut in his chest, was coughing (maybe from pneumonia), and was very lethargic (maybe from parasites in the throat and lung).  He felt sure that a good dose of anti-biotic, worm medicine, and some time would heal most of his problems.  The Sea Lion will be released out along one of the islands that forms Santa Barbara Channel.

Just got the net over him		Up away from the water		Carrying him up the hill
Putting him in the transport cage which will go into the truck on the left		As a change from sunset pictures I offer you two sunrise pictures		Sunrise is a couple of minutes after we open the park in the morning so the boys and I get to enjoy these.  Incidentally, the old adage, "Red Sky in Morning, Sailor Take Warning" apparently doesn't apply in these waters.  This turned out to be one of the calmest days we have had in two plus months.
The last surfers of the day getting their boat off of the pier		Now some more sunset pictures
				Looking east at low tide
Some low clouds hanging around the local hills		Full moon on the rise		The return of the Sea Lion. The rescue guy said he might bite which is why Gail backs up quickly.
Time=12:34:02 time as reported by my camera		Time=12:34:03 he wasn't interested in biting.		Time=12:34:03
Time=12:34:04		Time=12:34:05		Walking the beach at low tide
Our cliffs are shale.  Here you can see a good example of how rocks are bent as mountains get pushed up.		Another example of bending rocks		After a nice sunset the clouds are "sky blue pink"
What can I say?  More sunset pictures.				The sun did not set here.  It just a reflected glow during a spectacular sunset
With the wind blowing in off the ocean there was a lot of moisture in the air to catch the light		A larger than usual surf at Gaviota		Same day

Ever since we arrived at Gaviota the Rangers have been warning us that we might have to evacuate the park if we had a lot of rain, or if they thought there was going to be a lot of rain because the park has a history of flooding.  You can see the marks from a previous flood on the bathroom walls.  The park was covered in roughly 2 feet of mud in one case.  Sunday night (January 17th) we got the call, "Big storm coming, move to Refugio State Park tomorrow).  The following group of pictures shows the rain at Gaviota (not well since it isn't milk), the empty park, and some shots from our time at Refugio.

Heavy rain just before we pulled out of the park		The empty park a day later		The beach with a lot less sand than usual
Surf crashing under the pier		The creek that causes the flood.  Up a little but not as much as it appears in this photo		The view from the door of our trailer shortly after the move
With the beach to my back		A lull in the storm		Sunset on the first day
The storm returns on Tuesday		You can see in the foreground how the storm is eroding the beach		The lull after Tuesday morning's storm
		Tuesday evening a pelican skimming over the waves		Tuesday evening surfer
Heavy rain Wednesday, the 4th storm in 4 days		The creek is up higher-roughly 1.5-2 ft below the bottom of the bridge		The creek has jumped it's bed upstream and is flowing into the entrance road.  The low spot has been added to drain this back into the creek bed.  So far it is working.
Looking east along the coast.  Notice how much muddy water is flowing out of the creek.		Same scene at a wider angle so you can see how the wind is pushing a surface current to the west		Thursday after the main part of storm 5 (in 5 days) has gone through.  We are now camping IN Lake Refugio
You can see that mud was flowing through the park earlier on Thursday.  We couldn't get into the park to see how deep as the entrance road had at least 6 inches of mud on it before the bridge.		Another squall coming ashore.  Also note how wide the creek is at lower left		Friday-day 6 and now we are down to scattered showers (some heavy).  Here is one approaching.  you might be able to find the oil platform if you look carefully.
Friday-you can see that the creek did overflow the bridge on Thursday		The creek is back down but look at the banks and you can see where it was		Mud at the entrance to the park
You can see tracks in the mud from one of the Ranger trucks		Big, pounding surf on Saturday morning after the last of the storm had passed.

So, the storm has passed but we were still living in the lake at Refugio on limited power with our tanks filling up.  The Rangers are waiting for more rain to pass through in a few days before they decide when we can go back to Gaviota.  We decided to go to a commercial park where we have a membership with a low daily fee where we can have full power and dump tanks as necessary.  We moved Saturday afternoon to Rancho Oso Resort which is in the Los Padres National Forest, over the mountain from Santa Barbara.

Here is a panorama from the hillside above the campground,  Yes, that is snow on the peak in the left-center background.  Our rig is on the third row down and you can only see a small corner of it.  More to follow.

	Our rig at Rancho Oso		Sunset-not spectacular but nice
	More pictures from Gaviota can be found on page 3--Click here