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| Nanaimo Dorid (Acanthodoris nanaimoensis) |
It's been four years since I last visited Palomarin Beach -- six since I last posted pix on the blog (I made no posts in 2018). The parking area seemed slightly different than I remembered it, and it took a second to find the trailhead. A "You Are Here" map listed only three hikes from there -- to Bass Lake, Wildcat Beach, and Alamere Falls. The map showed no trail going down to the beach.
I drove back about a quarter-mile to a smaller parking area and found a steep, narrow trail that I suspect is maintained only by locals and other visitors, and certainly not by the National Park Service. As I descended I saw some tracks in the dirt and figured I must be in the right place, and about one second later I realized the tracks had been made by a coyote. As the trail deteriorated, I knew I'd gotten myself into a real-life coyote story.
I kept going down despite the sketchy trail. The last fifty feet or so was completely gone, with the trail replaced by a narrow chute of rubble. To get down to the beach required lowering myself down the scree, not quite rappelling, via climbing rope and a rope ladder that had been left for the purpose.
Google Maps still shows the Coast Trail going down to the beach, but folks on alltrails.com started saying the trail was closed as far back as November 2020.
Anyway, I made it down to the beach without incident. No surprise, I was the only person on the beach and had the whole reef to myself. Just as I was leaving, a guy with a surfboard and a woman with a camera tripod appeared out of nowhere. I think they must have walked up from Bolinas, and they continued north a ways before the guy paddled out into fairly poor surf, although he did have the break all to himself.
The reef did not disappoint. In addition to the usual suspects, I found a new-to-me species of sea anemone that I can't identify, and a couple of critters that I have no idea what they are. It was interesting to visit tidepools south of the Golden Gate one day and north of it the next.
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| Lined Shore Crab Skeleton |
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| Lined Shore Crab Ready to Rumble |
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| Kelp Crab |
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| Red Crab |
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| Hermit Crab |
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| The First Bat Star I've Seen In A While |
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| Cute Little Feller |
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| Ochre Sea Star Strikes a Pose at Mussel Beach |
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| Aggregating Anemones Doing Their Thing |
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| Tidepool Garden |
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| Preparing to See What the New Tide Will Bring |
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| Anemone Indigestion |
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| A Sea Anemone Species I've Never Seen Before |
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| Surf Grass & Friends #1 |
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| Surf Grass & Friends #2 |
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Red Feather Sea Weed
(Erythrophyllum delesserioides) |
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| Neighborhood of Sea Sacs |
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| Bladderwrack (Green) and Turkish Washcloth (Reddish Brown) |
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| Fashion Slug |
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| Leopard Dorid |
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| Also Known As San Diego Dorid (Diaulula sandiegensis) |
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| Orange-Peel Dorid (Acanthodoris lutea) |
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| Mystery Meat (Seriously, What Is This Thing?!) |
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| Close Crop of Whatever That Is At The Top |
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| Little Red Mystery Tube-Nuggets |
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| Going Back Up Was As Interesting As Coming Down |
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| Definitely Not A Park Service Trail |
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