True Nature Stories: Foggy Salt Point

The Wild Coast of Salt Point State Park

I was half-way home before I realized the itchy sensation on my left leg was due to a tick trying to burrow under my skin. Luckily I was able to pull over right away and toss the little critter out the window. (The wound later became quite painfully infected and required medical treatment.) That might have been the first time I ever got a tick at Salt Point. I'd noticed deer tracks as I meandered along the trail, and there were a couple of times where tall grasses laden with dew arched over the trail. Perfect tick habitat.

I was glad to find that the National Weather Service forecast was correct about the calm wind conditions, but disappointed that it was not even close to being "mostly sunny." As I drove up in the darkness of the wee hours, my windshield wipers were on intermittently the whole way.

The sunrise arrived at around 6 a.m., just a dimmer switch being turned up a little bit. I parked at Stump Beach and hiked down through the moody forest, accompanied by the patter of fog-drip and the cheerful, if slightly manic, chatter of a Pacific wren. A couple of small pinnipeds bobbed in the shallows just offshore, stealing glances at the biped exploring the beach. I was glad I'd brought a fleece jacket to keep me warm in the misty conditions.

I only stayed about three hours before making a quick check of Kruse Rhododendron Preserve (which, while beautiful, was not particularly photogenic), then headed home while enjoying the winding drive back down along the misty Sonoma Coast.

Stone Becoming Sand at Stump Beach

I liked the many pebbles on the beach that were veined with white lines of various complexity.

The foreground of paintbrush and bracken leads back toward a small creek drainage that empties onto Stump Beach, where gulls and a pair of black oystercatchers took advantage of the fresh water to drink and bathe.

There was a nice mix of wildflowers on parts of the bluffs above the beach. The California poppies remained closed during my three-hour visit, awaiting brighter conditions.

There were some nice patches of paintbrush, including some that were among lupine leaves. Once the lupines bloom, it will be even more gorgeous out there.

A pair of Canada geese were about the only critters larger than sparrows that were moving around among the wildflowers on the marine terrace.

Dew-laden lupine leaves promised purple-and-white flowers to come.

Tigher crop of lupine leaves from previous image (click any image to view larger).

Pink sea thrift and goldfields were the dominant wildflowers this time. I was there in early June last year, when the sea thrift was past its prime but the lupines and seaside daisies were blooming in abundance.