Air was clear and crisp in its true sense when we started out in the morning in Ventura, CA. The Channel island harbor was barely less than 5 minutes away.We had reached pretty late into the night. Ranjan had already ordered breakfast to grab in the morning and reach the marina in time to check in!
Pacific water looked gorgeous and sky couldn't be more blue-er! Crew was courteous and friendly. the boat slowed down if we came close to something that would delight the passengers. I grabbed a cup of coffee and watched through window mostly, as we cruised along. We went past group of dolphins, seagulls and even a few oilrigs!
Santa Cruz island is one of the five islands of this national park(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Channel_Islands_National_Park).The visitors must take back everything they brought in to the island to leave this pristine clean...no trash can to be found. Very well maintained.
Ranjan & Rijul had already opted for kayaking and go see some of those beautiful painted caves. Myself and Romil decided to go for hiking so that we can see the California sea coast beautiful vistas.
We chose Potato harbor trail as the map said "Moderate". Romil would probably have preferred a more strenuous one, he decided to give company to mom. The entire trail was 5 mi, initially it was slight steep but then quite flat.
Each vista looked amazing! At a distance, the pacific fog provided a nice backdrop against blue pacific warm waters. Hundreds of birds took rest on those beautiful rocks. Looking from top, the beauty of waves breaking and bottom emarald water against some black rocks, took our breath away. The hike was so much of worth!
We paused at every vista to admire Nature. The trail packs that Ranjan had packed tasted delicious. Both mom and son enjoyed our little picnics and chit-chat. We saw those magnificent ravens whose intelligence made rounds of stories - they can unzip your backpack if left unattended, take out food and other shiny objects like keys and be kind enough to zip up, as if nothing happened.
Descending the trail was quite comfortable and took us less time. As we were waiting for Dad and son to return from sea caves, Romil suggested to sit on one of many benches near the campground. We devoured the last batch of trail mixes and took a good sip of water. Sitting near the Eucalyptus trees, provided a nice breeze and a beautiful fragrance! Finally, we saw the group of foxes, who over time had evolved to look much smaller like cats.
Ranjan and Rijul had returned, I saw some of their beautiful pictures of caves, pelicans and blue sea.
Pretty soon we boarded our cruise right on time. The sea looked golden as Sun was setting on west. Suddenly, the boat slowed, lo and behold, the boat was surrounded by hundreds of dolphins - what a show of synchronizing dolphins splashing golden water at us, and rejoiced by thousands of bird!
Another annoucement came soon for moon rise. The last full moon of 2021 was peeking out behind the mountain, ready to illuminate the sky, as the boat anchored, the parking lot was full of cars and festivities for the town's annual boat parade and fireworks.
This morning, as we went to starbucks, decided to catch the first ray of sun and took a detour to the beach - the micro moon was still in command and was saying goodbye, as slowly the Sun was transitioning, some of fishing boats had returned and the sky looked amazing with a mix of twilight colors!
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