When Pigs Fly

Or the mercury in San Francisco nearly reaches 90 -- whichever happens first. After Helle and I exercised every bit of will power to leave Santa Monica and drive back north to the chilly Bay Area, we were greeted with a sunny surprise: The weather followed us home!


When we woke up at 8am on that Saturday morning (in mid-April, mind you), it was already well over 70 degrees. And I just wanted to shout "told ya so!" from the rooftop all the way back to New York to all those haters who tried to convince me the weather in Northern California is never desirable (although, I think that was an attempt to dissuade me not to leave, which I appreciate, but still).


So we packed a cooler, grab our towels and hit the nude beach just south of Pacifica. (The only ones who exercised their freedom to go without clothes were all over 70 years old; hey, more power to them!) One thing I can't get over about living in San Francisco is that I'm less than a 10-minute drive from a handful of gorgeous beaches. Granted, the days I can take advantage of that are few and far between, which is why the second the temperature rises above 70, San Franciscans throw on their bikinis and shades and soak up every last ray possible.


Beach Day in Pacifica from krysleigh on Vimeo.

It was so hot that day that I did something I thought I might die without doing: swimming in the Bay Area. SVV, whose head isn't always screwed on so tight, makes it a habit of surfing in the nearly freezing Pacific -- with a wetsuit, that is. After he frolicked about in the waves a bit, it was too cold even for him to stand. But I started getting a little warm -- OK, I really had to pee, and there was nowhere to hide from prying eyes but the ocean -- so I took the plunge.


The water was so cold it was paralyzing. My bladder wouldn't even work in those temperatures. SVV estimated it to be somewhere in the 40s and later stripped off his suit and joined me on my second dip. The rest of the people on the beach kind of gawked at us, as we were surely the only ones sans a few millimeters of rubber stupid enough to swim that day. Eighty-eight degrees outside did little to warm the water. Still, it was the perfect California day, and if every weekend would follow suit, I could only be so happy.