A slow descent

Just to the south of the Pigeon Point Lighthouse is the Ano Nuevo State Park that provides access to the largest colony of northern elephant seals.  Access to the beaches where the seals bask in the sun is through a pleasant walk via coastal dunes and heath vegetation. As I learnt the seals are only on shore for two periods per year, once to mate and then the catastrophic malt for 5 weeks at the start of summer, which luckily is when I was there.  

As it was the weekend there were  informative volunteer rangers present to provide insights into the lives of the seals. When not on land the seals undertake a 10,000 mile round trip ftp feed rom the Park to the Aleutian Islands off the coast of Alaska. Even more impressive is that using 3D tracking devices the seals have been recorded to a depth of 6,200 feet at which point the tracked seal had hit the ocean floor.  

They descend to this depth by turning on their backs, entering a stasis like state and gradually spiralling downwards like a falling leaf, in turn slowing their heart rate to 2 beats per minute.  They do this  to hunt the oily fish found on the ocean floor. This sounded very impressive, but what I couldn't, and still can't understand is, if they'd slowed their heart rate to 2 beats per minute at the ocean floor, how do they then catch any fish or crustaceans, surely the seal is moving very slowly at this heart rate, maybe they hunt only the slowest of fish in a slow motion game of life and death? I was also wondering how they withstand the pressure at these depths, but unfortunately I only thought of these questions on the drive back to San Francisco.

It was strangely comforting coming back to San Francisco as having been there previously I knew my way around and felt free of the need to see any sights.  By chance I ended up spending a fair bit of time in The Mission area to the south of the city centre, which characterised by its ethnic diversity, an artistic vibe and as a hipster stronghold. I'd been there previously on a walking tour of the numerous murals painted through the area by Latin immigrants depicting the struggles of their home countries.  

Mission Mural

This time through friend of a friend I ended up at an Indian bhangra nightclub one evening and then a day or so later to interview Danielle from Urban Air Market about her sustainable fashion fair.  Danielle lives in a fascinating building where all the apartments are rented by artists, or with a connection to art. To live in the building requires an interview process and as I saw most renters decorate the common area outside of their entrance for with examples of their work. For some reason the experience reminded me a bit of MONA in Tasmania, maybe it was the odd banging and clanking noises in the background as I wandered around.

Mission Mural Artist

I've now left the US having made my way to Brazil via Toronto, a slow descent indeed. On reflection I had couldn't have asked for more in terms of my experience. From a sustainability perspective there is so much going on in San Francisco and Portland that it's inspiring, I found out for example that a number of corporates in Silicon Valley are installing Bloom Boxes as the latest trend in clean distributed energy. You only have to drive off the coast however and these fertile grounds dry up. In towns like Susanville the hybrids disappear and the F250 trucks and larger dominate the landscape. That was one aspect I couldn't get my head around, the need to have a small truck as a personal vehicle.

On that note I thought I'd finish with my favourite highly varied radio moments while driving around, of which I endorse none, well maybe cool sculpting which I first thought was an ad for ice sculptures.

- Cool sculpting

- Veil of Thoughts