El Niño is finally promising rain for California. With the rain
come wind and dark skies. But no one is complaining.
The drive south from Poplar Beach to Santa Cruz is
picturesque. The cliffs are majestic and the Pacific Ocean incessantly pushes
its waves against these cliffs. The travel rods are serpentine and perfect for
a drive in a two-seat convertible roadster.
Hundreds of cars were parked along the road with folks taking
pictures of waves and beaches. That is not what a street photographer does, so
I kept on driving to Santa Cruz looking for humans!
As one gets close to Santa Cruz, the waves seem to swell bigger
and the sound of these crushing against the rocks much louder. No wonder that
it is one of the most popular areas for wave surfers. In fact the Santa Cruz
Surfing Club is among the first in California introduced to the region by
students from Hawaiian Islands who migrated to the San Francisco Bay Area for
jobs or education.
… I took two 1970s Nikkor lenses with me – a 105mm and a
180mm. Both open down to 2.5 or 2.8 and given
the cloudy skies I wanted fast lenses.
I parked my car and a quick look over the cliff uncovered a
small bay full of seals. I looked
through the 180mm lens to realize that these were wave surfers waiting
patiently for a good swell.
I waited as well. Wanted to catch the good wave through my
lens. After about 10 minutes of wait I became impatient and decided to be happy
with a small wave.
Ok, that was enough wave and rock for me—wanted to get into
the crowd and catch a few moments on the boardwalk.
This artist made imaginary trees out of scrap wiring and
anything shiny to shape into leaves. I opened the 105mm lens wide and wanted a
creamy background.
The boardwalk is secured with a sturdy steel fence. Yet many
jump over it to get closer to the edge of the high cliffs. I wanted to capture the
eclectic behavior on the boardwalk along with surfers jumping the fence to get
closer to the ocean.
But the call of the ocean seems to be for everyone –even a
Golden retriever was tempted to jump the fence!
Talking about dogs, I was surprised at the effort some folks
took to clean their dog before getting into the car. After all this is
California!
After couple hours of walking around, I got that one picture
that makes any of my street outings worthwhile. Atop a high cliff, about 300
meters away, I saw a fisherman, a young lady and a surfer next to each other.
Strange composition. Yet, what I thought as I looked through the telephoto lens
was three human shapes, on a cliff, looking at the tumultuous Pacific Ocean.
But they look at it differently, with a totally different body language. Here is what I saw with the naked eye:
And here is the view though my telephoto:
… On my way back along the coast of the Monterey Bay, when
fast Tesla cars were passing me from the right and from the left, I was wondering
how many surfers caught the wave they hoped for; and if fishermen took home rockfish
or lingcod. But most importantly, if the
lady on the edge of that cliff had a pleasant daydream.
January 31, 2016
© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2016
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