Sea Scenes on the Seashore

Asilomar, on the Monterey Peninsula sits at the edge of the world, buttressed by kelp forests and craggy pools filled with fluttering sea urchins.  An exploration at low tide yielded eye candy to give my brain a sugar coma!  The dunes surrounding the beach received careful restoration and became a moonscape of soft gray-greens and off-beiges.  Pops of pink Sand Verbena and yellow Lupines looked florescent against the theme of neutral tones.

Life imitating cartoons?  That's what this seaweed seems to be doing, nestled in rocks with mussels.  I love their chunky "leaves" and it has me thinking of the fun (and tribulations) of creating a seaweed garden!

A trio of miniature sea urchins sat in the mouth of an anemone.  I'd never seen any this tiny and the patterns of the shells look almost Elizabethan.

Snarls of seaweed dotted the sand and I couldn't get over the colors and textures.  Who knew that yellow-brown could look so lovely when paired with cola and green?  (Is that why the '70s happened?)

Is this a limpet?  The memory of my 6th grade tide pool class fails me.  The shape evokes the pine cones on trees twenty yards away.  I love how this and the mussel colonies convey a message of community through adversity as the waves crash against them. 

Unfortunately, the photos of the little red and green crabs gurgling very threatening bubbles at me and the pools of anemones, starfish and hermit crabs didn't convey the richness of the experience.  All the more reason to take a day trip again!