Homer's Travels: Aloha To The Sandcastles

Sunday, September 16, 2007

Aloha To The Sandcastles

Well, this weekend didn't go as I expected or hoped. My plan was to attend the Santa Barbara Sandcastle Festival. I left early Saturday afternoon intending to arrive about an hour before judging. I arrived on a beautiful sunny day and drove around and drove around and drove around and drove around and drove around ... there wasn't a parking spot available for miles. Well that's an exaggeration but after driving around for about 30 minutes (no exaggeration) I had ended up a short hike away from the beach and I still hadn't found a parking spot. So, after driving past the beach one last time hoping for an opening, I gave up and headed home. I was disappointed to say the least.

As I drove back down the 101 I remembered that the Aloha Beach Festival was going on near Seaside Park in Ventura. There was supposed to be some Frisbee competitions including K9 Frisbee catching. This seemed like a good backup plan so I headed there. Parking was a little better and I found a spot after 5 minutes of driving around the parking lot. I walked around and looked through the vendor stalls and watched for the Frisbee contest. No Frisbee contest. Turns out I had missed it but there would be another on Sunday so I planned to try again on Sunday. I did get some pictures including a very happy lab.

On Sunday, after a greasy breakfast at Mrs. Olsen's Coffee Hut with some friends, I headed back to Seaside Park hoping to catch the K9 Frisbee competition. When I got there a Hula demonstration was going on which was kind of cool. There were people playing around with Hula Hoops and drums nearby. There was a surfing competition going on and the crowd was a bit bigger then the day before. I walked around and people watched for a while. Then they announced the Freestyle Frisbee demonstration with some championship winning freestyle Frisbee people. OK ... Freestyle Frisbee turns out to be pretty dull. Sure they were better than I'll ever be but nothing they did was really that impressive. I was surprised to see that most of the Frisbee people were old guys about my age. No young kids at all. The younger generation were over at the skateboard demonstrations nearby. Looking at these guys you wonder what their day job is ... if they have a day job. I was hoping that there would be something better to come.

A high school heavy metal band came on stage and ... well, I didn't think you could ruin heavy metal any more then it already is but they were pretty bad. I walked around waiting for them to get off the stage so that more Frisbee demonstrations could continue. I sat on a planter to rest my feet while the teenage boys screamed at the top of their lungs. An old lady in too tight tights, movie star sunglasses, and wearing enough makeup to make Tammy Fay Baker proud sat down next to me and started to complain about the terrible music. Apparently it was so loud she was loosing her hearing. I nodded my head a few times until she got up and left. Fortunately the band wrapped up and the Frisbee people came back. The same people doing the same lame Frisbee tosses. That was enough for me. I walked back to the car and went home. I never did see K9 Frisbee catchers damn it!

While it sounds like I had a rotten weekend, the festival got me out of the house and into the fresh air for a couple hours each day. I can't complain too much about that. I think I will end this post with a bad haiku:

Room enough for Castles of Sand, None for my ride
K9 Pie Tin catchers a backup plan, None to be found
Freestyle Frisbee Surfer Dude, Hippy, Jimmy Buffet Wannabees - Lame


Pictures can be found here. Next Week: The Red Bull Air Races. It's going to be cool.

2 comments:

  1. Sorry you didn't make the sandcastles, it sounded cool. On the other hand, you got Hula Dancers & Drums, so that's not too shabby.

    Can't wait for the report from the Air Races!

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  2. GH,

    My experience was kind of like yours at the fair - Not great but not bad either. The Aloha Beach festival was ... o.k.

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