A low swell gathered the crushed satin sea like the waistband on a skirt. The fabric was blue-black except for segments here and there where pewter and pink splashed across the grain. In the sky a fire appeared on the eastern horizon and climbed higher and higher. Flames of color radiated across the sky and bounced off the island of San Jose. Why is it that after a brilliant sunrise there is a pause, a hesitation where the world turns gray for the briefest interval of time? It happens regularly, as if it were the period at the end of a sentence, the finale of the sun’s return to our segment of the earth. Today followed with turquoise seas and shades of coral on the land.
The arroyo at Punta Colorada wound sinuously into the heart of Isla San Jose. Our feet trod upon the granitic backbone of the island, a mirror of the spine of the Baja Peninsula itself. Reworked ash, in shades of pink and yellow bound lithified bivalves together into soft and easily eroded fossiliferous sandstone. Towering walls defined our path and led us through the stages of springtime in the desert. Flamboyant flowers are sparse most years but today this was not the case. A palette of color dotted the land. Lavender beach beans and matching Fagonia hid beneath the golden threads of parasitic dodder. Blue Jacqmontia contrasted with the sage green foliage. Palo adan waved tubular red flowers with extruding stamens waiting to paint the heads of hungry hummingbirds with delicate yellow pollen. A tiny female Costa’s hummingbird dashed towards us, not to investigate red or cherry shaded shirts but to warn us of her treasure, just inches from our faces. Miniscule leaflets and the cottony awned seeds of jasmine de la Sierra had been delicately woven together with cobwebs into a miniature cup. Here two eggs nestled in a downy feather lining. The heat of her body was needed to ensure the metamorphosis from embryo to hatchling and she told us clearly to move on. A black-throated sparrow sang its tinkling bell song from the tops of shrubs and bushes celebrating the coming of longer days and the time of plenty when flowers would turn to seeds and youngsters would grow and fledge.
The sea became a mirror beneath the noon day sun but one where the reflective back was many feet from the glassy front. Common dolphins silently surged within this realm, their movements effortless when pushed ahead by our bow. The sound of silence was disturbed as was the solid surface when they leapt together into our world rapidly exhaling with resounding puffs.
If one chose a little of every place within this sea and mixed it carefully, one might end up with a place very much like Isla San Francisco. Cliffs of red and green volcanic ash dropped precipitously to form its eastern shore. Dune loving plants abutted against the saline tolerant species of wetland regions and cacti thrived on rhyolitic rocky soils. A mini-salt mining operation in the harsh playa plain demonstrated the how-to-do style of larger commercial operations elsewhere in Baja California. A romantic mind might imagine Half Moon Bay, a curving beach embracing a turquoise bay where sailboats and yachts find shelter and kayakers paddle quietly. As the evening light filtered between the clouds, a campfire glowed and satiated souls sought companionship in conversation or silently turned within filing the memories that continue to accumulate.
