Torrey Pines State Reserve

Don't judge me, I don't do hair and makeup at 6am.

I went hiking through the trails at Torrey Pines State Reserve last weekend with my coworkers Pat, Marleen and Veronica at 6am on Saturday morning. This lighter hike is a lot easier then the one we did at Cowles Mountain a couple of weeks ago and is really more of a brisk walk with stairs thrown in now and again to make you pay attention. Paying attention isn't as easy as it sounds either due to the stunning views that constantly pull your eyes away from the trail below.

This hike starts adjacent to the beach. You start up a paved road that leads up to the cliffs above the beach at Torrey Pines and off that road are a number of trail heads, some that head down to the beach, some that run in a loop bringing you back to the main road and others that terminate abruptly at a dead end. We explored several and as you can see by the photos offered amazing scenery.


Me, Pat and Marleen at the big dead tree.


The view from the top of the bluffs.


Stairs lead down to an outlook.


View toward La Jolla from the lookout.


Veronica leads the charge while I hang back for a photo-op.


A stairway through the rock leads to the beach below.

We didn't see any live animals this time aside from a few birds and a large pelican. We ended our hike by taking a beach entrance trail and walking back to the car by the water. We did find something wet, slimy and definitely dead that had washed up. Not sure what it was. I guess some kind of large jellyfish. It had distinctively thick tentacles which lead me to believe it could have been an octopus. No suction cups though and it was completely clear in color. If anyone knows what it is, let me know.


Creepy dead thing.

After hiking I met up with Jeff and we went back to La Jolla Cove for another day of snorkeling. We saw many of the same fish as last time but while the visibility was lower there were a few extra surprises. We got to check the Calico Bass off our list of fish to identify. The coolest thing that I missed, hands down, was a harbor seal swimming under the snorkelers. Evidently it was about 5' to 10' below Jeff as he was swimming and I was off exploring other things and totally missed it. Maybe I'll have better luck next time. For now, I reel with envy.