Dominic Tartaglia

In the name of Independence Day I joined my usual group of scuba buddies at the Union Oil Pier in Avila Beach, CA. Oftentimes here on my localism blog I talk about going up in elevation whether it be mountains, Highway 1 or some other activity, however, one of my favorite activities is SCUBA and luckily for me the Central Coast offers an abundance of dive sites. While scuba is a sport that not all people will like I highly encourage people to give it a try if they get the opportunity and have the means. Below you guys will find my take on this wonderful 4th of July experience, ENJOY!

About the Union Oil Pier at Avila Beach: The small port city of Avila Beach use to be one of the most important shipping ports along the Coast of California and from the 1914-1922 time period was the largest crude oil port in the world shipping oil from the Santa Maria Valley and various other local fields. As the Union Oil and Standard Oil companies slowed down to an idle in the later part of the century the oil export ceased and now the pipelines and pier sit idle in the Avila Bay. The town has transitioned from a oil town to a small beach destination town that has a major attraction with one of the few South facing beaches in the area. Because of it's orientation it is consistently one of the warmer beaches in the area and draws many vacationers from near and far including divers, anglers, sailors and other water enthusiasts.

The dive site at the Union Oil Pier consists of parking along Avila Beach drive and donning your gear roadside. A diver can then walk down the sloping cliff to the side of the pier and depending on tide enter from the shale rock ledge OR walk underneath the pier to the boulder strewn beach to make a safer and easier beach entry. I prefer and advise the boulder beach entry. *Caution: when making a beach entry at this location, as with many others, keep an eye on the surf rogue waves can cause injury and knock off, damage or wash gear away. Once you get in the water the pier runs at a bearing of 0 degrees at the end and 180 degrees at the shore. If you proceed at 0 degrees via compass you can go out roughly 100 feet to the first rock reef and proceed out another 200+ feet to the second and third rock reef. This location does have sand and depending on current, tide and algal blooms visibility can be affected. Overall the sandy bottom is great halibut habitat and the kelp houses everything from perch, stripers, rock fish and octopusses.

Things To Take: As a SCUBA diver you will need the basics including air, wetsuit (probably a 7 mm), a bouyancy compensator, regulators, mask, fins, booties, gloves weights and I advise a hood. As a freediver I advise a 4.3 wetsuit, mask and snorkel, fins, booties and gloves as well as a removable weight belt. No matter how you dive i highly advise carrying a good dive knife witha blunt tip and line cutter, due to the occasional fishing line or thick kelp. I personally always carry a singaling whislte and dive with a buddy. There is no sense in putting yourself in unnecessarry danger.

What To Do: Get your gear on at the roadside and carry your bc tank and regs hooked up and adjusted as you would in the water as well as carry your fins and mask down to the water. This is where it pays to have a truck because the tailgate makes an awesome platform to set your tank and bc down on while you suit up and strap down. I find it particularly nice to sit down on a rock just at the water's edge and wash out my mask and put on fins and do my last buddy check before kicking out into the water. Once you are out there check out the pilons of the pier and you will find hundreds of rainbow colored starfish, crabs and smaller bait fish. If that doesn't catch your fancy kick on over to the rock reef and cruise through the kelp and you will find every other type of standard marine life from around these parts. Sometimes you will be greated by a local harbor seal curious about your bubbles or funny looking fins. Numerous times I have been surprised by these goofballs.

What To Expect: Prepare yourself for a great experience getting to know the local marine life as well as to not see anything. Depending on conditions you can have up to 15 feet of visibility or as little as 1-2 feet. If you take fish while you are down there make sure to check the state and local fish and game agencies to get up to date regulations but there are many species of fish, invertebrates, seals, sharks, and ocean birds.

How Did I Fare?: Weeellll, remember how I mentioned you should expect poor vis? That's probably because I had 3-4 feet of vis at best. Yea, it's a bummer but I still enjoyed getting in the water and keeping my gear in shape. The best thing of all is that I still fit in all of my gear, sometimes it amazes me how my wetsuit just seems to "shrink". While I was down I saw some crabs and some bait fish but nothing too amazing. On the other hand I got to play search and rescue for the borrowed pole spear that I accidentaly dropped in the surf zone. Surf zone = no visibility period which = Dom swimming back and forth aimlessly in the waves feeling for a skinny fiberglass pole. LUCKILY, my search and rescue paid off for me and I found my buddy's pole spear, phew! Nevermind the fact that I didn't need it. To top th dive off we drove over to Fat Cat's restaurant near the Olde Port Inn and had a great breakfast.

How Do I Rank It?: Because of the fact that the vis was poor I rank this dive at a low 3. If the vis had been up around 8-10 feet I probably would have given it an 8.

Other: The local dive shop that I recommend getting fills or gear from is SLO Ocean currents located on South Higuera Street in San Luis Obispo. If you are coming to visit the area give me a call and I would be glad to meet up and take you out for a local dive.

Pictures:

This is the view from the shore looking along the Union Oil Pier out to the South at 180 degrees.

This is the view from the Union Oil Pier out to Port San Luis. *note all of the sail boats moored out in the bay.

Just to let everybody out there know
This Friday at 5:30 pm Resination, a local band, will be playing two solid hours of live music in the Mission Plaza in San Luis Obispo. As always there is free admission to the concert and once you are inside you can come visit yours truly at the bar serving local wine from Edna Valley Vineyards along side other volunteers serving localy brewed beer from Firestone Walker Brewery. Before you leave be sure to pick up a cd or some merchandise from the band or the concert.

Resination is a band that we invite back to the Concerts in The Plaza series every year for their energy and crowd pleasing sounds that we all can dance to. So bring down your significant other, friend, dog or dancing shoes and be ready to have a good time in Beautiful San Luis Obispo.

I want to start off with confessing that I have become two weeks behind on my blog, I apologize to you all. The truth of the matter is that I went on a vacation to Shaver Lake and our family's cabin one week ago and then my next adventure was an engagement party. The beauty of that all is that it only took me three hours to go to either location from home base here in San Luis Obispo.

That being said, I am very excited to announce that San Luis Obispo is kicking off our summer long Concerts in the Plaza. Every Friday night our downtown association and local businesses, mine included, promote, sponsor and present a different band in the Mission Plaza, downtown. For the rest of the summer I can be found helping behind the bar at the concert from 5 o'clock to 7 o'clock pm. We strive every year to bring a little bit different flavor to each show and always provide good music for the crowd to dance to.

The concert also features a bar where the audience can purchase a glass of locally grown Edna Valley Chardonay or Cabernet or locally brewed Firestone Brewery, Pale Ale, Double Barrel Ale, Honey Blonde or new this year Union Jack. Across the way from the bar guests can enjoy local restaurants' finger foods and entre's.

So come down this Friday for the first concert this year and see SIKO live! Check out SIKO's music here.

It has been almost an entire week since Mother's Day but I am writing this week's CCAB about the day that I spent with my mother, Natalie Tartaglia. Everyday is Mother's Day in my life because I have the privilege of working with my mom. In case you folks didn't know she is my broker which also makes her my lunch appointment and companion throughout the day. Anyways, in the spirit of the holiday our family took the mothers in the family out to breakfast and spent the morning together but as soon as we had got down to my immediate family we packed the kayaks, life jackets and spf 30 and split for the harbor of Morro Bay.

This weeks blog: Kayaking in Morro Bay Harbor

About the Morro Bay Harbor:A lot of people visit Morro Bay, in fact people have been visiting this quiet little fishing village for centuries. The two most notable features of Morro Bay are Morro Rock and the three gigantic exhaust stacks for the Morro Bay power plant. Morro Rock has been referred to as the Gibraltar of the Pacific and as such has been used as a navigational point by sailors for many ages. The rock overlooks the inlet to a harbor that provides great shelter for ocean vessels and of course many species of wildlife. The smoke stacks are not a main attraction to the town but can be spotted from many miles away and provide a unique look into Morro Bay's history and currently changing future. The stacks are supposed to be replaced by smaller more efficient stacks, time will tell.
Many people use the harbor to fish, sail, sight see and dine on/ near. That's right you can buy a dinner ticket on the Papagallo and cruise the bay on a boat with live music from local artists and dine on the deck of the boat. The harbor also provides a great spot for local SCUBA divers to explore the ever-changing environment as well as surfers to catch that next great swell. The swell and ever-changing environment are two things to take into consideration if you plan on kayaking the harbor. As the tide changes it will affect your adventure. At low tide the only spots that you can really get around in a kayak are in the main channel but at high tide you can cruise just about anywhere including across and onto the sandbar for a picnic. Depending on the swell on the outside of the breakwater and the tide you may have good visibility or poor visibility which will determine the ocean life you will find.

Location of This Adventure:If you are traveling on the Pacific Coast Highway 1 you can turn off onto Morro Bay Boulevard and follow it down to the Embarcadero. Turn Left and follow the Embarcadero down to the boat launch. Along the way you will find places to rent kayaks or if you have your own, as I do, you can launch at the boat ramp. Generally there are enough kayaks to accommodate any size crowd and at a reasonable cost too. Once you get your gear in the water you can pick your destination and paddle around. On our trip we launched off of the boat ramp and proceeded South to the back bay and followed the docks and boats through town and down to the Natural History Museum. Once we paddled around below the museum we paddled across the channel to the sand bar. The sandbar provides a great spot to get away from everyday worries and just walk around listening to the waves crash on the beach. You will sometimes find wildlife like black tail deer, rabbits and snowy plover.
We continued up the sandbar to the North and once again crossed over the channel to the town side of the bay and paddled back to my truck.

What to Take:Kayak, Personal Floatation Device(PFD) aka known as a life jacket, paddles, sunscreen, hat, sunglasses, something to protect you from the elements if it is windy or foggy, bathing suit, sandals, water and a snack.

What To Do: The ultimate thing to do is to get in your kayak and explore. While many people kayak for exercise they also enjoy the feeling of gliding through the water and experiencing nature from a new perspective. Due to the fact that kayaks don't have a motor to emit noise pollution many forms of wildlife will allow you to get close to them where you can observe and interact with them. If you feel like picnicking you can simply bring a picnic lunch and a beach blanket and land on the sandbar and set your picnic their. Oftentimes, you will see people on the sand dunes of the sand bar playing beach games or walking along the shore. The local tourists also get a hoot out of the kayakers that paddle by the boardwalk and piers so feel free to wave at them.

What NOT To Do:Please be considerate of the boat owners that have their boats moored in the harbor. No matter how you may be feeling that day, you are not a pirate and boarding people's boats will surely having you walking the plank or at least being yelled at. In seriousness though, you do need to respect the private property of the harbor. Another no-no is to cross in front of other vessels including other kayaks and larger boats. Because kayaks sit so low in the water larger boats have trouble seeing you and may run you over, not too good for the kayak or the kayaker. Also, while it is okay to interact with the wildlife it is not okay to antagonize or tease the animals. Seals can be especially territorial and will not take kindly to you splashing in their territory. It is also not okay to take captured game out of fisher men's pots, traps, nets or lines. That is how they make their living and doing so is the same thing as robbing, in fact it is a crime and punishable by law.

*General rule of thumb is, "Be cool."

What To Expect:Expect to be amazed out how different it is to sit in the water on a kayak versus on land or in a boat. You are going to get wet no matter how hard you try to stay dry but really a couple splashes are not a big deal, suck it up and enjoy the rest of the adventure! Expect to find at least 10 different types of animals, at least. If you are new to kayaking or a little bit out of shape expect to feel a bit of a burn the next day. You will be using a lot of muscles that you never knew existed but are glad you found because the trip was definitely worth it.

How Did I fare: I fared quite well actually. I am used to being on a kayak because I like to lake fish off of mine so I was in condition and knew what to expect. The loop we made wasn't too big but it did take about two hours to complete. We didn't stop too much to explore but we did sit in our kayaks and observe the nature. Remember I said that you could expect to see at least 10 species? I saw five different bird species, several types of fish, seals, oysters, clams, rabbit and deer signs on the sand and a sea otter. Those are all things that I noticed passively while paddling along the shores.

How Do I Rank It? I give it a 8 I highly recommend this adventure to people of all ages and abilities. I have seen young children and elderly people alike enjoying the water and have yet to see anybody without a smile out there. So what have you got to lose? Get out there and hit the water!

This week's Central Coast Adventure comes from the center of San Luis Obispo on Cerro San Luis Obispo or as the commonly referred to (incorrectly) Madonna Mountain. This is a pet peeve of mine when people call this mountain Madonna Mountain because that is not the true name of the mountain but because it is owned mostly by the Madonna family and has a giant "M" on the East side people have given it that name. The truth about the "M" is that it was put up there by Mission Prep Highschool. Okay, enough history about the name.

About the Mountain: The mountain is one of the Nine Sisters here on the Central Coast. The Nine Sisters are a chain of nine ancient volcanic cores that stand out from San Luis Obispo all the way out to the Pacific Ocean in Morro Bay. This chain includes Islay Hill, Cerro San Luis Obispo, Bishop's Peak, Chumash Peak, Cerro Remauldo, Hollister Peak, Cerro Cabrillo, Black Hill, Morro Rock and lastly the Davidson Seamount which is about 3,600 feet below the ocean surface. This chain has provided numerous artists and photographers inspiration for their works as well as been an established set of landmarks. Morro Rock has even been referred to as the Gibraltar of the Pacific!

Location of This Adventure: As mentioned, this adventure took me to Cerro San Luis Obispo to ride up the fire road and down Rock Garden and across Lemon Grove to the Marsh Street Exit on Highway 101. I started my ride from home near Cal Poly SLO and rode across town to the trail head at the end of Serrano Heights Drive. There is no parking at this trail head so you have to walk or bike to here to start from this point. There is a parking lot at the Marsh Street exit and many people park there and begin their adventure from there. The peak of this hike hits 1,300 feet above sea level and provides an awesome vista over SLO and the surrounding areas.

What to Take:

For HIKERS - Comfortable hiking clothes, a hat, camera, hiking boots or what ever you are comfortable hiking in, I have seen people up there in sandals, sunglasses, water, your dog on a leash and friends. This is a good social hike to take with friends or man's best friend.

For BIKERS - A good bike with at least front suspension, I prefer full suspension, a helmet, whatever tools you feel comfortable with, a spare tube for those frustrating pinch flats in the Rock Garden, gloves, whatever clothes you feel comfortable riding in, sunglasses, hydration, camera and friends. Once again this is a great social ride or hike and can accomodate friends. An optional idea is to bring a good light and go for a night ride. I haven't done it yet but I have heard it is a good night ride trail too.

For this trip I rode my bike.

What To Do: I started my ride at the Serrano Heights Drive entrance to the openspace and rode up the trail past the water tank and made a right turn into the oaks and followed the trail up to the tree line and cut right. The single track begins here and whips you around the hill to the west side of the mountain. You should have a wire gate at one point with a technical turn immediately after so watch out. I then proceeded to climb up more single track to a fire road then cut up and left. Folow the fire road to the top and you should find a big white stage where you can rest, hang out, picnic or do whatever. If you look to the West, South West direction you see that a road runs out that way follow that and take the single track that goes to the left and follow it down to Rock Garden. If you are unfamiliar with this section take it easy and sit back in the saddle and stay alert and have fun! It's a blast to bomb over the top of the large rocks. You should come back to the beginning of the single track. Take that back down a little ways and go right as soon as you can and follow the new single track.

The new single track will take you through two metal pipe gates. Once you get to the second one take the second left down the hill and follow that trail, you are now on Lemon Grove. This trail should drop you off at the Marsh Street exit parking lot.
*If you want to ride with somebody to make this more clear feel free to get in touch with me at tartagliarealty.com.

The Trail Track of my ride up Cerro San Luis Obispo

What to Expect: Expect to spend about 45 to 60 minutes of uphill riding, depending on your conditioning, followed by a quick descent through a rock garden, hence the name of the first part of the trail, and then a winding single track descent. There is a lot of brush lined singletrack with varietals such as black sage, grease wood, poison oak, poppies, annual grasses, oaks, laurels and other native brushes. On my ride there were many wildflowers out there with lots of colors from peach to red and purple. Since this is a volcanic core the ground you are riding on is mostly rock or decomposed rock so you get some really neat geological features like cuts into lava flows and massive boulders. This ride can be a bit trying in some sections but for the most part it is not too technical. I would recommend this to an intermediate or greater rider.

How Did I fair: Better than my last ride. I didn't have any spills or break any parts although I did come close once due to wet conditions. (Generally I don't ride in the rain but because it wasn't raining it was more like drizzle I went ahead with the ride. Rainy conditions aren't good for the trail incase you're wondering why I don't ride in the rain.) I made the entire ride from start to finish in about 1 hour and 30 minutes and took my time.