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| Balboa Peninsula Printable Map |
Showing posts with label Newport Beach. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Newport Beach. Show all posts
The Wedge. September 7 2015 (RAW FOOTAGE)
This is just a really awesome video from of surfers and body boarders at The Wedge in Newport Beach.
What backpack should I buy for day-hiking?
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| Tahoe Backpack by Granite Rocx |
If you’re looking for an inexpensive multi-purpose backpack
for hiking, there are a couple key questions that I would consider:
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Does it have waste strap and a chest strap?
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Does it have low-profile design?
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Does the pack fit my torso length?
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Does it have plenty of extra compartments for
easy access to your gear?
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Is it made from a high quality, lightweight, ‘ripstop’
material?
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Can you attach additional gear to the outside?
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How long is your intended hike?
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Can I afford it?
If someone asked me for a recommendation for a day-pack, my
first choice would be the Tahoe backpack made by a company called Granite Rocx.
For 65$, no one makes a comparable pack with anywhere near the number of
features as the Tahoe. It has an adjustable waste and chest strap. It has a low profile design that keeps the
pack close to your back when you hike. It has 3 large compartments with a ton
of extra smaller pockets for gear access. It’s made from ripstop nylon. It has
a compression buckle to attach a tent, a nylon gear stash on the outside of the
backpack for holding your beach towel and it has a insulated detachable cooler that
can hold 12 beers. The Tahoe also has a
feature where you can unzip the main compartment and strap a beach chair to the
backpack. I’ve never seen another pack with that feature. This is the best
beach backpack on the market at any price point.
I’ve hiked with a ton of backpacks and this is the first
pack I’ve ever used that satisfies the medium between the too small camelback
type backpacks and the over-sized internal frame backpacks that hurt my
shoulders. Last week, I took my Tahoe on a 17 mile round-trip up Mount Wilson in Southern California. It was the first hike I've done in months where I didn't have shoulder pains. You can order it directly from Granite Rocx website or through
Amazon for 65$. I’m not the only person who loves this pack, it currently has a
perfect 5/5 rating from users on Amazon. Hope this post was helpful on your quest for a new day-pack.
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| Granite Rocx Tahoe Backpack |
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| Newport Beach Picnic |
Fairview Park. Costa Mesa
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| Fairview Park. Costa Mesa |
Fairview park is a great little park in Costa Mesa. It’s
situated on a bluff overlooking the 'not so scenic' Santa Ana River. There is a wide flat gravel trail that
loops around the perimeter of the park which is shared by hikers, families and cyclists.
Fairview Park is also the “secret” mountain biking spot where locals come to hit the jumps
and the makeshift dirt trails that snake through the middle of the park. The mountain bikes trails and the dirt jumps are
not maintained by the city, so you probably want to scout the trails before you
do any hardcore riding. The jumps can get washed out after any heavy rain.
Fairview park isn’t very large, probably less than 2 miles
in circumference, but you can turn your trip into a longer loop by combining
Talbert Park, Canyon Park and Fairview Park.
If you’re looking for an even longer ride, you can access the Santa Ana
River Trail from the park and ride 30 miles north to
Crazy big waves at the Wedge in Newport Beach
I love watching people get absolutely destroyed at The Wedge in Newport Beach. In September of 2011, the waves were ridiculous. My only complaint about this video is that it cuts off just as that 20 foot wave was about to crash on the idiot who was kayaking. If you read the comments under the video, someone talks about how the police gave him a huge ticket for reckless endangerment. After you watch the video, you can check out my skim-boarding pictures from that same week.
Just a photo from today at the Wedge
This kid was killing it today at the wedge in Newport Beach. The waves weren't huge, but they were getting at least one large set every hour. It was fun just to sit and take pictures.
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| Sunset at Balboa Beach |
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| Balboa, Newport Beach |
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| Balboa Pier, Newport Beach |
A Foggy Day on Balboa Peninsula in Newport Beach
This is just a test video I made with my new Canon T2i. I shot it with the 18-55 kit lense in 1080p at 30 frames per second on auto exposure mode. I edited and exported the video to Youtube using a great program called Power Director. The song is a Sparks cover performed by Erin Merle.
Skimboarding on Balboa Peninsula in Newport Beach
The Wedge, Newport Beach
There was a south swell today at the wedge in Newport Beach. For anyone unfamiliar with the wedge, this picture pretty well sums up what you can expect to see when its really pumping. The wedge is an awesome and unpredictable display of blond haired teenagers vs nature. Its widely considered to be the best bodysurfing beach in America. Sit for an hour or two on a day like today, and you are pretty much guaranteed to see someone get absolutely destroyed. Often, the ambulances park right along side the beach waiting to cart the unlucky ones away. On the weekends, the news vans and the crowds will be there too, watching “safely” from the beach. Every once in a while, a rogue wave will roll in our of nowhere and smash the crowd too. Tensions between the swimmers can run high in the water. People have died surfing the wedge. Although Balboa Peninsula is one of the safest and nicest areas in Southern California, its not uncommon to see screaming match or even the occasional fist fight at the wedge. I’ve dared to get in the water during a south swell two or three times, but I usually wont attempt any wave over ten feet. The fear of sustaining a serious injury without health insurance usually keeps me on the beach. I’d rather be snapping pictures than snapping my neck .
Back Bay, Newport Beach
We finally got around to biking the back bay loop in Newport Beach today. We started on Balboa Peninsula and took the Ferry across to Balboa Island for 1.25$ each. You pedal across the Island and cross the bridge on Marine Avenue. Make an immediate left onto Bayside and it’ll take you across Pacific Coast highway. There is small pedestrian bridge that crosses the harbor onto the trail on Backbay drive. It doesn’t show up on Google maps unless you zoom all the way in on it. Backbay Drive winds through the Newport Beach ecological preserve and wetlands. Its a nice paved trail and there were a ton of people bikng and jogging and we never saw a single car. Once we hit the end of the wetlands, we decided to keep biking North along the San Diego Creek bike trail just to see where it went. The Creek Trail is paved and well maintained, but its kind of drab compared to the Newport Wetlands area and Balboa Island. At 12 miles in, we took a water break at the Harvard Athletic Park in Irvine. We decided to turn around and head back to Balboa Island for dinner and we ended up fighting a nasty headwind. Thankfully, the bike trail is almost completely flat, because it literally felt like I was dragging an anchor on the ride home due to the wind. We opted to take the identical return route and avoid the loop on the back bay to save some time and avoid the hill. At the Village inn on Balboa Island, we ate dinner, drank margaritas and watched Watched Louisville beat Michigan State to a pulp in the sweet sixteen game. We ended up doing a little over 23 miles round-trip, but it felt worse because of the headwind. Next time I bike the Newport back bay, I’m going to head a little further down San Diego Creek in Irvine and do the Orange County zoo in Irvine Regional Park.
