December 13, 2010 Monday

Bolinas	Patch
9:40 am to 10:50 am	2', sets to 3'
Mid dropping tide	Slight offshore breeze to no wind
High overcast and high fog	OK session

Work on the seawall was the story today. Big construction and earth moving equipment and the appropriate crew of people were gathered at the top of the ramp when I arrived this morning. From the cars I could tell that the regulars were already in the water: Mary, Marty, David who rides the Becker board, Jaime the starving artist cartoonist, Hans and standup surfers Frank and Russ. The construction crew had placed sheets of plywood against both sides of the ramp, and the “jefes” were standing on the seawall discussing the project.

“What are you guys going to do?” I asked.

“Fortify the wall,” one jefe responded. “You can see that the wall is slowly giving way.”

“So what are you going to do with the naked woman?” Years ago someone had sculpted a figure of a nude stretch over the top of one of the sandstone boulders. It has become a landmark for all the Bolinas regulars.

“Don’t worry, we’ll protect that one.”

I walked to the Patch to take some photos of Mary, Hans, Russ and Frank. On my way back, I had to walk up against the left wall because the lead jefe was slowly driving a massive tractor-tread backhoe down the ramp. They were getting ready to move some rocks around. I went up to the overlook above the Groin. While taking some photos a huge rock carrying dump truck arrived, turned up the road to the overlook and backed down the ramp to dump its load of boulders. That’s it in the above photo. After suiting up and with board in hand I had to wait patiently at the top of the ramp until the massive backhoe had finished grabbing a boulder out of the truck, turning and dropping it on the sand in front of the north side of the ramp. Seeing my chance I dashed up the steps and across the seawall to get to the Patch.

Out in the water and despite my poor hearing and earplugs I could hear the constant groan of the backhoe and the clash of tumbling boulders being dropped at the base of the seawall.

“What’s the best way to get around the machinery?” Mary asked.

“Go across the top of the seawall and wait at the top of the stairs for an opening to dash up the ramp.”

Around eleven I thought about going in and looked to see what was happening with the construction project. By now a big bulldozer for pushing around the sand had joined in. The tractors had stopped. Both the backhoe and bulldozer were parked on the sand at the base of the ramp.

“It must be lunch time,” I thought. “But why stop? They have to get this done while the tide is low.”

Three guys with push brooms were sweeping up the ramp as I walked by after my session.

“Hey are you guys through already?” I asked the guy sweeping up the lower part of the ramp.

“I don’t know! I’m here to clean up someone else’s mess.”

A streak of black fluid three feet wide stretched from the top of the ramp to the bottom. The sweeping crew had spread an absorbent that looked like cat litter on the fluid and were now sweeping it up. At the top of the ramp were a fire truck, three county pickup trucks, a sheriff’s car and one large purple dump truck still loaded with rocks. Lots of people were standing around: the sheriff, three truck drivers, the whole construction crew and five Marin county workmen with shovels, brooms and bags of cat litter. Another driver sat in his truck waiting his turn to dump his load; he fired up his engine, made the difficult maneuver to turn the truck around and slowly drove off with its load still in place. Obviously one of the trucks had spilled something and the project had come to a halt.

Marty and I went into town for a coffee and when we returned the same crowd was still standing around. We walked down the ramp to get a better look and to check the surf. We talked to a nervous truck driver who was standing in front of the rocks that were already dumped. He was a hard-ass character that looked like a member of the Hell’s Angels, long thinning hair, large graying beard, cut-off sleeves and tattooed filled arms.

“What happened?”

“Backing down the ramp my truck hung up on the hump at the top. It broke the line that runs from one tank to the other and diesel fuel flowed out. I pulled the truck up to the street and now I’m stranded until they repair the fuel line. And then I won’t know if I have enough fuel left to get out of here.” His truck had two large round cylinder tanks located under the doors of the cab with a line that runs between them. It was this line that broke.

“Hey we overheard that the contractor didn’t have a permit.”

“I don’t know about that. They called me to haul some rocks so here I am.”

The backhoe driver and a companion from the work crew stood nearby. Marty and I overheard a piece of their conversation.

“Can you imagine that? You would think that the general contractor would had taken care of the permit.”

The surf was ok, mellow small waves at the Patch, glassy conditions and only three of us out there. But the real story of today was the mess at the ramp. A truck had spilled a tank full of diesel fuel that ran down the ramp and some general contractor had just dump tons on rocks on the beach without a permit. It was just another interesting morning in beautiful Marin.