Summer-Cation Blog Hop: Sharing My Sunshine!

I love the idea of Sheila's Summer-Cation Blog Hop--

"Everywhere I look in Minnesota there is SNOW SNOW SNOW. We are having wind chill warnings weekly, snow storms, and more school closings this year then I remember in my entire life. :shock: Then I go on-line and read other book reviewers in the same boat – unusual cold temperatures, winds, snow in states that normally do not get snow…

"I am calling an emergency Summer-Cation. We need to talk sunshine people!!!! I am looking for people to write posts of a great summer experience (sun is not optional… I repeat sun is not optional! )"

--but I feel like a bit of a fraud participating in it. While so many of you have been bearing up under a winter for the record books, here in Southern California, it's been mostly sunny, dry--we're actually setting records for that, as opposed to snowfall--and pleasantly warm. These photos were taken earlier this winter in Ventura, California, about 35 miles west of where I live. The surf wasn't up very far, but it was up to something...

The beaches out here are more crowded when the calendar actually says it's summer, but other than that, they won't look much different in July than they did in January. And the forecast won't look all that much different, either:

Don't shoot me, I'm just the weather messenger.

It's not so much that this is the land of the Endless Summer--it's that we basically have one season that feels endless because it doesn't vary all that much. It can get very hot--well above 90 degrees--for days at a time from May through October, but it's the proverbial "dry heat"--and having spent nearly 80% of my life in the humidity belt between the Atlantic Ocean and the Mississippi River, I'm here to tell you that the dry heat really is easier to handle. And because our summers really are the dry season--not that our winters are all that wet--we get used to making outdoor plans without even considering a rainy-day backup.

So, my contribution to the Summer-Cation is sharing some of our warm California sun...and a little touristy giveaway. Leave a comment on this post, and after this Blog Hop Weekend ends, I'll choose one commenter at random and send you two refrigerator magnets depicting scenes from Sunny SoCal--hopefully they'll brighten your kitchen, at least, if not your winter!