Beach Is Packed

The 2010 Bikini Season is off to a fantastic start with a packed beach for the Easter Break.

Cars were parked door handle to door handle for miles north and south of the Main Street Pier on the World's Most Famous Beach, a sight that hasn't been seen this early in the Season for a decade or more.

The National Cheerleader Association and National Dance Alliance held their annual International Championship once again in Daytona Beach, and flower patches of high caliber abounded everywhere. 

Shannon Orrange, of the University of Buffalo Bulls, was featured in Sports Illustrated as Cheerleader of the Week. Here she is during the NCA/NDA Int'l Championship.

What a great beach.

2010 Bikini Season Opening Day Coming Soon!

Every spring, after Bike Week and before Easter, the Day of Days arrives and it's suddenly warm.

Then, like flowers giving forth their blooms, Bikini Wildlife pops up out of the sands of the beach practically overnight.

This Day of Days can't be forecast with any precision. It requires arcane sciences and consultations with various oracles, auguries, signs and prognostications to predict; and even then we may be fooled by false Days of Days like this past Saturday.

A beautiful Saturday, warm and sunny, it brought forth a dense profusion of beach-goers, some of whom ranked at the professional level. But it was a fleeting glimpse, followed by cold rain on Sunday and colder days ahead.

Nevertheless, the Stewards Committee has high confidence that the Official Opening Day of the 2010 Bikini Season will be this Saturday, March 27, 2010.

Bike Week on the Beach

The 69th Annual Bike Week celebration and guzzle-a-thon began Friday and roared into full swng today. While not strictly a beach related even, Bike Week is the first real warm weather event of the year and the herald of coming spring.

We have half a million tourists in town, parading up and down Main Street, gnawing on smoked turkey legs, and casting coin to all and sundry of our starving tourism businesses. They are most welcome.

One thing Bike Week is known for is the care-free attitude towards apparel - or the lack thereof. Despite what we Floridians view as chilly temperatures, the horde of Harley-Davidson enthusiasts freely eschew heavy clothing in favor of items rarely seen outside of Wal-Mart or Frederick's of Hollywood catalogues. This may at first seem a good thing. But not so much after noting that beer bellies and faded tattoos are just as popular.

In other words, the bikini viewing may be hazardous, and viewer discretion is advised.

However, it is posible to discover a little surprise here and there as many of the vendors bring in Bikini Professionals to help hawk their various wares:

Which just lets us know that spring is coming soon. Y'all keep your Puxatawney Phil ground hog thingy.

For our spring barometer, we'll use something a little easier on the eye.

Spring Rises from the Sea

Spring comes at the end of the cruelest month with a warm sunrise out of the sea.

It is a day not marked on any calendar nor forecast with precision. Warm sunrises may come and flicker and fade in sorrow to wintry nights, but there is always a daybreak that is the day of days; there is always a morning forbidding mourning.

You can tell when the day of days has come. The air itself will herald Spring with a hint of warmth in the predawn humidity as if the moisture in the air tingled with a promise that hot house days will come again. The sun will rise in colors of fire, having shed the pale chastity of winter whites. The sea will be softer without frigid nights to sharpen the wave crests.

Winter steals down from the North like a wolf upon the fold, but Spring will always rise from out of the sea.

Winter Reading

Winter on the beach, even in my Beloved Florida, is not a time for swimsuits and water play. Rough winds do shake the curling waves of spray and summer's lease hath already passed its date, to borrow loosely from the Bard. However, dressing warmly and reading a book or two on the beach is a fine activity for the cooler months.

While any book will serve as good beach reading material, the best choices are those old sea tales from the Age of Sail, when the oceans were wide and voyages took years. Why? You're at the beach... the sea is right there... and you went to the beach to get away, right? So why not enjoy an adventure yarn or two that combine all three?

Joseph Conrad, one of my favorite authors, writes some of the best sea tales ever told. Try his collection Tales of the Sea, which includes Conrad classics such as Lord Jim, Heart of Dearkness, and Typhoon.



For those who like stories with a bit of the spooky, look no further than The Terror by Dan Simmons. This fictionalized account of the ill-fated Franklin Expedition to find the fabled Northwest Passage is part carefully researched historical fiction, part mystery, and part horror. I'm not a horror fan, but I couldn't put this book down. Something is out on the ice. You will want to read this one someplace warm (like the beach) with snacks ready to hand.

If high adventure in a historical setting is your cup of tea, the C.S. Forester's Hornblower series is for you. The 11 volume Hornblower series is hands down the best damn sea tales ever told. Follow Horatio Hornblower's Royal Navy career from lowly midshipman to Admiral of the Red during the Napoleonic Wars. Start out with the first in the series, Mr. Midshipman Hornblower. Be sure to have the others handy, as you'll blaze through Hornblower's adventures. Forester is not only a good historian, he's one helluva great storyteller.

No Surfing Today in Florida

No, there is no surfing today in my Beloved Florida. No sir.

This is Day Six of sub-freezing night temperatures. The cat actually wants to come in at night. The sea lays prostrate beneath the cruel heel of bitter air, and the shore birds have abandoned us for God-knows-where. Even the pelicans, both the Brown and the White, are reluctant to get their feet wet.

Fish in the ICW (the Intra-Coastal Waterway, aka The Ditch) can be seen lying on the sandy bottom belly up, writhing feebly. Forget pouncing on them with a cast net; the cast nets are all frozen stiff and fail to spread.

I can acually see my breath inside my surfer apartment in the morning, and it's not because I forgot to brush my teeth.

I admit it has been hard to brush them lately as they are chattering too fast to hit with the brush. I've found the best way is to hold the brush steady and just move my head back and forth.

Any of you folks Up North who would like to experience a Florida Vacation in the convenience of your own home need merely move some of that snow stuff in your driveway out of the way, put out some lawn chairs, and set outside for a spell.
 
Image
 

The Cruelest Month

Be at peace... this isn't a picture of a beach in Florida, although with temperatures below freezing at night and barely creeping above fifty by day, we could very well wake up one morning to find a scene like this.

Notice the brave beachgoer in a parka and the dog frolicking in the background? We're not doing this in my Beloved Florida. No, Sir. First, we have no parkas, excepting of course for those transplants from Up North. Second, my Evil County Government has banned all animals from the beach, so no dogs may frolic here.

There is a long list of things and activities that are banned here on the Most Famous Beach, and a multi-million dollar police force ready to seize upon violators to ticket them or arrest them as the mood strikes said police force. Unfortunately, no one has yet figured out how to ban cold fronts and ticket them or arrest them for invading our beach. Most unfortunate.

January is the cruelest month in Florida, but look at Ipanema Beach in Rio de Janeiro in January:

Winter Beach Image: Richard Slessor 
Ipanema Beach Image

New Year's Eve on the Beach

Without a doubt the best place in the world to attend a New Year's Eve celebration is not Times Square, where temperatures can freeze exposed flesh in minutes... it's in Rio de Janeiro, where temperatures require bikinis.

Why, you may ask, would a blog suppposedly about Floridian Beach Life post about Brazil? The answer is simple: Temperature. Despite God's wisdom in making Florida a narrow peninsula situated in the subtropical belt, temperatures late in December and into January get downright cold. Like ghosts of Reconstruction carpetbaggers, cold fronts from Up North invade our Beloved Florida, robbing the Sun of its warmth and sucking the land dry of vitality. Thus we must turn our eyes further south to the tropical beaches of Brazil to find our vanished summer lifestyle.

Meanwhile, long pants and jackets - the dreaded encumbering outerwear of the Up North folks - are required for most days on the beach. Only the most intrepid surfers venture out, and like Californians in the summer, they do so in full wet suits.

Nevertheless all is not lost. King Neptune warms our beaches through the winter with moderating seabreezes off his watery domains, and there are days when the temps would be considered balmy Up North, and surfers don't need wetsuits.

Spring comes first to Florida, and the 2010 Bikini Season will open around March 1st. We'll let you know how it goes.

Image Source: Rio, Surfer

Blue Moon in Florida

So we're expecting a Blue Moon for New Year's Eve. Blue Moons themselves are rare events - two full moons in a single calendar month - and to have one on New Year's Eve is rarer still. Selecting a suitable image for this post was easy thanks once again to local photographer Paul Bates.

Let me tell you just how cool this Paul Bates fellow is. First, he has Mad Skillz, as you can easily see from his gallery of Florida Images. Second, he provides a great selection of images humbly offered without copyright restrictions for non-commercial purposes like this blog. Third, his philosophy of paying it forward by sharing his art first in trust of reward later says a lot about his character. Très Cool!

Paul's Moon photos capture the essence of a Florida beach at dusk, when the air itself seems velvet and luminous with blue faerie light, and a stroll by the surf is like walking through a half remembered dream. The blues in his Moon photographs are reminiscent of Maxfield Parrish, an early 20th century American painter so renowned for his blues that a color has been named for him.

Well done, Paul!

Christmas on the Beach

Christmas in Florida is a little different than those frigid States Up North (which includes all the others but Hawaii). We have no snow with which to build snowmen, so we make do with the materials at hand. A little carefully shaped sand, some palm frond arms, sunglasses... and voila! A Florida Snow Man. While all you Up North folks trudge through snow, sleet, ice and bitter cold, dressed up like Eskimos, we Floridians head to the beach in shorts and T-shirts for a little sun and surf. We don't care How You Do It Up North... and boy are we glad!

Image Source

Autumn Moon Festival

Off season is terribly boring. The beach is empty, the water gets cold (just 70 degrees now), the weather uncertain.

It's a great time to read a book at the beach if you'd like to be undisturbed.

Better yet, fall is the best time for watching moonrises. When close to the horizon, the magnifying effect of the atmosphere makes the moon seem huge and sometimes tints the moon an unusual color. Forthwith this post inaugurates the first ever Autumn Moon Festival on the Beach. Grab some leftover mooncakes from the Chinese bakery, head down to the beach

Since I'm no photographer, let alone skilled in photographing the moon, I've relied on the skills of Paul Bates for this post's Official Beach Photo.

Off Season Has Arrived

At last that special time of year has come when the crowds retreat from the beach like the outgoing tide.

Or maybe not. The unseasonably warm Indian Summer (record temps over the past couple of weeks) is giving the beach a split personality. One day looks like the middle of summer, the next like the middle of January.

Although the folks who moved here from Up North (which is all of the other states except Hawaii) may complain about lingering upper 80s temps, this reporter does not.

Warm weather means more beach time with minimal clothing. King Neptune's watery domain is also still warm, meaning we enjoy an extended surf and boogeyboard season before breaking out the wetsuits.

It's a great time of the year for a beach cookout: not to hot to make the cooking a chore, and not too cool to make the relaxing miserable. Bring your grill, your osyter pot, and a half bushel of the little river gems. Of course there's always room in the pot for some shrimp.

Soon, however, Indian Summer will fade away. Beachgoers will vanish, leaving the beach to scattered mobs of seabirds and the occasional bundled-up beachcomber.

I love the crowded beach in midsummer, but it can't be denied that an empty beach has its own charm as a wonderously lonely place.

2009 Bikini Season Closing this Weekend

My Devoted Readers (well yes there are none here yet but they can be found here) may recall that each year I courteously post the opening of Bikini Season here in my Beloved Florida.

Now that I am semi-retired, it occurs to me that this valuable Public Service should be expanded. This blog will provide the venue. So without further ado, here's the official 2009 Closing Summary.

Ahem.

2009 Season Summary

Although the Season began slowly due to a poor economy and unpleasant weather in the spring, crowds returned after the Memorial Week Monsoon. Numerous Flower Patches were noted throughout the core beach area. Of thongs there were not a few, and most, fortunately, adorned the kinds of curves the designers had in mind.

An influx of Europeans & Brazilians in July and August provided opportunities for this reporter to test his French and Portuguese.

Native Francophone skepticism towards American attempts to parlay the langlay was overcome by smooth, properly enunciated French. Beers were purchased for this reporter by astonished Francaises. Local gringos offered money for translation services but were politely refused.

The Portuguese was not so good (just a beginner) but Brasileiras are such good sports that they just laughed and bought drinks anyway. Again local gringos were politely refused... more of them, though, this time since flowers from Brazil attract a lot of bees.

The unseasonable autumn warm spell on the World's Most Famous Beach has provided the public with an extended viewing Season. Normally vacant after Labor Day, the beach was packed through early October. Lots of the perpetually welcome Brits were still in attendance up to the Biketoberfest activities. Many of these Brits should consider more frequent visits for appreciative viewers.

Thank Yous and Notes of Appreciation

1.) Many thanks and various blessings are bestowed on The Netherlands for sending over 2 lovely ladies who fearlessly flouted puritannical American views on bikini tops.

2.) Amazed thanks are given to the Beach Patrol for leaving the sunbathers in (1) alone and for chasing off the old creep with the telephoto lens.

3.) Gracious appreciation is offered once again to ZooFou and the busload of beauties from Montreal. Despite scaling back this year's trip to a single bus, the crazy Quebecers demonstrated the value of partying in a country whose language you neither speak, understand, nor care to.

4.) A Note of Appreciation is issued to whomever organized the flash mob skinny dipping party for a certain Midwest college. Well done.

5.) A Note of Appreciation is issued to certain professional ladies who drew so much business to the umbrella and food wagon stands, proving once again that judiciously issued free lounge chairs for the summer are a wise investment.

Notes of Caution

1.) To the lady from New Jersey: There will be No free ice cream from me in exchange for no top on you. I admire your enthusiasm, but there is a certain minimum standard in such exchanges.

2.) Rare is the man who can sport a speedo. Do-lappers are specifically excluded.

3.) To the parade of gold chain wearing loud fellows from Up North: No, I do not care to carry on a conversation with you about all the women on the beach. It's the beach; they're supposed to be in bikinis (well, most of them anyway). Courteous viewers observe a certain etiquette.

4.) To all the thugnecks: Women are not attracted to your monster trucks playing hip-hop at thunderous levels... no matter how many times you drive by a Flower Patch. I know this because they talk about you with me after you leave.

5.) To certain ladies who think that "showing me something" will get you something for free. 20+ years of beach living makes one somewhat jaded to 99% of the female beach-going public. Unless you meet the standards and level of cool mentioned in the Note of Appreciation number (5) above... the answer will be 'no'. A gracious 'no', but a firm 'no'.

The 2009 Bikini Season is now Officially Closed. We invite the Hotties of the World and attendent Bikinilife Observers to gather again next year on the World's Most Famous Beach. Au Revoir!

End of report.

Why is This The Sea?

Okay, okay. So in The Obligatory "What's This All About" Post #1, I wrote that this blog would not be about surfing. Yet here we are, on post #2, with a surf photo, mention of a great surfer movie, and link to a video about said surfer epic.

What's going on?

Simply put, everything begins and ends with the Sea. I could wax poetic about the religious, scientific, and metaphysic aspects of the Sea, but nearly any work by Joseph Conrad would do a better job. Suffice it to say that the Sea is pretty big stuff and worthy of thoughful reflection.

The sea is the reason why we go to the beach. A beach without the sea is a desert: when's the last time you got amped to go to the desert? The sheer pleasure of sitting on the beach all day, doing absolutely nothing but watching the sea is a narcotic all its own. Surfing, sailing, beachcombing, any of these can change your life. All you need is to embrace the Sea.

So without further ado, watch the clip below and reflect on the lyrics from the Waterboys. Whatever your troubles may have been, that was the River. This is the Sea.

Watch The Video

These things you keep

You'd better throw them away.

You wanna turn your back

On your soulless days.

Once you were tethered

And now you are free.

Once you were tethered

Well, now you are free.

That was the River;

This is the Sea.

Now if you're feelin' weary,

If you've been alone too long,

Maybe you've been suffering from

A few too many

Plans that have gone wrong.

And you're trying to remember

How fine your life used to be,

Running around, banging your drum

Like it's 1973.

Well, that was the River;

This is the Sea.

Now you say you've got trouble.

You say you've got pain.

You say've got nothing left to believe in,

Nothing to hold onto,

Nothing to trust,

Nothing but chains.

You're scouring your conscience,

Raking through your memories,

Scouring your conscience,

Raking through your memories.

But that was the River.

This is the Sea.

Now I can see you wavering

As you try to decide.

You've got a war in your head,

And it's tearing you up inside.

You're trying to make sense

Of something that you just can't see,

Trying to make sense now

And you know you once held the key.

But that was the River

And this is the Sea!

Now I hear there's a train,

It's coming on down the line,

It's yours if you hurry,

You've got still enough time.

And you don't need no ticket.

And you don't pay no fee.

No, you don't need no ticket;

You don't pay no fee.

Because that was the River;

And this is the Sea.

Behold the Sea!

-Written by Mike Scott, The Waterboys, 1985

The Obligatory "What's This All About" Post #1

The first post is always the most difficult, isn't it?
Like the foundation stone for the Great Pyramid, it sets the the direction and tone for all the content to follow... despite the fact it will be shortly be buried, archived, and forgotten.
So to get this out of the way quickly, I resort to the bulleted list:

• This blog is focused on the "beach lifestyle" as enjoyed on the World's Most Famous Beach. There will be posts about the peculiar things that make Daytona Beach a legend (no matter how decrepit it has become). There will be odd stories, unbelievable reports, and various shenanigans.

• It is not another surfer blog. Although surfing is big here, the surf is not. There are blogs managed by real surfers living near real surf. Visit them if you want surfing content.
  
  
• There will not be any nonsense posted about turtles, seabirds, dolphins, or sundry other critters. Critters are nice to see but I don't give a particular damn about them.

• No lighthouses. I once rented a beachfront house for a year. Inside was a framed engraved plaque of a poem by some Improvement Society lady about the Ponce Light (in the first person voice of the lighthouse, no less). It was not a good poem. The plaque was bolted to the wall. No mas, mi amigo, no mas.

• Posts and comments about the odd characters, strange happenings, and fond memories of yore are most welcome.

• Although Bikini Season will be a frequent topic, formalized with Official Annual Opening and Closing Ceremonies, Bikini Season will not be a prurient topic. Bikini Season will be treated with the reverence it deserves: the time and location where women from around the world enjoy the freedom of coming to the beach to share God's wondrous creative powers with the appreciative public. Peepers, gawkers, and spankers not welcome.

I'm bored, so that about wraps it up.