Half Moon Bay

After a short but fairly impressive drive (we were going straight into the wall of oncoming fog) we have arrived at the Half Moon Bay hotel. It's called The Beach House - http://www.beach-house.com/half-moon-bay-hotels.html - and it is very nice. We have a balcony looking out over the harbour, and we managed to spot a few dolphins this evening.

I've just got back from a meal at the Half Moon Bay Brewery - it's a restaurant too, apparently. Half of dad's work colleagues were there as well, somewhat amusingly. I have probably now consumed far too much pork (ribs, to be precise) than is healthy and I have hiccoughs, so I'm going to sleep.

Pictures will follow in the morning, as it was first too foggy and then too dark to take them today.

Big Ser

We went up to Big Ser yesterday. It's about 3 hours drive downwards along the coast - very scenic. Lots of mountains, cliffs, beaches ect.

So, pictures:
These two are the main "beach" bit - very pretty. Blue sea, white sand, ect. Lots of rocks around, too - mostly sedimentary, and so worn into interesting shapes.


There was another cove/beach, but the wind was coming off the sea so strongly that the flying sand made it difficult to walk around here for more than a few minutes without getting blinded.

This was part of the rock between the two coves, and the narrow opening was the only way the sea could get through, so the water levels in this bit fluctuated quite a bit.

I just liked this view because of the waves, though my camera isn't good enough to catch them when they're very high. You can see the fog rolling in in the background - it arrived just after we left, so we were driving back along the cliffs in the mist. Kinda scary.

There seemed to be a large number of natural arches along the cliffs - these are just the ones from the beach that we visited, but there were loads of them on the drive up the coast. These are the best ones - they were quite hard to photograph because of the bright sun coming though vs (relatively) dark rockfaces, but these are the ones that came out the best:




The best bit was trying to actually get photo, as there were large numbers of highly stereotypical americans climbing all over it totally oblivious to the 3 or 4 people with cameras who were trying to get pictures. We had this problem a few times, mostly with people walking or sticking their arms into shots when were were trying to take family photos. Kinda makes me wish I'd brought a gun. Or at least a fly-swatter.

I have some more random ones from Chico and elsewhere, and some I took with Dad's new SLR at the BBQ, but I can't find them now.

I'm back...

...in California!

Photos to follow. I'm here for 6 weeks or so.

Creepy

I'm getting slightly creeped out now. I keep passing random teachers in the corridor, who then turn to me and say well done for my Cambridge offer. Apparently, there's a list up (presumably in the staff room) saying who's got what in the way of Oxbridge offers, since both Mrs Reilly and Mr Bullen-Smith knew and neither of them teach me.

Weird.

In other school-related news, I have just recieved a nice ton of work - Physics 4000-word essay, Biology assessed practical and both a Chemistry and a Maths end-of-unit test have all been announced within two days. Help.

On the plus side, I should be going horseriding with school tomorrow!

Wow

This stupid internet connections is really annoying.

In the time that has passed since I last posted, I've had my Cambridge interview (It was fine, thanks for asking); had my Bristol interview (ditto); nearly been killed after I got a phonecall whilst in the car to say Bristol was going to make me an offer and told my mother, who was driving at the time and nearly swerved off the road; survived what must have been the coldest week of work exp ever (still interesting, though); managed to buy christmas presents for everyone before the day; had relatives (granmother and uncle) over; nearly died of shock after recieving an offer from Cambridge and finally dived back into schoolwork this week.

I really need to get this connection fixed. I also need to get a new phone, since my current one now doesn't tell me when someone rings me and displayed completly wrong amounts of battery.

Does nothing I have work properly?

Worried

Only a few more days to go until my Cambridge Interview :-s

Starting to get just a little bit worried.  Or a bit more worried, anyway. It somehow seems alarmingly closer than it did on Sunday. But I can't do extra work, because I have Physics Coursework (&*%!) to do. So I read New Scientist pile a bit at a time before bed, and browse the science news sites in my not-so-copious spare minutes.

But, other than that, life's not bad. Tiring, and I'm still ill, but I'm surviving. Famous last words, though. . . gimme a few days.

Eugh

I hate being ill. Especially if you can't take any time off school because you need a reference that doesn't say you "skive" regularly. Even though I am genuinely not well. Eugh.

Also, is there some unwritten law that states that every subject has to set an end-of-unit test in the same week? I have a Chemistry test on Friday, a Biology test on Monday and Physics test next friday!

Anyway, apart from the griping...

Actually, there's not much else.

Though I have got a Cambridge Interview :-) 8th December. One of my interviewers is an astrophysicist - not quite sure about that. Though she is the Vice-Mistress of the college as well. And one of my other interviewers (a Vet Bye-fellow) is french. So now I'm terrified she's going to talk to me in French :-S