Santa Barbara - Day 2
August 5th, 2006 by Denis | Comments Closed | Photo Journal »
We woke up to a crisp morning bathed in sunshine and a clear blue sky for an umbrella in the Los Padres National Forest in the Santa Ynez Mountains close to Santa Barbara. We were secretly happy that there were no showers and we get on the road faster and bathe in the ocean later.
Our gracious Santa Barbara hosts prepared a marvelous breakfast spread set up the courtyard where the Santa Barbara SY center is located. We sipped tea by a beautiful fountain surrounded by flowers and ate apple pie for breakfast. We contemplated the newly found fruit ‘Pluot’ (a cross between a Plum and an Apricot), its existence and place in the world. But seriously, we satiated ourselves well before morning meditation at the beautiful Santa Barbara SY center. The Santa Barbara yogis have used their collective artistic talents to transform and ordinary room into a exquisite temple.
The task ahead was to give realizations at the arts and crafts festival at the boardwalk and wharf. Even before we setup the artist selling paintings across from us approached us with a ‘request-for-prayer’ for him to make good business that day – which ended up in his receiving his self-realization. Later he approached us commenting that he had done more business that day than any other in the past two years.
Under palm trees with the deep blue Pacific Ocean as our backdrop we found ourselves sharing our Mother’s divine knowledge and love with passer-bys. They came from all over the world to beautiful Santa Barbara only to walk away with a gift more precious than anything they could have bought at the fair. It was fascinating giving realizations in many languages in a diverse environment with people from Switzerland, Spain ,Germany, England and Mexico.
Behind the scenes there was a big effort to get our laundry done as young Sopan and Radha assisted Auntie Kristine. Twelve loads of laundry later we were ready to hit the waves. We came to a beach with masses of sea weed and crashing waves. The yogis built sand castles, surfed the waves, footsoaked and bonded. As the sun went down we made our way to the other side of the Santa Ynez Mountains.
Ajay prepared a veggie stew with lots of hot peppers – good for the chilly night ahead. After collective meditation we retired earlier, exhausted and satisfied with the exceptional day.
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