There’s a storm brewing tonight. What better time to announce Coastsider has added weather for Montara? How much wetter and colder is Montara than the metropolis to the south?  Now you’ll know. We’re still working out some of the navigation details, but for now, you can access either weather page from the menu bar just below the "Coastsider" banner at the top of the page.

Keep dry.

The National Weather service forecasts high winds and rain for tonight after midnight and Friday morning:

A powerful pacific storm is forecast to move into the San Francisco and Monterey Bay areas thursday night. Strong and potentially damaging southeast winds will develop late Thursday night and continue into friday morning before diminishing friday afternoon. Strongest winds are expected from san francisco southward…Mainly along the coast…Near the bays…And over higher terrain.

San Francisco-Alameda And Contra Costa Counties-Santa Clara County- Coastal Monterey County- Salinas Valley/Interior Monterey County/San Benito County- Santa Cruz County-San Mateo County-

High wind warning from midnight tonight through noon pst friday…

Strong and potentially damaging winds are forecast to develop late tonight. Southeast winds will increase to 20 to 40 mph late tonight with gusts to 60 mph expected by sunrise friday. The strongest winds are expected along the coast…Near San Francisco Bay…Down the Salinas Valley…And over higher terrain late Thursday night and Friday morning. Winds will shift to southwest and diminish friday afternoon…But blustery conditions with will continue through the coming weekend.

Persons in the warning area from San Francisco and Contra Costa Counties south through Monterey County should be prepared for strong gusty winds. Tie down any loose objects or bring them inside. Due to the wet…Saturated ground…Trees will be more susceptible than usual to being felled by the strong winds. Power outages may occur. Drivers of high profile vehicles should use extra caution thursday night and friday morning. The winds will be accompanied by periods of rain…Possibly heavy at times.

There will be training in February and March for volunteer docents and visitor center volunteers to work at Half Moon Bay State Beach with the endangered Snowy Plovers. HMB State Beach is in the process of being designated as critical habitat for the plovers.

There are currently about 20 visitor center volunteers or more and over 60 plover docents.

One of the special activities of the plover docents is to watch for new nests during the breeding season, Apr. 1 through Aug. 31 each year. When nests are found, they erect a fenced ‘exclosure’ around the nest to exclude predators, primarily ravens. They try to do this within hours of finding the nests which requires having docents who are local and can come out to the beach on a few hours’ notice.

There will be training for both the plover docents and the visitor center volunteers coming up in Feb and March. Contact Ranger Nelle for info on the plover docents and Ranger Rose for info on visitor center training at: 726-8819 or 726-8804.

Oil On Ice, a documentary about the ecosystem and people of the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge will be shown this Friday in Half Moon Bay.  The film is being screened by Cunha’s Environmental Science Club this Friday evening, at 7:30, in the Multi-Use room at Cunha Intermediate School.

Oil On Ice looks at the relationships that have existed there for centuries, and how drilling for oil in the area may affect these delicate balances. Dan Newitt, a local resident, and an editor who worked on the film, will be present to discuss the film after the screening.

"Peninsula Politics" is a new blog that plans to provide "insider information, commentary, and a forum for discussion" of local politics.  So far, there are only a few posts since the site was created last Monday, but it’s very promising.

The author prefers to remain anonymous. He, she or they told me, "at this time, we are staying independent and anonymous in order for the site to grow without being dismissed as connected to a particular point of view or for not being connected enough (often the result of the power plays in SMC and SF).  Instead, judge us on our content and if we are able to produce timely, accurate information.  But simply stated, we are concerned residents of the Peninsula who are very interested in our local politics and believe there needs to be an open discussion forum available."

I’ve added a link to Peninsula Politics under "Coastside Bloggers" in the navigation bar. I’m also adding headlines from Peninsula Politics in the navigation bar below local bloggers as an experiment.

Tim Massey, of Half Moon Bay, was strolling hand-in-hand with his wife along a resort beach in Phuket. Suddenly everyone started running.

"He said the first thing that came through his mind was it was a terrorist attack," mother Faye Massey told The Examiner. "Then he saw a wall of water coming toward them."

As Tim Massey, a principal with the investment company Band of Angels, ran to higher ground, he made sure Carol was right behind him. When a wave came crashing down, Massey jumped up onto the back porch of a building and held on. Then suddenly, Carol was nowhere to be found, Faye Massey said.

 

Massey is scouring the hospitals and makeshift morgues of Phuket looking for his lost wife.

Money’s Mushrooms plans to close its farm in Pescadero on Jan. 10.  The farm employs about 150 pickers and 20 supervisors and 60 other employees. Some employees have worked there 25 to 30 years. We broke this story on the Coastside last year, but the Santa Cruz Sentinel tells the ten-year history of the operation and why it has to close.

The San Mateo County Times has an editorial today extolling the deal that John and Clarence Arata made with the Peninsula Open Space Trust (POST).

We applaud POST’s mission, admire the agreement they reached with the Aratas and urge those among    us who have the means to help this worthy group prosper in its goal to keep our open lands open.

We’re fortunate to have neighbors like the Aratas and allies like POST who see the Coastside as something worth preserving, and not as a collection of unexploited opportunities.  The County Times’s excellent article on the Aratas was a rare bit attention for the coast by the Bayside media. And it’s great to see them put their editorial columns behind the preservation of open space on this side of the hill.

A reader has posted an eerie account of his encounter with the surfer who drowned at Montara Beach, shortly before the accident, as a comment on our original story.

He was about 20 feet away when I waved to him and was going to ask him about the water and if there was undertow or dangerous currents because I was thinking about coming back sometime and going in the water.

Be sure to follow the link and read the whole account. Finding stories like this is one reason I started Coastsider.

Vida Verde is a nature education center on Tunitas Creek Road, south of Half Moon Bay. In October, I’d linked to a story about Harley Farms that featured Vida Verde.  Last week, the Chron ran a nice profile of their program.

Teaching kids they have choices about food is at the heart of Vida Verde. Five years ago, founders Shawn Sears and Laura Dickerson were teaching poor kids in rural Mississippi. "There’s a huge disconnect about where your food comes from," says Dickerson, who grew up in Kentucky. She says she never even heard the word "organic" until she turned 18. "I just love to see kids’ surprise when they find out where food comes from—that milk actually comes out of an animal."

After struggling for a couple of years with the challenges of teachers in poor schools, Sears and Dickerson met Jim Sheehan and Nancy Schaub. Social justice advocates from Spokane, Wash., Sheehan and Schaub purchased this farm south of Half Moon Bay, a former llama ranch, in the early ‘90s, and had been seeking the right people to establish an environmental education center.

After seeing "Supersize Me" last night, this really hit home.