February, 2026
I’ve talked a little bit about high tide and low tide in these blog posts. During my camping trip back in early 2024 to Pacific Beach State Park, I took pictures of the beach, but the tide never did come in very far during that entire week … there wasn’t a really HIGH high tide. Well, during this trip here in 2026, there IS a high tide, all the way up to the rocks that are right behind my trailer! Let me show you.
First I’ll share two videos I took. Keep in mind that the pilings you see in the videos were supports for a fishing pier that was built in the middle of the little river here. It’s just a little river. This little river exits the woods and then runs along the southern edge of the campground and then out to the ocean. Ordinarily, the little river has lots of dry sand along both sides of it. But today, with this high tide, there is NO sand on either side of it. The ocean is rising!
The tree trunk that is lying in the water at the very beginning of the video below is usually completely surrounded by dry sand, even at the usual height of most high tides. With this higher than normal high tide, the tree trunk was swimming!
Let’s start the video below with a look at Towhee the Trailer. 🙂 Turn your sound on.
From where the ocean waves first break on top of the out-flowing river water, out there just past the pilings, it’s about a third of a mile from that point then up-river to where the waves finish breaking and the white water blends into the river water. It might not seem like 1/3 of a mile, but it is.
I walked a little ways up-river to take the second video below, in order to get a little different angle on the ocean waves as they came in on top of the river. In the video below, you can just see the tops of the pilings. And, again, ordinarily, there’s just a little river here, with lots of dry sand along both sides of it. Hmmm, you’d sure not think that by watching this high tide come in! Those ocean waves came all the way up the river and then continued on a bit past the first curve of the river.
Those videos do tell the tale, but let me share some photos too. The first few photos below show the back of my trailer and the view to the ocean, with the river pilings in the photos, and the photos show the ocean water that now comes all the way up to the rocks right behind my trailer.
I then turned directly to the left and looked upriver. The photo below shows the empty camping sites in that area, and it shows the river, again with salt water on top of the fresh water.
Photo below. And now you can’t even see the river, which is just a stream in the middle out there where the pilings are. The river is still there, still fresh water, still flowing towards the ocean, but now it has several feet of salt water on top of the fresh water, and that salt water is flowing UP-river, it’s flowing inland on top of the fresh water that is flowing OUT-bound.
Then below, turning back to face the ocean, you can again see how much water there is covering the beach that WAS on each side of the little river. And, you can see Towhee the Trailer on the very far right hand side of the photo.
Photos below … I’m back out right behind my trailer, with the water still rising. Thank heavens there wasn’t a storm that blew the water in even higher, smashing the waves against the rocks and spraying my lovely trailer. No wind today, just a really nice HIGH high tide.
Here’s hoping the wind doesn’t change, and I don’t get blown clear out to sea! Yikes!
I’ll pay attention this week and see if there’s a nice LOW tide where I can take some photos and show you the difference. Check in here next Friday for the next episode. Smooth waters everyone. 🙂