Chumash canoe ( Tomol) Santa Barbara CA

Santa Barbara , Southern California is known by the Chumash people and other tribes as the "keepers of the western gate". This is a special place and very beautiful and in some ways reminds me of home. The warmth and the ocean.

I have been blessed to share with the people here and very kindly taken around to special places here and greet the land. Here are pic's of the "Tomol", the only functioing canoe of its type .he canoe( Tomol), was built by the people to be ocean going ten years ago. It is made of red wood and hand crafted according to traditional ways. The crew practices and gets in condition and then once a year travels across the channel to their homeland, on the island of Limuw( santa Cruz Island ) ,where the people were moved when the settlers came.
It is a hard crossing and there can be dangerous currents. I was taken out with the crew to the blessing of the canoe at the Equinox and spent the day as people took turns going out. The paddling is not easy and takes a lot of strength and flexibility and balance. This is a big part of it , to become one with the boat and with the ocean and to be in tune with the crew.
I felt very priveleged to do so. Here are some shots of the day as well as one of me with a surfboard on another day! Yes , finally after 9 mths of no surf and not much ocean I was home again. The surf was small , but glassy and it was great to be with the ocean again.