Crowds head out to bask in heat wave
If your idea of an ideal summer day is an abundance of sun and a shot of dry heat, then the Bay Area came through on all fronts this weekend — complete with a cooling wave predicted as people return to work, whatever that means these days.
Temperatures approached or topped 100 degrees on Sunday in such inland areas as San Ramon, Fairfield and Santa Rosa, while hovering in the low 90s in much of the South Bay. Closer to the Golden Gate, the highs were a cozy 70 degrees in San Francisco and roughly 10 degrees above that in Oakland and Berkeley — conditions made more pleasant over the weekend by a scarcity of fog.
“It’s a bit of an unusual pattern for this point in the summer,” said Dave King, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Monterey. “High pressure and dry air have been sitting over the bay, and that’s strong enough to keep out any marine layer” that brings sunblocking high clouds.
On Monday, temperatures should nudge downward as morning and afternoon fog increases at least a bit. Forecasted highs for most the region the next few days are not above the low 80s, King said.
That cooling is likely to be welcome in places like Walnut Creek, where temperatures on both Saturday and Sunday reached the high 90s.
On Saturday afternoon, with the thermometer at 97 degrees, dozens of people visited the city’s Heather Farm Park to sit under the shade of trees or canopy tents.
“Playground temporarily closed due to COVID19” read a sign near one of several entrances to the swings and slides of the play structure. Children ran instead in the grass nearby as their parents chased after them.
Childish Gambino’s “This is America” blared from the speakers of a white van as Belinda Rollins set napkins on a picnic table. She placed white tablecloths on the tables adorned with pink and blue balloons.
Rollins, the owner of Shantea Creations, an event planning business, drove to Walnut Creek from San Francisco to host her friend’s gender reveal party. She expected about 30 family members and friends to attend, but with masks, she said as she adjusted her own black mask.
“I wouldn’t have done this indoors,” she said.
“No, no no.”
The crowds were smaller several miles away at Larkey Park. A woman sat in the shade next to her young son. A couple stretched on a blanket in the shade and closed their eyes.
A woman walked her young daughter into the park panting.
“Much cooler in the shade,” she said to her daughter before putting her on the ground.
Not everyone lingered in city parks.
Cooler temperatures drew high numbers of visitors to parks closer to the bay, such as Tilden Park above Berkeley. Many people on crowded trails wore masks and tried to observe social distancing, according to general manager Robert Doyle of the East Bay Regional Park District. Others did not.
Park staff also stopped a number of people from taking a dip in lakes — lakes that are closed to swimmers because of concerns about spreading the coronavirus, Doyle said. John King and Sarah Ravani are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. Email: jking@sfchronicle. com, sravani@sfchronicle. com Twitter: @johnking sfchron, @SarRavani