This morning it was an odd scene. To the south - rain and mist, and almost everything obscured under huge cumulo-nimbus clouds. Overhead - clear blue skies, carried by a biting cold wind from the north. To the north, the huge anvil-heads of thunder-storms. Hail, it's hailing now, I run for cover as pieces of ice the size of McD's fountain drink ice rattles down around me. The winds are coming from the southwest again. Makah Bay looks the same as it has every day since I crash-landed here. Big raging waves breaking over it's fields of reefs. Not a friendly looking place...
Something big is happening with the weather and I've no choice but to hunker down and wait. Peanut Butter is almost gone, fruit is finished, ran out of sweets. Still have tuna, KD, cous-cous, lentils and oats. Mussels to feast on for the harvesting at low tide. Freshwater falling from the cliffs around the corner - orange tinted but drinkable. Managed to get a few bags of wood cut up for my little stove before the hail came. I'm eating fresh Mussels tonight my friends, and they're the sweetest, most buttery little beasts I've ever enjoyed. Could be the fresh air though too ;O)
Monday, March 29, 2010
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Sleeping with Slugs
They're green, they're surprisingly fast, they're very hungry, and they're tramping through my bed. Every ten minutes or so I have to stop what I'm doing, search out intruders and do the pinch and flick. Things a guy puts up with to 'go-light'. At this moment - as I lay here under my tarp hiding from the rain - a big one munches on an apple core I tossed him, two more are heading straight for me, tubulous eyes extended, mouth thingies extended, bodies extended in a full-out slither. Just out of reach as of yet but...
Twelve of them, I went out to 'relocate' three of them and found an even dozen! Ooosh!
Now I've got myself spooked over the high tide tonight, coming into a full moon you see. Logs are moving about the beach a surprising amount every night. I lay out an escape route to the highest ground possible, a meager three more feet. A scramble up the scree slope would get me higher but no way to get gear up there. Stormy days and highest high tides suck... I'm being forced higher and higher up the beach as the logs continue to start drifting. Thousands of them, rolling and colliding, and the biggest of them pounding the beach like great battering rams - backing out and slamming in. I can feel the big impacts through the sand at my feet. Powerful things these waves... high tide is at midnight, guess I'm sitting up to keep watch. Full moon in two days.
I spent the day scratching my head looking at a field of dumpers. Between here and the outside I can count six or seven layers of crests at any one moment. It's a 'You got yourself into this now how are you getting yourself out?" moment. Low or high tide the big ones are still out there, always over six feet, the smaller ones over four. High tide the reef is covered but it allows the big ones to reach shore. Low tide I risk being washed back over the reef. Full high tide the beach is awash with a sea of floating logs. Sighhh...
Found a bunch of whale bones yesterday. A jaw, a few vertebrate, and what I think may be the flipper joint bones. Like giant mushrooms. I'm surprised how light whale bone is, I'd expect it to be heavy and strong coming from such a large animal. It's light, and porous, and fiberous. Fun beach-combing here, fishing floats and aerosol cans with japanese writing on them - plastic water bottles by the dozens - blue glass and a beach of stones pocked and dimpled and perforated. I picked a little one up as an amulet. Reality is though that I can't carry anything with me so I limit myself to the tiniest pieces of beach glass that I collect from the beaches I stop at, and which I gift to people I meet. Beach Jewels - the one thing I can take, and enjoy, and not feel like I'm slighting the sea's generous accomodation.
Twelve of them, I went out to 'relocate' three of them and found an even dozen! Ooosh!
Now I've got myself spooked over the high tide tonight, coming into a full moon you see. Logs are moving about the beach a surprising amount every night. I lay out an escape route to the highest ground possible, a meager three more feet. A scramble up the scree slope would get me higher but no way to get gear up there. Stormy days and highest high tides suck... I'm being forced higher and higher up the beach as the logs continue to start drifting. Thousands of them, rolling and colliding, and the biggest of them pounding the beach like great battering rams - backing out and slamming in. I can feel the big impacts through the sand at my feet. Powerful things these waves... high tide is at midnight, guess I'm sitting up to keep watch. Full moon in two days.
I spent the day scratching my head looking at a field of dumpers. Between here and the outside I can count six or seven layers of crests at any one moment. It's a 'You got yourself into this now how are you getting yourself out?" moment. Low or high tide the big ones are still out there, always over six feet, the smaller ones over four. High tide the reef is covered but it allows the big ones to reach shore. Low tide I risk being washed back over the reef. Full high tide the beach is awash with a sea of floating logs. Sighhh...
Found a bunch of whale bones yesterday. A jaw, a few vertebrate, and what I think may be the flipper joint bones. Like giant mushrooms. I'm surprised how light whale bone is, I'd expect it to be heavy and strong coming from such a large animal. It's light, and porous, and fiberous. Fun beach-combing here, fishing floats and aerosol cans with japanese writing on them - plastic water bottles by the dozens - blue glass and a beach of stones pocked and dimpled and perforated. I picked a little one up as an amulet. Reality is though that I can't carry anything with me so I limit myself to the tiniest pieces of beach glass that I collect from the beaches I stop at, and which I gift to people I meet. Beach Jewels - the one thing I can take, and enjoy, and not feel like I'm slighting the sea's generous accomodation.
Saturday, March 27, 2010
The Cape
I lay here under my tarp this morning, it hanging mere inches from my face, wet with condensation, thinking... well maybe another hour. I know very well that the tide changes to a solid flood at 1030 which means I need to be past the Cape really early or really late, but not on the change. I get up at 0800, fiddle enough that I hit the water at 1000. I put myself in 'The Gut' at tide change.
Cannons, crash, boom, bang. It's a very, very big world out here. Waves crash over reefs, a chop is six feet, clapotis is like mountains of water sloshing back in forth in a giant's bathtub. From the bottom of a slosh it's a stretch of the neck to see the top. I choose to follow the coastline side, which though larger, seems more predictably constant than going out towards Tatoosh Island. Stronger flood current to deal with, but for a shorter period of time.
Cape Flattery really is the big world. Massive pillars of stone surround it, grain askew, the slish-slosh of the unbridled Pacific bouncing through a grandiose Pachinko. Sea-lions own this place, and snort their disapproval as they follow me closely. "Hole in the Wall" hmmm... interesting name, and very descriptive, it all goes through here. Deciding to check things out a little closer I roll and lurch my way closer to the shore, passing through the narrowest of slots and over a reef that bared it's teeth at me as I was lifted up and over on a wave. The pulse out here is over-whelming, the seas blood surging with power far beyond anything I've ever experienced before.
12oz Nylon. That's only a hair thicker than the average pair of jeans. That's the only thing between me and all of this unbridled power... I feel it all... everything... the kayak flexes and twists... overwhelming... My hips are being thrown back and forth in the water. My hips are really getting a work-out today.
Once I get around the Cape things feel calmer, the hardest part is over. So I think.
Waatch Point is a triangular reef, sticking out into the Pacific, just before a low valley that divides the Cape from the main part of the Olympic Penninsula. It runs to the Northeast. I'm coming across the outside of reef, giving it's booming big waves a wide birth when a wild Easterly roars out of that low valley, 25 to 30knots, pushing me off-shore and tearing the Makah Bay up into a froth. Boomers everywhere, crests everywhere, trails of spray blowing back off their heads as they roared shoreward in vertical faces. The wind and snot are more than I can handle, can't go into the bay, and after my last experience with off-shore winds I'm pretty damn hesitant to play games with them. Options? The point, two beaches, I choose the closest one and struggle to stay upright while surge after surge tries to surf me wildly in. I didn't even see the reef until I looked down and saw Persephone's bow scraping across it while I'm back-paddling with all my might, my stern held high by the wave. Please don't bite in I'm thinking, and thank-you it didn't. I'm being unceremoniously broached, dragged, scraped, slid, and washed across the entire reef by each wave coming in until finally I'm out of reach of the biggest. I sit there, my paddle trapped under my kayak, feeling like an ass.
Persephone thankfully is virtually unharmed. I have new respect for that nylon.
Friday, March 26, 2010
Neah Bay
Spent day at Makah Tech Center, catching up on emails and the blog. Launched yesterday at 1700 for the short paddle to Koitlah Point. Found a beautiful little sandy beach, hidden behind a reef and great pillars of stone.
Note to self - sandy beaches aren't what they seem around here, they're usually sandy because they're protected by great rocky shelves of reefs.
Waahdah Island, just off Neah Bay is beautiful. Lots of reefs on it's outside and guarding the entrance to Neah Bay. Beware the breakers on the reefs - I decided to have an end of day goof around session on the waves spilling over the reef, got too close and was sucked in to the void as a big wave built.. It crested on top of me and pulled me back and forth over the reef a few times. Two rolls later I managed to get myself upright, and paddle away unhurt - and wiser... I can be such a dummy sometimes.
Neah Bay is a pleasant fishing town on Makah land.
the marina is home base to a fleet that fishes the rough waters of the 20 miles south of the Cape, all the way to the Canadian border. This is big water and hats off to these men and women. Washburn's General Store - 1902, serves this community and the others nearby, including Sekiu.
Looks like a big storm coming in Sunday, better check my weather resources. Looks like a big weather system is getting ready to hammer the coastso I'm going to try and get up really early and make the twenty mile dash around the Cape to Shi Shi Beach before things get ugly. Looks like a 5 hour paddle - all in one go. I can ride the storm out on the other side quite happily while I explore the place. Though it's pretty here I'd really prefer to be stuck on the other side.
Early to bed early to rise. G'nite!
Note to self - sandy beaches aren't what they seem around here, they're usually sandy because they're protected by great rocky shelves of reefs.
Waahdah Island, just off Neah Bay is beautiful. Lots of reefs on it's outside and guarding the entrance to Neah Bay. Beware the breakers on the reefs - I decided to have an end of day goof around session on the waves spilling over the reef, got too close and was sucked in to the void as a big wave built.. It crested on top of me and pulled me back and forth over the reef a few times. Two rolls later I managed to get myself upright, and paddle away unhurt - and wiser... I can be such a dummy sometimes.
Neah Bay is a pleasant fishing town on Makah land.
the marina is home base to a fleet that fishes the rough waters of the 20 miles south of the Cape, all the way to the Canadian border. This is big water and hats off to these men and women. Washburn's General Store - 1902, serves this community and the others nearby, including Sekiu.
Looks like a big storm coming in Sunday, better check my weather resources. Looks like a big weather system is getting ready to hammer the coastso I'm going to try and get up really early and make the twenty mile dash around the Cape to Shi Shi Beach before things get ugly. Looks like a 5 hour paddle - all in one go. I can ride the storm out on the other side quite happily while I explore the place. Though it's pretty here I'd really prefer to be stuck on the other side.
Early to bed early to rise. G'nite!
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Rain Drops and Whale Souls
Rain drops throw up deep green fountains on an opalescent, shimmering sea. Concentric circles seem a tidepool of sea anenomes amongst shimmering fronds of kelp. Every splash of a drop a new story, erasing the last, a new unfrozen frame of time. Little pearls of water skitter across the scene - it's all so alive and fresh.
Landed on a beach, nestled amongst tidepools, in a forest of rock formations, gardens of stone spilling from their flanks. Marked on my chart, a special place, my place, for today.
It's a wonderful paddle today, my stroke feels strong, and precise, and entirely natural. In all it's subtle, and not so subtle variations. I speed across the water, a wake behind me bigger than I've ever made. Persephone's bow slices the water like a sharp knife. This is what paddling a baidarka is about.
A spiritual experience...
There is a spirit at Seal Rock, I felt it roar, shreik and scream. Seal Rock is a monument of an island, visible many miles away, standing upright with steep cliffs on all sides. It's the outermost of a chain of reefs that curve far out into the bay, bisecting it. Across, and closer in, is it's sister, Sail Rock. I paddle towards it in the misty light, a spatter of fine rain on my face. Back-lit by the whiteness of the Strait it's outline is stark, ominous, towering. As I approach, it just keeps getting bigger, and bigger, until I realize the sheer scale of it. Sail Rock is covered in Cormorants and Gulls, squawking and squabbling. Oddly there are none but a single solitary shadow of ?a bird? sitting motionless high on it's flat top. I tap my eyebrow in acknowledgement of it.
As I pass between the two sisters, I bump bottom, a glimpse of eel-grass sliding under me as I pass. Waves suddenly start coming up, big and sharp and the wind starts to blow harsh and bitter, and the skies burst open, pelting me with intense rain... obliterating rain... raindrops so close together they meld into the sea surface, blurring the hard line between sea and sky... tearing everything open.
I become aware... the hair on the back of my neck bristles... there is something here... something powerful... incredibly angry and sorrowful...
At first it feels like I'm being warned. "Don't get too close". I speak back, "My name is Daniel, I'm passing through, please forgive me, I wish your blessings to continue my voyage in safety". Things stay intense and the sea crashes around me... I repeatedly kiss my hand and touch it to the wave crests and apologize... for what I have no idea but I feel the need to...
A Sea Lion surfaces between myself and the Rock, less than twenty feet away and watches me, unmoving, unflinching. A guardian or sentinel? Again I kiss my hand and touch a wave crest and start paddling away. Gives me shivers even now.
Three days later I meet two Makah men who I talk with about the life here, I asked them about Seal Island, "Is there a spririt there? Some kind of legend?"
The answer was brief... "That's where they shot that whale. All kinds of bad stuff there."
You can't make this shit up, and I didn't, and wouldn't dare. First Nation's culture means more to me than my own, they know about life and nature - more than I could ever. Something happened to me out there that day, and I wept as I paddled away from that place... not knowing why.
Now I know...
Landed on a beach, nestled amongst tidepools, in a forest of rock formations, gardens of stone spilling from their flanks. Marked on my chart, a special place, my place, for today.
It's a wonderful paddle today, my stroke feels strong, and precise, and entirely natural. In all it's subtle, and not so subtle variations. I speed across the water, a wake behind me bigger than I've ever made. Persephone's bow slices the water like a sharp knife. This is what paddling a baidarka is about.
A spiritual experience...
There is a spirit at Seal Rock, I felt it roar, shreik and scream. Seal Rock is a monument of an island, visible many miles away, standing upright with steep cliffs on all sides. It's the outermost of a chain of reefs that curve far out into the bay, bisecting it. Across, and closer in, is it's sister, Sail Rock. I paddle towards it in the misty light, a spatter of fine rain on my face. Back-lit by the whiteness of the Strait it's outline is stark, ominous, towering. As I approach, it just keeps getting bigger, and bigger, until I realize the sheer scale of it. Sail Rock is covered in Cormorants and Gulls, squawking and squabbling. Oddly there are none but a single solitary shadow of ?a bird? sitting motionless high on it's flat top. I tap my eyebrow in acknowledgement of it.
As I pass between the two sisters, I bump bottom, a glimpse of eel-grass sliding under me as I pass. Waves suddenly start coming up, big and sharp and the wind starts to blow harsh and bitter, and the skies burst open, pelting me with intense rain... obliterating rain... raindrops so close together they meld into the sea surface, blurring the hard line between sea and sky... tearing everything open.
I become aware... the hair on the back of my neck bristles... there is something here... something powerful... incredibly angry and sorrowful...
At first it feels like I'm being warned. "Don't get too close". I speak back, "My name is Daniel, I'm passing through, please forgive me, I wish your blessings to continue my voyage in safety". Things stay intense and the sea crashes around me... I repeatedly kiss my hand and touch it to the wave crests and apologize... for what I have no idea but I feel the need to...
A Sea Lion surfaces between myself and the Rock, less than twenty feet away and watches me, unmoving, unflinching. A guardian or sentinel? Again I kiss my hand and touch a wave crest and start paddling away. Gives me shivers even now.
Three days later I meet two Makah men who I talk with about the life here, I asked them about Seal Island, "Is there a spririt there? Some kind of legend?"
The answer was brief... "That's where they shot that whale. All kinds of bad stuff there."
You can't make this shit up, and I didn't, and wouldn't dare. First Nation's culture means more to me than my own, they know about life and nature - more than I could ever. Something happened to me out there that day, and I wept as I paddled away from that place... not knowing why.
Now I know...
R&R
Spent a second day in Sekiu so that I could catch up on a bunch of boat maintenance, sewing, sleep, laundry, mail, and eating. Stayed up waaaay to late last night watching 'High Plains Drifter'. I so love this movie - Clint Eastwood at his best.
Shed a bit more gear, will re-pack again tonight and see where I'm at volume-wise. At the moment I'm using a flat bag on the rear deck as my overflow bag when I re-stock groceries and such and would like to reduce it down a bit. Having the weight up high like that isn't doing me any favours. I'm sure there's still more to shed ;O)
Though it's nice having the creature comforts, Persephone is so much lighter in the water with less, and when I'm paddling the weight on regular basis it's very easy to forsake a sleeping bag and tent for a tarp and rain gear. One of these days I'll put up a gear list. Not much, not much at all...
I'm trying to fatten up a bit for the next leg of the trip. Small towns like this have such great little cafes. Home-made spicy tomato soup, and a grilled provolone and swiss cheese sandwich - YUM!
Persephone is on the beach, loaded and ready to go. My belly is full. It's a twenty n.mile paddle to Neah Bay. Should be a pretty paddle, the shoreline keeps getting better the closer I get to the Cape. I'll be getting in at dusk as I'm starting late today. I find with towns it's better to come in quietly in the evening and sleep on the beach beside my girl. No-one bothers me and I can re-supply in the morning before the rabble-rousers are rabbling. Landing on unknown beaches is best done early afternoon - dawn launches these days.
Had a gentleman on the beach this morning tell me the story of his daughter. Very sad... she was young and naive and went off to the big city to work and be on her own. She got in with the wrong crowd, a rough crowd. Things went bad to worse, and she put a gun to her head and shot herself, the first shot passed through her skull but didn't kill her, so she put the gun in her mouth and shot again... this shot took out her eye and a good part of her brain. She lived... poor girl.. poor man... I stood there for an hour after he walked away looking out to the ocean. I realized something about myself. I love the ocean, and the soil, and nature very much - not for the wonder of it all - though it is indeed wonderous... because it is honest, and true... predators are unabashedly predators. The eagle never lies to the fish before it eats it.
The tides come and go, a storm is a storm, a wave is a wave. Night and the moon, day and the Sun.
Possibly we ask too much of life by forcing it to adhere, be defined, predicted, follow patterns that we can understand? Straight lines are so obviously out of place on the sea, the horizon yes, a roofline is obviously man-made many miles away.
I'll be a drifter, unapologetic for who I am, floating alongside the lines of flotsam, a traveler, an observer, a participant, and sometimes a victim. At least the one who victimizes feels no malevolence, doesn't need to and can't. I'll tell the stories of journies and not apologize for who I am, or be anything I'm not... please... tomorrow let me continue to voyage.
Today was a spiritual day... Jim came down from his resort where he was such a hospitable host - Curley's resort if you ever find yourself in Sekiu. Clean sheets, nice people. A pleasure to shake your hand Jim. I did a few rolls for him in the Bay on my way out - a thank-you from a paddler.
Shed a bit more gear, will re-pack again tonight and see where I'm at volume-wise. At the moment I'm using a flat bag on the rear deck as my overflow bag when I re-stock groceries and such and would like to reduce it down a bit. Having the weight up high like that isn't doing me any favours. I'm sure there's still more to shed ;O)
Though it's nice having the creature comforts, Persephone is so much lighter in the water with less, and when I'm paddling the weight on regular basis it's very easy to forsake a sleeping bag and tent for a tarp and rain gear. One of these days I'll put up a gear list. Not much, not much at all...
I'm trying to fatten up a bit for the next leg of the trip. Small towns like this have such great little cafes. Home-made spicy tomato soup, and a grilled provolone and swiss cheese sandwich - YUM!
Persephone is on the beach, loaded and ready to go. My belly is full. It's a twenty n.mile paddle to Neah Bay. Should be a pretty paddle, the shoreline keeps getting better the closer I get to the Cape. I'll be getting in at dusk as I'm starting late today. I find with towns it's better to come in quietly in the evening and sleep on the beach beside my girl. No-one bothers me and I can re-supply in the morning before the rabble-rousers are rabbling. Landing on unknown beaches is best done early afternoon - dawn launches these days.
Had a gentleman on the beach this morning tell me the story of his daughter. Very sad... she was young and naive and went off to the big city to work and be on her own. She got in with the wrong crowd, a rough crowd. Things went bad to worse, and she put a gun to her head and shot herself, the first shot passed through her skull but didn't kill her, so she put the gun in her mouth and shot again... this shot took out her eye and a good part of her brain. She lived... poor girl.. poor man... I stood there for an hour after he walked away looking out to the ocean. I realized something about myself. I love the ocean, and the soil, and nature very much - not for the wonder of it all - though it is indeed wonderous... because it is honest, and true... predators are unabashedly predators. The eagle never lies to the fish before it eats it.
The tides come and go, a storm is a storm, a wave is a wave. Night and the moon, day and the Sun.
Possibly we ask too much of life by forcing it to adhere, be defined, predicted, follow patterns that we can understand? Straight lines are so obviously out of place on the sea, the horizon yes, a roofline is obviously man-made many miles away.
I'll be a drifter, unapologetic for who I am, floating alongside the lines of flotsam, a traveler, an observer, a participant, and sometimes a victim. At least the one who victimizes feels no malevolence, doesn't need to and can't. I'll tell the stories of journies and not apologize for who I am, or be anything I'm not... please... tomorrow let me continue to voyage.
Today was a spiritual day... Jim came down from his resort where he was such a hospitable host - Curley's resort if you ever find yourself in Sekiu. Clean sheets, nice people. A pleasure to shake your hand Jim. I did a few rolls for him in the Bay on my way out - a thank-you from a paddler.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Clallum Bay and Sekiu
Skipped brekkie and launched early. Couldn't believe the water today, flat calm, not a gust of wind for the entire day except an evening puff from behind to carry me into Clallum Bay and over to the little town of Sekiu. Nice quiet little town this time of year. Sportsfishing is it's big industry and come May it goes crazy, or so I'm told.
Gorgeous coastline coming in. Pillar Rock is striking - the size and quantity, and pot-marking of it's cliffs and formations are very different from anything I've seen so far. Tide-pools abound with sea-life, mussels as big as my fist. I stopped here on a little, sandy, east-facing beach for a quick lunch of fats and proteins. Tuna-fish, kippered herring, peanut butter, and chocolate. Sounds awful I know but it's what my body wanted, who am I to argue.
Pysha River would/could be a great place to launch to get out and see this stretch of coast, and has miles of sandy beaches and a protected estuary to get in and out from. The stretch from here to Clallum Bay seems uninhabited and wild - sea-life big and small everywhere. I traveled well off-shore to Pysha, and paddle with porpoise twice - small and black and in no particular hurry to be anywhere. Had a nice off-shore ebb carrying me along the tide-line of drifting flotsam most of the day. Later, as it statrted to change, I was past Pillar Rock and and exploring the coastline. Lots of eddies and flotsam lines to follow. Saw a pair of sea otters today, they first showed up sliding along the surface in a way that I didn't recognize, at least not like seals or river otters.After a few minutes of this one popped his furry little face up in front of me about fifty feet ahead, then a second about fiftenn and looking at the other otter instead of me. I came up right behind him, all of a sudden he turned, his silvery face showing a look of shock and they both ducked under. A very funny moment, one that had me laughing, and grinning now as I write. Really curious animals. I hope they don't remember that men in kayaks just like mine hunted them almost to extinction.
Coming into Clallum Bay a tiny little seal pup who was sitting on a rock waiting for mam to return, splashed into the water and popped his little head out of the water to watch me pass. So cute... There was a rock formation nearby that looked just like a Chia head. Jim at the fishing resort later mentioned the exact same rock, desacribing it the same way and called it 'Little Musolini'. Apparently there's really good Halibut fishing out there. Imagine... me fishing for halibut in a skinny baidarka... bwah ha ha ha ha...
Gorgeous coastline coming in. Pillar Rock is striking - the size and quantity, and pot-marking of it's cliffs and formations are very different from anything I've seen so far. Tide-pools abound with sea-life, mussels as big as my fist. I stopped here on a little, sandy, east-facing beach for a quick lunch of fats and proteins. Tuna-fish, kippered herring, peanut butter, and chocolate. Sounds awful I know but it's what my body wanted, who am I to argue.
Pysha River would/could be a great place to launch to get out and see this stretch of coast, and has miles of sandy beaches and a protected estuary to get in and out from. The stretch from here to Clallum Bay seems uninhabited and wild - sea-life big and small everywhere. I traveled well off-shore to Pysha, and paddle with porpoise twice - small and black and in no particular hurry to be anywhere. Had a nice off-shore ebb carrying me along the tide-line of drifting flotsam most of the day. Later, as it statrted to change, I was past Pillar Rock and and exploring the coastline. Lots of eddies and flotsam lines to follow. Saw a pair of sea otters today, they first showed up sliding along the surface in a way that I didn't recognize, at least not like seals or river otters.After a few minutes of this one popped his furry little face up in front of me about fifty feet ahead, then a second about fiftenn and looking at the other otter instead of me. I came up right behind him, all of a sudden he turned, his silvery face showing a look of shock and they both ducked under. A very funny moment, one that had me laughing, and grinning now as I write. Really curious animals. I hope they don't remember that men in kayaks just like mine hunted them almost to extinction.
Coming into Clallum Bay a tiny little seal pup who was sitting on a rock waiting for mam to return, splashed into the water and popped his little head out of the water to watch me pass. So cute... There was a rock formation nearby that looked just like a Chia head. Jim at the fishing resort later mentioned the exact same rock, desacribing it the same way and called it 'Little Musolini'. Apparently there's really good Halibut fishing out there. Imagine... me fishing for halibut in a skinny baidarka... bwah ha ha ha ha...
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