Dan and I Shoot the Bull in the Russian River Estuary

Thursday October 29, 2015 Jenner CA.

Dan was on the boat ramp with his boat as I backed down to put my boat in the water at Jenner this morning, so we shot the bull a bit before putting my boat in the water. Dan headed out first towards the river’s mouth area and a bit later I headed on over to Penny Island and paddled down along it’s side to the lower end were I sat in the grass at this spot looking down towards the ocean. Some big waves were still breaking over the rocks down that way, but not like yesterday. The wind seemed to be picking up as I paddled.

I paddled on down towards the mouth area, where the wind seemed to be a bit less.

When a big wave would come in, the birds resting on the sand went airborne for a bit until things settled down then they went back to the sand, sometimes chancing their spots trying to find a dry place. There were mostly seagulls, some cormorants and some brown pelicans.

Dan was over by the shoreline in back of me sitting in his boat as I watched the goings on from this spot.

The brown pelicans where preening away, pushing their big bills around on their bodies.

I was surprised to see as many harbor seals inside the estuary today as most of these ones stay on the ocean side when the mouth of the river is closed. They have to walk over the sand from the ocean to get here.

Dan came up behind me in his boat so we shot the bull some more, then Dan took off. I shouted after him to go check out the flooded Island as I pulled into this spot and watched the pelicans in front of me for a bit, before I turned and headed for the flooded Penny Island myself.

I caught up with Dan again on the island’s flooded grass and we shot the bull some more, before Dan took off and went up the back channel. That’s him in the orange out there.

I stayed and sat around and enjoyed the day for some time in this spot on the flooded Island. That’s the town of Jenner in the background. The wind was blowing a lot more then the weather guy said it would so this spot was one place to hang out, out of the wind.

Eventually, I paddled out into the wind and started up the back channel of the island, mostly just drifting along as the wind had a good push.

I noticed these little flowers along the islands shore and paddled over to check them out. It’s fall, but they looked more like spring.

I made it up to the upper end of Penny Island and sat in this spot, looking up river. The wind was blowing fairly good here, so I decided to not go up that way.

But instead I went over to the upper north side of the island and poked around looking for ways in the flooded part of the island. This great blue heron was sitting there just resting in a spot out of the wind.

I found this spot where I was able to paddle into the island just a bit before getting into heavy brush. This little channel went over to the houses on the island which I knew from walking around on the Island. But there are some willow trees behind me that block the boat access so this was as far as I got.

After that, I decided to head on over to the boat ramp going through some nice windy waves on the way. I only got splashed a couple times over the bow, so all was good.

I had planned go do some shopping for pipe parts for my pipe project, but canceled that for another day.

Instead I pulled my boat out and went on home for a nap. I had planned to do some things in the yard, but in the end just puttered a bit and enjoyed the evening and that was it for me today.