An Eagle, Otters, Birds, a Paddle and a New Camera

Thursday January 7, 2016 Jenner CA.

The rain stopped early this morning so it was just overcast as I got it going this morning. As I headed on down to Jenner, the sun popped out on my way out of Guerneville. It looked like it was going to be a nice day and it was.

I was putting my boat in the water when Dan pulled in with his boat and started to unload when Ray pulled in, in his truck and unloaded his boat. Ray and I left Dan at the ramp and headed on down towards the open river’s mouth area.

The sun as out and the wind was down and the river water was muddy from the recent rains.

Here we are paddling down towards the mouth.

Cautious at the open mouth

It was going to low tide so the water was flowing pretty good so we stopped a bit away from the open mouth so as not to get in the current that pulls you out into the ocean. While Ray and I were sitting there Dan pulled up, but didn’t stay long and headed back up the river.

Ray and  I sit here as Dan paddles away headed back up the river.

We sat here and watched the waves break across the river at the open mouth. There was a big swell with lots of big waves breaking today.

Of course there were the usual harbor seals and seagulls resting on the sand.

Can’t paddle onto Penny Island

Eventually we moved out and headed over to Penny Island to see if we could paddle onto the flooded west end, but the water was dropping because of low tide and we couldn’t paddle in, so we started up the island back channel heading up the river which looked like this.

Eagle flies

I knew an eagle was up ahead in a tree on the hillside, as it was there when we put in,  but as we approached, it flew into the air and landed on this big tree on the island.

We continued on up along the south shoreline of the river and stopped here for a break.

River otters show up

Ray said something like what was that as a big splash appeared almost right in front of us. I said, otter maybe and shortly they popped up again headed down river. Here’s two of them, I think there was three of them.

Dan enjoys himself

We moved on up the river and could see Dan across the river sitting on his stool having his hot tea and lunch.

We paddled on up to the muskrat area and sat for awhile taking it easy and enjoying the day.

From there we paddled across the river and paddled down along the shoreline looking for birds.

This great blue heron was intent on getting something there in the weeds. So intent that it ignored our approach.

We continued on down along the north shoreline. Ray was looking for a place to get out for a break, but most of the shoreline looked real muddy as the water level was dropping as the tide was going out.

This snowy egret flew in, in front of us and started fishing in this spot.

Ray found his place to go to shore for a bit. I stayed in my boat. We then headed on in for the day headed down along here.

John’s not home

We took our boats out and headed on home. But I stopped at Ray’s brother’s John’s house to see if he wanted to go to the hardware store to get some pipe parts to finish repairing the spring we worked on in Cazadero the other day.

John wasn’t home, so I headed to the local hardware store, but they didn’t have what I needed so I had to drive further to the closest Home Depot to get what I needed. As long as I was there, I also went into Wal-mart to do some shopping.

A new camera

I headed home and found a package stuck in my gate. My new Sony Camera had arrived which replaces the one I dunked in the river a while back.

That was pretty much my day.