Monday December 14, 2015 Jenner CA.
Clean up
They were cleaning up the parking lot that got flooded the other day as I arrived at Jenner this morning. There were some state maintenance people and some volunteers from the visitor center working away.
I asked one of the ladies how the visitor center faired as it got flooded too. She just shook her head and said, not good. Other people were in there working on that.
Paddled over to Penny Island
I put my boat in the water to a fairly windy day, so I headed over to Penny Island’s upper end and sat in the little channel which was mostly out of the wind.
With the wind blowing there was a chill in the air, so I couldn’t make up my mind which was to paddle today. But I finally decided to head on up to the muskrat area up the river about a mile, so I paddled across the river to the south shoreline and started up that way looking for spots to stop briefly along the way.
I stopped in this spot for a bit. The river water was a bit discolored from the recent rains that have increased the river’s flow a bit.
Chilly wind
I made it up to the muskrat area, but the wind was blowing directly into the shoreline there, so I didn’t stay long and headed across the river to the north side where it looked like the wind was less, but it wasn’t.
I paddled along the north shoreline headed down the river. These birds were resting just below Paddy’s rock. Mostly seagulls with a cormorant too.
The wind was stronger on this side of the river, so I crossed back over to the south shoreline and continued on down the river.
As I neared the boat ramp, I was thinking of pulling out as it was a bit chilly. These mud hens were feeding on underwater plants.
Wind was dying down a bit
But looking down river towards the mouth area, it looked like the wind might be dying down a bit, so I paddled down along the north side of Penny island which looked like this.
I stopped in this spot on Penny Island for a spell before crossing the river to get down to the open river’s mouth area which you can see down that way.
River’s mouth is open
The ocean was real rough today so there were a lot of big waves crashing on the rocks and the jetty. Lots of birds were resting on the beach.
There were quite a few brown pelicans on the sand taking it easy with some seagulls.
And harbor seals too.
John makes a good point
I hung around the mouth area watching things and then crossed over to John’s house to see how he was making out cleaning up his yard and his garage that had flooded. He had his yard pretty much cleaned up and was still working on his garage which he said was a total mess. John says this flood should never have happened if the people in control of the mouth had a plan B for backup when their plan A didn’t work out. I have to agree with him on that for as far as I know, there is no plan B or C.
I lift John and started paddling back up the river headed to the boat ramp. I passed by this great blue heron, just resting by the side of the river.
The parking lot was pretty much cleaned up as I took my boat out of the water and went on home for the day.
Chilly at home too
It was rather cool when I got home as the sun was already behind the mountain, so I stayed in the nice warm house for the rest of the day and that was my day.
Poor John…