Saturday, Jan. 12, 2013, Jenner, CA.
A hike was in order for the day.
I was thinking of kayaking at Monte Rio today, so I drove down there and looked at the boat launch area. It wasn’t too bad, but a little muddy. Since it looked like the wind was down today, I drove on to Jenner, instead. I put my boat in the water just before noon and headed across to Penny Island. It was fairly calm today, so I paddled up the river to Eagle’s Landing, which is about a half mile up the river. It was real nice out, so I took my time. It was also fairly clear today, so it would be a good day to go for a hike up the ridge and do some sight seeing and get a little exercise.
Eagle’s Landing area for a hike up the hill.
I put ashore at Eagle’s landing and tied my kayak to a bush, before heading up the hill. I also call this area Poison Oak Alley as there is a lot of that up in this area, but, lucky me, the stuff doesn’t bother me much. There is so much of it, it’s hard to avoid it.
Below, you can see the trail I took just as I started up the hill.
I was rewarded right away, with these real nice lush mushrooms, in the photo below.
A hike up to the ridgeback for some pictures.
I first hiked up to the ridge lookout and spent a little time. There is a good view of Jenner from here, so I took some photos.
Below, you can see Penny Island and part of Jenner.
Another shot of Penny Island and a couple of kayaks, below.
Might as well go over to the rock of the face of the old Indian woman.
After spending some time there, I decided as long as it was a nice day and I was already up the hill, I’d take the trail over to the Rock of the face of the old Indian lady.
Below is what that rock looked like as I was approaching it.
The rock is a good vantage point and a good place to take a break, so I did.
Below, is a picture looking down at he river from the rock toward the highway one bridge.
Phew, this hiking wears one out.
I stayed at that rock for quite awhile, then decided to go all the way to the hill top to check out the ocean view. As I was going up the hill, I got tired and plopped down and took the picture below, as you can see from my feet.
I’m headed for the mound on the ridge for the view.
I sat there for just a couple minutes, then continued on, heading for this mound of rocks at the hill top.
As I approached the little rock mound, below is how it looked. This is looking across the rock mound.
I was in their territory for sure.
Now, this mound commands quite the view. There were a lot of deer scattered around the hill top eating grass and they were all watching me, as I was in there territory.
Looking west out over the Pacific ocean, below is what it looked like looking toward the sun.
And looking south, toward Bodega Bay, out over the ocean, it looked like the photo below.
I needed to get back down the hill before it got dark on me.
I spent some time on this mound and decided I better be on my way by four PM, if I wanted to get back before dark.
As I retraced my way back, I took the below photo of Jenner again as the sun was going down.
I was down the hill fairly fast, since it was all down hill and put my boat back in the water and headed back in.
Might as well continue kayaking as the weather was so nice.
When I approached Penny Island, I decided, what the hay, I might as well head down the island back channel and go down to the rivers mouth and check that out too, as the weather was still fairly nice for that time of day. I saw the sea lion out hunting fish. He came up fairly close to me, which always causes a bit of concern on my part, as they could do a lot of damage to me, even, just by accident. I tried to get a picture, but he was too fast. As I was going by the River’s End restaurant, the sea lion surfaced several times very close to me, but didn’t stay on the surface long enough for me to get a picture of it. Usually, if there are sea lions in the river, there are also big fish coming up the river to do their egg laying thing, but I didn’t see any fish being taken.
And one last photo for the day of the nice Jenner sunset.
It was almost dark when I pulled off the river and the sunset was fairly nice, so I took this one last photo from near the visitor’s center.
As you can see below, the sunset was fairly nice.
I was off the river around five thirty today and had a great time.