Wednesday October 1, 2014 Fort Bragg CA.
I hung around the cabin near Boonville until noon, then jumped in my van and headed out towards the Pacific ocean and on to the town of Mendocino, where I drove out to the headlands for a break.
This was the view of the ocean from the Mendocino headlands looking west, of course.
From there I headed to the town of Fort Bragg, CA. where I posted my blogs at McDonald’s and then headed to the south harbor launch ramp up the river a bit and put in my boat to some real clam water. I seemed to be the only person here today. Even the harbor had very few people or boats moving around.
I passed this big crane which has been working on the other side of the wall repairing docks. I’m headed down to the main part of the harbor in this picture.
My view as I headed down through the harbor. I noted that the two coast guard boats were gone as I passed their spot. Usually, they’ve been tied up there as I passed, but not today.
I paddled past the main harbor and was headed out near the jetty to the ocean when I spied these two coast guard cutters coming into the harbor from the ocean. At first I didn’t see both boats, but if you look carefully, you can see the bow of the other boat.
I was over in the shallows where the cutters couldn’t go, so I watched them enter the main part of the harbor where I realized the boat on the left was towing the boat on the right. You can see in this picture that they are tied together. A way to tow another boat and still have some control in tight spots.
They went down past me, then unhooked, as I could hear them holler commands. Then both boats gunned their engines with lots of smoke and they turned and headed back out.
They’ve just turned around in this picture.
They were still practicing maneuvering so I left them and continued out to where the jetty was where the river flows into the ocean to have a look.
Shortly, the two cutters came by headed out to sea. First they went real slow, as there is a three mile limit inside the jetty.
Then they got on it and took off fairly fast likely out to sea for a patrol?
I headed back to the main part of the harbor and sat around looking for any action.There wasn’t much action today, other than the cutters.
One of my sitting spots in the Noyo harbor.
I paddled around poking into the side harbors. These are some of the larger fishing boats. Boats this size only go out when there are lots of fish as they are costly to run. Most of the fishing boats were in the harbor today, so I don’t think fishing is any good right now.
When I came out of the side harbor there was this harbor seal sitting in the water as I went by.
And just past that, a great blue heron was sitting on a log and wasn’t going to move, no matter how close I got.
And this king fisher temped me to take it’s picture and actually stayed long enough to get a picture, which they usually don’t do.
I paddled up the river just a short distance to this spot, where I stopped for a bit then headed back to the launch ramp.
I got my boat loaded back on the van, then headed on down the road a short distance to Big River, where I pulled into the parking lot and had some dinner, then watched the sun head on down for the day.
My view from my van looking west under the 101 bridge, just as the sun was headed down for the day. Looking down Big River.
After that, I headed back to the cabin at Boonville where I am now.
Nice day.