Thursday November 20, 2014 Jenner CA.
Quack Quack weather
I could hear the rain coming down before I got up this morning and it was still raining when I got up, so I hung around the house this morning.
Until about noon, when the rain stopped for a bit.
I checked the weather and it said rain through the afternoon. I put on my rain pants and headed down to Jenner to kayak for the rest of the day.
I passed through a couple showers on the way driving down there, but when I got to Jenner, the rain had stopped, so I put my boat in the water and headed across the river to Penny Island and decided to head up the river to Muskrat beach.
This is what it looked like as I just cleared Penny Island going up. Those are coots out there ahead of me.
Started to shower
As I was paddling along at my usual slow pace, it started to shower lightly, not enough to be a bother as I had my rain gear on.
I passed by this great blue heron, just before I got to Eagle’s landing. See the rain drops on the water?
Seagull eats coot
I noticed this seagull eating something in the water and went over to check it out, thinking it might be part of a big fish. But no, it was what was left of a coot. The coots take quite a beating from predation down here and maybe some die of natural causes too?
Rain picks up+
Time to put my non waterproof camera away. But, I remembered I had my waterproof back up camera in my pack, so I got that out.
I made it up to Muskrat beach where the rain started to pick up with more and bigger drops. I was looking for a place to get under a tree, so I checked out Dead Deer Gulch to see if I could get out of some of the rain. The only trouble was, the trees were already saturated, so there were big drops of water falling under them.
Dead Deer Gulch, which is a spot under some big trees. Should I go in there with the big water drops from the trees?
I thought, sure, why not, it’s already raining, so a little more water won’t hurt.
Here is my view from under the Dead Deer Gulch trees.
I stayed there just long enough to get the feel of the place and then headed across the river to see if there were any birds along the shoreline.
Most of the birds where hunkered down, as the rain was really picking up now.
I passed by these cormorants by Paddy’s rock.
I continued down along the north shoreline where I ran into these coots and some ducks too, as the rain continues to pick up some more.
After I passed by the coots, I headed back across the river to Penny Island where these seagulls landed by me. This immature one started begging from me. Not sure why as I didn’t have anything for it. I’ve noticed in the past that these immature gulls do a lot of begging, mostly from the older gulls. Notice the rain drops are getting bigger.
The rain turns on even more
By now, the rain is coming down in big drops and much heavier than before.
I’m passing by the old milk barn on Penny Island and thinking I should head on in for the day.
So, I paddled back across the river and pulled under the visitor center for a bit as it provided protection out of the rain.
I didn’t see anyone else out today. I don’t know what’s a matter with people? :O) Seemed like a nice day to me.
I got my boat out of the water and started on home. On the way, just past Monte Rio, the sky let loose and I almost had to pull over as the visibility was so bad, but it was good to get this rain.
At home, I got the heat going and hung up all my gear to dry a bit and hit the couch for a nap.
That was my day.