Boat Trip in Grays Harbor Washington Part II

On my last post, we were out on the beautiful Pacific Ocean and Grays Harbor in Washington State.  Such an amazing place with tons of marine mammals, birds, ships, and beautiful views!  You can Revisit Part I by clicking that link!

In the meantime, here's a little video I created (my first really) to memorialize the wonderful trip and the amazing time we had watching the birds out in the open ocean.  I promise there is no annoying music. 

We had so much fun sitting there watching all the birds come in and fight for the fish.  Sabrina and I were just snapping away the entire time!  Let me tell you, it is HARD to take video on a boat in the ocean, even though it was a relatively calm day!

And now for the pictures:

Look at all the fish!  Anyone know what kind?

Pelicans coming for a landing in black and white

There were so many birds out there!  I love this shot which is a good illustration of pelican pouches in various states.

And in this guys pouch, you can actually see the outline of the fish he's swallowing!

I'm kind of fascinated with pelicans.  They are so prehistoric looking!  If you look carefully, you can see the head of a fish that the guy in the front is scooping up. 

And then off they flew!

But soon it was time to go back into the harbor before we ran out of gas.  Lee wanted to take me under the bridge we drove over, which can only be done when the tide is high, which is evidenced in the next picture by the waves breaking. 

And under we go!  This bridge is actually pretty close to Sabrina and Lee's house.  And it's right next to Brady's Oysters, where we usually stop for some delectable ocean delights. Last year, we witnessed a bad accident, so it's no longer Angela's favorite highway, that's for sure.  

After we had cruised around under the bridge, we headed back to the marina.  But first, I had a question.  Periodically there are these towers in the water.  They are a single pole with a ladder going up to a basket on the top.  I wanted to know what they were for.  

I guess I really had two questions because I also wanted to know if I could climb up one.  I was DYING to climb up one.  Verna seconded my idea enthusiastically.  Lee?  Not so enthusiastic.  

Last time I was in Washington Lee got pulled over because us ladies were sitting in lawn chairs in the back of the truck while we were riding on the beach.  He was really not excited to get in trouble again.  But how could he resist us???

And in a MASTERFUL show of boat piloting...errrr...driving....errr whatever, he pulled that boat next to the ladder and up we climbed!  Verna went first while Sabrina and I made sure the boat didn't rub the ladder.  And then up I went!

Thank you Sabrina for the lovely shot of my ass, and Angela for the screen grab and threat to put it on Facebook!  Beat you to it!!

Let me tell you, those rungs HURT and they were covered with bird poop.  But it was WORTH IT!  Verna and I were KING OF THE WORLD!  I believe Sabrina has a photo of us, but I don't have it yet.  We wanted Lee to pull the boat away so you could see how high up we were and how far out in the water we were, but he was a bit nervous.  

And then we saw the Coast Guard helicopter take off and we thought we were flat busted!  Verna shimmied down the ladder, but then became a bit indecisive about how exactly to get back on the boat.  So of course she had one hand and foot on the ladder, one hand and foot on the boat... Lee was getting a little nervous about that helicopter and let his attention waver for a second and Verna looked like a big X!  We thought she was going to fall in for sure, but Lee corrected quickly.  

A little too much, to be honest, because then she got squished between the boat and the ladder!  I was so worried, but I honestly couldn't help laughing somewhat hysterically!  It was like a freaking cartoon!

But soon she was safely on the boat, so I went down the ladder as fast as I could and jumped on board so Lee could put some space between us and the tower before we got arrested. 

Luckily, the Coast Guard was otherwise occupied, picking up a boarding party off of one of the huge ships. 

It was really cool to see them winching men up one after the other. 

But we soon saw another menacing sight...a Coast Guard ship heading our way! And yes, that little tower to your right of the boat is very similar to what we climbed up. 

But they were just going back to base and we all breathed another sigh of relief!  And then we headed back in as well. 

I love this sequence of this pelican landing on the breakwater.  

Not just for the graceful beauty of these birds...

 But also because there was one pelican who didn't want any more birds landing!

 It's the old man pelican equivalent to "Get off my lawn!!"  Haha!

 Pelican says "I do what I want!"

Cormorants!  And I believe you can see the crest on the double-crested cormorant on the bottom left!

And on these guys too! Kind of. 

 Another great shot of a pelican flying low above the water. 

When we got back to shore and Verna told Angela about our adventure, she let Verna have it!

 Apparently Verna doesn't know how to swim!!!!!  OMG!  I totally would have dived in to save her. 

What a lovely day!  We finished up by stopping at Brady's Oysters where my big brother bought me some oysters, clams, and an adorable mug which proudly adorns my desk at work. 

This is a tower like the one we climbed, but this one is closer inland to Brady's oysters.  

So much FUN!

xoxo

Nikon D3300

Boat Trip - Exploring Grays Harbor, Washington

After our morning spent at the Satsop River,  we headed to the Westport Marina to meet with Lee, Sabrina, and the kids.  Robert, Angela, and the kids were going to spend the rest of the morning/early afternoon Pokemon hunting while Lee took me, Sabrina, and Verna out on the boat.  We were hoping to see some whales, as Lee had seen some a few days before.  

Our ocean-going vessel!

There were sooo many cool things to photograph as we left the marina!  Everything was a wonder to my eyes and lens.  There were so many pelicans, cormorants, and seagulls around and the lines and structures of the marina made for perfect perches and perfect photographs.

There were also some very interesting sights to see amongst the boats themselves. Including the gorgeous gray backdrop of the stormy sky behind this blue and white boat.

And this fishing boat, which had sunk in its mooring a couple days before.

That's a quarter of a million literally down the drain!  Or, me being cynical, maybe it's a happy insurance claim.

Westport has a really lovely marina and it's punctuated by a very large and beautiful American flag flying in the breeze.

Across the opening of Grays Harbor lies Ocean Shores.  We stayed at Ocean Shores many, many years ago and I remember it being wonderful to be right there on both the Pacific Ocean on one side and the bay on the other.

As we made out way out towards Ocean Shores, we saw some sleepy sea lions tanning on a navigation buoy.

Perfect for two!

It is SO cool to be out on the water, right by these huge ships!

This is the beach of Ocean Shores.  It looked so fascinating with all the driftwood, and ships sailing by out to the sea.  Someone even built a teepee which gave an air of what this place may have looked like hundreds of years ago.  I could almost see the Quinault or the Chehalis peoples walking these beaches in my mind's eye.

Meanwhile, back in the present, we got to see a lot more of the native marine life!  This buoy was Cormorant Central!

And we saw some dolphins!  Yay!  There were 2-4 and they were really, really quick!  So yay for shitty pictures!  But an amazing experience!

I swear they had heads.  No!  They really did!  I'm hoping Sabrina got a picture with their heads.

I think this is the closest I got. lol

And this IS a head!  But it's an adorable Harbor Seal, not a dolphin.  haha

We saw another ship heading out of the bay, so we decided to follow it.

Literally!

We were putting Westport well behind us at this point.

We caught up to the ship...

 ...but - oops - it wasn't sailing anywhere.  It was at anchor, which was also really cool!

And pretty soon, we'd left it in our wake.

And all the land too!  We were now in the open ocean!  Hello beautiful Pacific!  To my surprise, my sister IL said she had never been out on the ocean before.

I confess, I've been on the ocean just a few times.  Once in Monterey, CA on a whale-watching expedition with my family.  I got sick once we found the whales and the boats stopped moving forward, so that sucked.  And in Hawaii, we went snorkeling on a Catamaran, and once again I got sick!  Shite!  I did end up throwing up on that trip and then I felt much better and was able to enjoy the rest of the outing.  The other time was in New Zealand where I didn't get sick at all.  Lee's boat was about the same size as the one in New Zealand, so I was hoping for the best.  Plus I took a couple Bonine before we left!

I didn't get sick!!  Yay me!  No one did, so it was a very successful outing.  And fun.  Did I mention fun?  It was soooo fun.

The ocean is amazing by the way.

We saw what appeared to be a bird party going on, so we followed the flying pelicans and headed over hoping that they were attracted by whales feeding.  Birds like it when whales drive schools of fish to the surface.  Feast for all!

We didn't see any whales, but we did see more and more birds flying over.  In addition to the pelicans and gulls, there were also murres, which we had seen at the Point Defiance Zoo in Tacoma and I had seen at a distance at the Point Reyes Lighthouse near San Francisco.

Pretty soon there were tons of birds congregating just outside of Ocean Shores.

It was amazing!  And more on that in the next post.  

xoxo

Nikon D3300