A Crab Feast

 

In my last post I promised to write more about the gulls we met at Doran Beach. The above one - a juvenile Western Gull or a Herring Gull? (David, to the rescue, please) - found the fat crab first and thought it might make a nice afternoon snack.

Alas, not for long since another gull (and I think this is a Western Gull) had the same idea.

He (she?) got to work immediately and with a lot of skill. It was hugely entertaining for us watching him/her pulling out the crab meat.

A close-up for Nicole's Friday Face Off. You can almost feel sorry for the crab.

And soon after, this gull got company as well...

The Call of the Coast

 

Goat Rock Beach

It was the Geek's birthday at the begnning of October and we opted to spend the day at the coast. We don't give presents to each other; we rather spend a beautiful day together. It's only a short drive to the coast, but by the sea feels like being on vacation in a different world. You just need that every now and then.

We started at Doran Beach in Bodega Bay and slowly made our way north up the coast, walking at favorite beaches. The weather was a very mixed bag - a swift change from thick fog to clear skies and sun and the other way round as well.

This is what it looked like from the cliffs on our way down to the beach...

... and this is what it looked like at the beach. There are only a couple minutes between these two photos. (The picture below is Portuguese Beach, "our" clean-up beach where we used to participate in the state-wide coastal clean up day in September; unfortunately we can't join that anymore since it is always on a Saturday and I have to be at work.)

This is a typical Northern California day at the coast.

While walking along the beach, I enjoyed seeing all the "stuff" that the ocean swept onto shore, without knowing what you call most of these (well, I know kelp and crab of course).

Feathers could be found everywhere and they make a beautiful subject. I assume it's from a gull - more on gulls in a later post.

This "creature" was my favorite:

Of course I couldn't resist sticking my feet into the surf. The water wasn't as cold as I had expected, maybe because the beach here (Doran Beach) is rather shallow and in a protected bay. Usually the ocean along our coast is freezing, being supplied with nice cold water coming down from Alaska.

Someone had played with sand - Stonehenge on the beach.

I always look for shells and I found a couple beautiful pieces.

At Goat Rock Beach - my all-time favorite beach - we hung out on a large piece of driftwood, looking out onto the foggy ocean.

The gulls kept us entertained. We also saw Brown Pelicans swooping over the ocean, barely touching the water. They are such graceful birds and always look a bit primeval.

We ended the day with a visit to our favorite seafood place, Betty's Fish & Chips. It's hard to beat their seafood and we always compare seafood that we eat anywhere to them. So far only the Seafood Shack in Gualala comes close. We find that many places make the batter too thick (probably to save on the fish), but at Betty's the batter is just right and the cod can't get any fresher.

I'm sharing this delightful, tasty fish with Rain's Thursday Art and Dinner Date.