Tales of the Riverbank

For me, today was a break from everything.
Not so for Kevin, he was not only at work, but having to deal with all the Realtor and broker phone calls, the carpet fitter, and Uncle Tom Cobbley and all.

I was gallivanting.
Since it was spring break for the schools and we have no programmes this week, I was able to accompany Kris who was taking the seniors trip out to Blackie Spit and Crescent Beach.
This was somewhere I had been with Sleepy in the summer, so I was pretty excited to be going there today on the first day of spring, and with a professional and extremely good naturalist.

I knew there would be eagles. Here on the west coast, the Bald Eagle is the default eagle. Right now they are nesting.
This one was sitting in a tree just looking down at us, and soon another one swooped down and joined it. There were eagles just standing in the water all along Crescent Beach, and along Highway 99 that leads to the US border.

Then there were herons and grebes, American robins, goldfinches, kinglets, widgeons, sandpipers, cormorants and shore birds. Shore birds could be any number of varieties, but one thing they have in common is a mesmerising way of flying as a flock, so that they appear like something shimmering in the air, a ghostly sail suspended above the water, then in a single instant they all simultaneously bank and become invisible.

But we also saw beaver activity.
This is quite different from beaver action.
The picture may look like a pile of logs, but is in fact a beaver lodge. Just beyond was a pile of trees that had been felled by them and the city had ringed a number of poplars with chicken wire to protect them from the critters.

We ate our lunch surrounded by tall cedars that sussurated in the wind, if you closed your eyes, you could imagine you were near the sea.
And I did.