RIDING ALONG THE BEACH

We had a great time in Monterey riding bikes along the coast and catching up with Zac.  He is juggling 4
jobs and doesn't have much time off, so we were honored that he invited us to spend some time with him on one of his rare days without a commitment to one or more shifts somewhere.

October is one of the best months to visit any coastal area in CA and we managed to have a gorgeous day.  A windbreaker in the morning was shed off by lunch.  As we rode along Zac shared stories from his week at Sea Lab and his group of 8-10 year-olds - some of them had never been to the beach!

I almost fell off my bike laughing when he told us about trying to re-direct the attention of his "campers" from a sea otter which was frantically fornicating a deceased harbor seal - apparently those cute, furry little otters everyone loves are quite kinky - and violent!  He regaled us with a couple of other "bad otter" stories.  His group also witnessed an otter grabbing a seagull, ripping it's head off and eating it, which is more disturbing than their usual tendency to simply drown gulls which are trying to poach their food...

Fortunately they also got an opportunity to see some of the magical side of marine life, too.  On their last morning at the beach there were some dolphins passing through.  Zac lined them up to watch them when suddenly a wave crested right in front of all the kids and the dolphins were riding the wave right in close to shore.  They did it over and over and all the kids in the camp got a chance to witness this  amazing spectacle!

HILDA AND THE BEACH

We heard it was going to be sunny and 70 degrees on the coast this weekend - yes, in January - so we packed a picnic and went to Monterey.  We even took the dog.  In a way, we planned it for the dog.

Hilda is really showing her age, she is sleeping more and more, she is jumpy and nervous and unsteady in her feet.  She was always tail wagging happy and very puppy-like until a couple of years ago, so it is hard to see her personality so diminshed. 




We can see that her eyes are clouding over and realized about a year ago that she can't hear.  She still gets excited about going places with us, but we see that she is frightened when she is out - probably overwhelmed by what she can't see and hear.

But we wanted to have an outing and take her along.  She was great in the car, we brought her little bed and she sat and looked out the window all the way there.  Once her little paws hit the sand she was not so sure of things.  He dachshund nose was sniffing away, but she was not as intrigued with the sealife strewn over the sand as we thought she would be.  Once the blanket was spread, she was much happier.

We walked her down to the water, thinking she might get excited and run in as she did in the past, but she was tail-tucked and looking back to the blanket so we made it a quick walk.


For the 3 hours or so we were there she never relaxed. 

She did enjoy the picnic.

After Tom had a nice nap, we packed up and headed home with our little old lady.  She slept almost all the way home - when we drove up over the Sunol grade and down into our valley she smelled home, perked up and sat looking out the window the rest of the way.