Frogger

Nothing can get my heart racing like crossing a shipping channel. You get out the chart and read off the course: 3 miles across, 2 of them in shipping lanes, north bound and south. That's 40 minutes in shipping lanes. 40 long minutes. I must be in the wrong sport!

The calm before the storm

... SMALL CRAFT ADVISORY IN EFFECT FROM 8 PM PDT THIS EVENING THROUGH LATE TONIGHT ...

... GALE WARNING IN EFFECT FROM LATE TONIGHT THROUGH TUESDAY EVENING ...

Columbus Day out on the bay. Absolutely calm in the lee. The shimmer of cat's paws touching down. Followed the shore up to Hopkins where I slowly, steadily, cautiously wove my way through
the rocks without flushing a single cormorant or brown pelican that looked on--or that I presume looked on, since I wasn't making eye contact. Four young sea otters were diving and basking and feeding in the shallows beyond. Making my way up the alcoves between Hopkins and Lovers Point I came across willets and black turnstones, a silent pair of black oystercatchers, and a drab grey robin-like bird I had never seen before--a "surfbird"--working the rocks.

Mystery solved

From the undeveloped site on Blake Island, you follow the path about a hundred yards to get to fresh water. When I rounded the corner the sun was just going down, a string of moored boats bathed in golden light. As I walked I could hear the whine of rubber on rumble strips in the distance, eighteen wheelers on I-5, no doubt. But how could that be? Here I was looking west, with an island between me and I-5, five miles away. There had to be another source, so I started looking around. It didn't take long to discover that the din was coming from the bushes themselves--it was bees!