The first surprise was the weather. The sun broke through and we found ourselves sheading a layer of clothes. We saw the tiniest crystal-clear jelly fish, like pulsating glass grapes. Paddled in close all the way up to Hopkins, where we darted outside to avoid seals, then back in again into that stormy 'room'. Couldn't have been more than a foot deep. Long green surf grass, pink encrusting algae and snails. An otter lay in the shallows and watched not twenty feet off to our right, chewing and looking on, utterly disconcerned. Then, paddling out the Northwest side we hopped over rolling incoming waves. To stretch out the day, on our way back we paddled out to bouy number 4, covered with lazing tawny sea lions. Where do people from Monterey retire to? How do you upstage this? Every cloud has a dark patch too.
