Summer Sky: Learning as I go

Back in Seattle again

Oh, before I forget: I have a nature walk post up over at The Magnifying Glass. Check it out if you have a moment. Thanks!

 

The kids and I visited my parents last week. D had to work, and stayed behind, poor guy.

We started out our visit doing the exact same things we did two years ago.

We did that partly because those things were so much fun the first time, but also because N was only 4 then and he doesn't remember anything from our last trip.

That made me a little sad. That he had forgotten, I mean. But then, how much does any of us recall from when we were 4?

We took the monorail. Because it's there. We jumped off the train and right back on again. The stationmaster was a bit surprised.



 

 

 

We went up the Space Needle. It was much less crowded this time, but also much cloudier. Still, it was a thrill for N who has cherished a desire to go up the Space Needle for years now. (Yes, even though he had already done it once. I think I mentioned he was 4 the first time?)

 

 

As far as the whole trip went--we had the usual issues--the super long plane ride; waking up at 5:30 in the morning the first couple of days (which I considered excellent, considering that was 8:30 am by their internal clocks); and then E had a fever for the second half of the week. And so we were housebound for several days. But we were with my parents and the kids ate up every bit of love grandma and grandpa had to give. Which, as you might imagine, was quite a bit.

Leelanau summer

Most years, we take our family vacation (where D finally leaves the office and gets to relax) on the Leelanau Peninsula in Michigan.  Although D first came when he was 3 years old, my first visit was as a newlywed. 

This part of Michigan is a bit remote from the urban bustle.  You deliberately choose to go there; it's not "on the way" to anywhere else. We were there again a few weeks ago, and I'm just now finding a moment to reflect on the good times we had.

In my mind's eye, when I think of Leelanau, I picture us at the top of the Dune Climb at Sleeping Bear Dunes, waiting for the fog to clear so that we can see Glen Lake. 

"Glen Lake from the Dune Climb," fabric collage by Holly Sorensen* 

We are still a little breathless; it wasn't so easy to get up here. Then the fog starts to lift, and suddenly Glen Lake comes fully into view, hovering, bigger and more beautiful than we remembered.

 

The kids can't wait any longer. They want to run all the way back down. Now that they're a little older, they'll turn around and climb most of the way up again, racing each other over and over until it's time to go.

 

 

*Holly Sorensen is a fiber artist with a multi-faceted talent; her studio is in Empire, Michigan, near the Dunes. This treasure was purchased on our first trip to Michigan, and we hung it where I could easily enjoy it as I nursed my little ones.

That reminds me...

I had posted (here and here) about our tour of the Currituck Sound in the Outer Banks of North Carolina (which we took a couple of weeks ago), and what an amazing experience that turned out to be. 

Although the two places couldn't be more different, I was reminded of another jaunt we took while visiting my parents in the state of Washington in June, to Padilla Bay, one of several estuaries on Puget Sound.

 

 

 

When the tide rolls out, it leaves lots of mud, plus all sorts of fascinating things.  (Note: Padilla Bay is a protected area, and all shells and other creatures found there must stay there.)

 

 

 

 

 

You can see huge oyster beds out in the muck:

 

and herons of various shapes and sizes:

 

 

There is a wonderful interpretive center located not far from the water, where we found some land-locked wonders:

 

 

 

and a thoughtful note penned by a young visitor.

Just another day at the beach.

 

Well, that's not really true.  Although I mentioned that we had a beach rhythm going, that shouldn't suggest that every day was the same. 

Pelicans flying and fishing, parallel to shore.

When you're only at the beach for a week, no two days are alike.

On Friday the wind whipped the umbrellas around (and nearly took me with them--I have a bruise on my tuckus to prove it) and finally I grabbed my two and called it a day. 

One day was unusually hot.

Another day, the storms rolled in a little on the early side, and we high-tailed it back to the house.

But Saturday, our last full day at the beach, was a glorious day. The temperature was perfect. The water was the warmest it had felt all week.

That day, a man fishing for spot (for supper, he said) set himself up along the water's edge, right in front of our usual encampment.  The pied piper himself could not have done a better job.

He let every kid take a turn--and I do mean every single one--who wanted to hold the rod and catch a fish.  The littlest guy, who is 3, was beside himself. He could hardly believe his luck.

 

I will never forget the look on his face as he reached up eagerly to grasp the fish he had caught after reeling it in.

 

 

The kids weren't the only ones fishing that day.

 

This particular osprey had clearly caught a fish, but kept wheeling and wheeling overhead. The next day, our Currituck Sound guide suggested the bird might have been turning the fish to an aerodynamic position; they always hold them just so, with the face pointing forward.

 

 

There were so many dolphins. Last year, we saw dolphins once or twice a day. This year, we saw dolphins at least 3 or 4 times a day, and some days, many more times than that. One day--I wish I had photos to show you--another mom and I watched from the porch as the dolphins lept high into the air, at least six or seven times. It was astounding, and we managed to gather the kids to see them just in time.

But today, they weren't frolicking quite so much.

 

We could not see the dolphins' faces, either. This was just a lucky click of the camera. Yes, I've started saving for a better zoom lens.

 

Also, on that same day, several of us, kids in tow, swam out to the sandbar.  No matter how many times you do it, it's very peculiar to be swimming in water five feet deep, turning your head away now and again to avoid swallowing a huge wave, and to see your friends just in front of you, standing in water up to their knees.

 

And of course, all week we kept finding treasures. Did I mention the treasures?

 

 

 

On the Sound (part 2).

(Read more about our boat tour of the Currituck Sound here.)

Our boat captain had a great deal to share with us about the history and ecology of Currituck Sound. It was once a highly popular duck-hunting destination, with various clubs organized by the likes of Rockefeller.  The condition of the Sound is constantly evolving; development, not surprisingly, has had a considerable impact.  Of course, tourists such as ourselves drive the demand for even more rental properties on the Outer Banks.

Beach houses line a barrier island separating Currituck Sound from the Atlantic Ocean.

Within Currituck Sound lie small marsh islands covered with grasses. Ideally, they would be covered with cordgrass, which prevents the islands from erosion and protects all kinds of birds, insects, and small animals that call these islands home.

 

 

Unfortunately, cordgrass is giving way to sawgrass, which causes the marsh islands to be much more susceptible to erosion.

 

 

Who, or what, is the culprit behind the disappearance of cordgrass?

 

That would be the rodents of unusual size, known as nutria. Originally from South America, nutria were introduced to the Outer Banks to create a fur-trade of sorts. No one is willing to pay very much for a nutria's fur, at least in the U.S., so not only were the nutria left to their own devices, but there is to this day very little incentive to keep this invasive species' population down. Our guide told us some hair-raising stories about nutria and dogs (the nutria won) but as they say, little pitchers have big ears, and besides, we digress.

The Sound is a wonderful place to bird-watch. We saw wrens:

 

 

egrets:

 

 

osprey:

 

 

swallows:

 

 

and red-winged blackbirds.

 

 

We were also regaled with stories of the various items our guide has found along the beaches of the Outer Banks, washed up from the numerous shipwrecks just off shore. Coal used to power an old boat,

 

and also bits of boats: some with hand-forged nails, some with spikes, and the oldest of all (dating from before the 1700's), those with wooden pegs.

Altogether, we spent two and a half hours on Currituck Sound, and I still left feeling that there was so much more to be experienced here. My roving childhood leads me to fall in love with whatever place I gain some insight into, as if I imagine that this place will become my new home.

 

On the Sound.

 

This year at the beach, one of the moms arranged a special treat: boat tours of the Sound. As you probably know, the Outer Banks are a series of barrier islands, composed entirely (!) of sand, and they are separated from mainland North Carolina by 3 bodies of water known as "sounds."  We took a tour of Currituck Sound. 

(If you are ever curious about the Outer Banks, how they were formed, their ecology, flora, and wildlife, you may want to check out Ribbon of Sand, which I've found fascinating and useful for understanding the area.)

Our boat captain was a gentleman who had a great love for nature and seemed to particularly enjoy teaching children.  Our tour started out with a blue crab lesson.

 

Male and female blue crabs can be easily distinguished from one another, if you know what to look for. Females, as our captain told my daughter, like to "paint their toenails red":

 

and if you flip the crabs over, their "aprons" have distinctive shapes--and you (the adult) can probably guess which is which:

 

Yes, that's the male on the left, with the rather, er, male-shaped "apron" on his belly. The female's apron, on the right, shows that this crab is still maturing; an adult female blue crab has an apron with a much more rounded shape. E wanted to know if these crabs were married. The captain deftly responded that it was possible.

(As an aside: if you've never heard of the book, Beautiful Swimmers, it is a magical [and Pulitzer-prize-winning] portrait of the life cycle of the blue crab, albeit from the perspective of the Chesapeake Bay, just north of the Outer Banks.)

These particular crabs had a destiny: to become food for eels.  Our guide let the kids help him bring up the eel trap.

 

By coincidence, I had checked out a summer-themed book, Bird, Butterfly, Eel (see the Reading Basket in the sidebar) that portrays the life cycle of the eel in lovely illustrations. I was amazed to learn that just as the book depicted, these young eels will eventually make their way to the Sargasso Sea near South America, where they will live during the winter, and they will later return to these waters to bear their young.

 

 

We also had a chance to bait a crab pot with the oily menhaden fish:

 

 

and to learn about the "cull rings" on crab pots, which allow young crabs, too small to be caught, to escape.

 

 

The guide let the kids "drive" the boat

 

 

and to tell the other passengers (me) to walk the plank:

 

We experienced a great deal more on our boat tour of the Currituck Sound, which I'll share in a separate post.  When we return: strange islands, large rodents, and birds of every size.

At the lighthouse.

 

 

 

 

Sometimes it rains.

We had some pretty spectacular thunderstorms at the beach. They tend to blow through fairly quickly, and mostly at night.

The sky before the storm is unbelievably beautiful. The light, the clouds, it all resembles a painting, so lovely it doesn't seem real.

 

The rental houses here are high up, so you can see lightning strikes far in the distance.  The kids pull their chairs up to the window and watch the show.

One evening, after the rain, we ran down to the beach. Enormous puddles had formed in the sand.

 

 

 

 

Ghost crab hunt.

Ever wonder how to get a passel of five-year-olds talking excitedly, giggling, and racing around in circles? Well, there are lots of ways, but at the beach, suggest a ghost crab hunt. They get started before you're even out the door.

Eat your dinner all up.

Grab your flashlights. One for each kid, if possible.

Grab your camera.

Sun's nearly down, but there's enough twilight to see by.

Walk down to the water's edge. That's where they like to fish at night.

What was that?!

 

Why, hello there!

 

They are mighty, mighty hard to catch on camera. They stay still when a flashlight shines on them, they let the kids look at them for a good long time, but when I approach (even though I'm not using flash) they dart away.

 

 

 

Down by the water, see them eating tiny fish. They scurry, scurry when the water comes near.

 

Watch the crabs a good long while.  Other families are hunting, too.  See their flashlights bobbing at a distance, pools of light on the wide beach.

 

It's getting late. Time to head back for a bowl of ice cream, and bed.

 

 

 

Some facts about ghost crabs:

 

* they range from Rhode Island to Brazil, but they are most well-known for frequenting the beaches of North and South Carolina (a different species frequents the beaches of Australia)

 

* they are usually pretty small; their bodies are about 2 inches wide

 

* they are able to change color to match the sand

 

* they can run very fast--perhaps as fast as 10 miles and hour--and can quickly change direction

 

* they live in underground burrows that are 3 or 4 feet under the sand--the entrances can be seen all over beaches that they inhabit, together with their little tracks (as in this photo)

 

* they are mostly nocturnal, feeding at night on small creatures they encounter; but they can at times be seen during the day

 

Source: South Carolina Dept. of Resources     

Every day at the beach.

 

We have a rhythm we settle into when visiting the beach. E wakes up first. She always sleeps later than N, her little brother, at home. But not at the beach.

She whispers through the half-darkness. Can we get up? No, I whisper. Depending on how late the kids stayed up (or, more importantly, I stayed up gabbing with the moms), I might hiss, don't wake up N. DON'T wake up N.

She lies quietly, keeping her thoughts to herself, while I roll over. But a few minutes later, I hear some covers ruffling. N is waking up. Mama? He asks. I give up trying to sleep a little longer.

The first morning, we pulled on some clothes and snuck down to the beach. It was so magical, I wish we had done it every day. Memo to self. 

This morning, though, we tiptoe into the kitchen to eat breakfast. I pour cereal, put away clean dishes, fix some tea. Other tykes start to wander out of their family's room to join us. A mom arrives and starts the coffee maker.

 

We eat breakfast as if we had all day to do it. But then the mood shifts, and we all jump off our stools and out of our chairs. Dishes are left in the sink for later.

I grab my two and scramble. If I don't, the whole process can take an hour.  Sunscreen gets smeared all over each of us.  Dry-ish bathing suits nabbed from the rack. Beach bag stocked with water, snacks, toys, hats, camera, book, more sunscreen.

We step onto the deck behind the house. The kids grab a shovel or a chair. We gather up any other kids who are ready to go and we're off.

Another day to savor.