The finest of days

S and I portage down the hill to the sea, but turn back, the onshore wind and steady sprinkling rain less than inviting for a canoe trip on open water.  Instead, we load up and head over to the West River.  S has not been there, yet.  In fact, she has spent far too little time in the canoe since we arrived here.

It is not long past the turn of low tide when we set the canoe into the river.  Another foot of bank is exposed since I was here yesterday.  I know we won't go too far knowing that the portion upstream of the downed tree will have little canoeable water.  But, the reason to return here is to show S the birds, which don't disappoint.  As soon as we get started, an osprey flushes from a nearby tree. Canada geese complain about our presence, but the others - the red-wing blackbirds, the little yellow birds and the unseen possessors of songs that I don't know, could care less.  A green backed heron flies overhead giving me the shortest instance to identify it.

We turn a bend and find two mute swans.  One of the pair watches us carefully and puts out its odd call - a wheezy whistle fart.  It occasionally raises its wings...the first bluff...making itself look big.  But, we just follow slowly, backed up in traffic and letting them move along at their pace.  Another osprey flies off with a fish in its talons and a blackbird in pursuit.

 

S spots three deer in the brush on the bank.  I take a poor photo - hand held, in a canoe, on a dark and drizzly day, but the velvet stubs of the antlers, antlers just beginning to grow - is worth hanging onto the image.

A short trip and a damp and chilly one at that.  This is not what most people would call the finest of days, but most people don't have S in the canoe with them.