Advertisement
Published: August 14th 2007
Friday August 10, 2007 We met our tide pool and hiking tour at the Homer dock at 7:15 am and left by 7:30 am so we could catch the low tide. We went to an island on Peterson Bay across from Homer. There was a negative low tide, which is good for tide pool walks because the water’s lower than normal. The sun was shining (again!) and the breeze was brisk on the boat. It took us about 30 minutes to get to the island. Our tour was conducted by a nonprofit organization whose primary purpose is to educate people about the sea environment and ecology of the Homer area.
The group included a father and his 6 year daughter from Anchorage and a middle-aged woman, her grown son (worked for BLM in Valdez) and her man friend. The leader was a young college man (went to Duke in NC) who reminded me of the Johnny Depp buccaneer type. Because of the widely fluctuating tides on these islands (20-30+ feet) there was a floating dock used as a raft to come ashore. The boat dropped us off on the raft and then we pulled the raft to shore by a pulley
system.
The tide pool walk was very productive. We saw Sea Stars (now the politically correct name for Starfish), sea urchins, sea anemone (they squirt water when you touch them), jelly fish and various kinds of other creatures. We’d walk along the shore, and turn over rocks to see what was there. You could pick up the creatures and look at them, then replace them. It was neat.
As we walked back to the “outpost” we learned various ecological things about the island. We ate our packed lunch on the gravel beach because the weather was so beautiful. We had a good group. Turns out the young man who worked for BLM had been a Park Ranger at Sequoia NP. This summer he was working for BLM documenting ATV trails in the southeast /central part of the state. Two of them would leave on a Monday and ride ATV trails till Friday camping on the trail. Then they would file reports. Interesting work! The father was a single Dad and he took his daughter camping and fishing. He loved Homer and wanted to instill in her an appreciation of nature and the area. He said his father had done the
Frank Holding a Big Sea Star
The suckers would grab you if you held them upright so this is his bottom viewsame for him.
After lunch we did some more hiking around the island and at 2:30 we were picked up by a boat to go kayaking.(we were the only ones from the group going.) This was a different tour company. There were about 12 of us. We were kayaking out of China Poot Bay, right next to Peterson Bay. The waters in these bays are fairly calm.
After they gave us instructions and scared the bee-geepers out of us we were ready to roll. Frank and I chose a double kayak and Frank got to steer. The experience wasn’t bad and we were able to get where we needed to go. The problem I experienced was that I was not comfortable (have to keep knees bent and pointed outward and place feet on rests) and my feet and legs lost circulation. Other than that, it was fine. Frank enjoyed it and he was comfortable. We did see two otters (at different places ) in the bay and paddled around them. One thing, I didn’t take photos. It was pretty awkward and the camera was in a wet bag. I didn’t want to move around too much after all the scary
Another type of Sea Star
I can't remember all their formal names! instructions they gave us so I don’t have any “documentation” of our kayak trip.
We got back to the campground around 6:30 pm, tired after a full day!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.276s; Tpl: 0.014s; cc: 15; qc: 103; dbt: 0.1083s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
