Re-up

Today Amanda and Melissa were kind enough to bring us food from the mainland! Every two weeks volunteers do a big grocery shop and hop onto a boat (which has also been volunteered to take the trip out) to bring it to us in order to resupply our fridges and pantry. They made it out here early afternoon, got a quick tour of the island and were getting back onto the sailboat again within an hour and a half. It's a brutally long day for anyone who does that (they shopped all evening last night, woke up at 5am, and will probably get home by midnight) and they also had some horrible weather on the way back, making it extra rough, so THANK YOU for doing it! Glad they got to see the island for what it is, but also where I'm working and living.

I somehow did not take any pictures while Amanda was here, but maybe she will supply some on her blog?

This sea lion was not happy about the e-seal. The e-seal could have cared less.




Black Turnstone


Black Oystercatcher, should still be the logo, I think






Big swell yesterday, made us wonder if the food and friends were going to make it onto the island today


Same Brown Creeper. I found him trying to cling to the house, he finally found the roof, then finally found the tree.

Owl Chute

This is Owl Chute. Owls live here, I've seen them, the burrowing and short-eared flavors. It is the worlds steepest net lane.


This is our home for 4.5 more weeks. I know you've seen it before, but the island is small, so expect more like this, just different angles.


A Cali Sea Lion

West End

Yesterday Jim and I headed over to the West End island which is normally off limits as it is where the pinnipeds hang out and we don't want to disturb them for the most part. However, every two weeks or so Jim goes there to get a count on the different species. Everyday we get to see the Elephant Seals and California Sea Lions, but rarely do we have Northern Fur Seal sightings, so a trip over to West End is a pleasure, as you get to see the colony, which was at around 300 yesterday.

The first step to getting to West End is crossing a channel. We harness in and zip across between waves:


The second part of getting to areas where we can actually get counts on them is walking extremely slowly, and hopefully out of sight so as to not flush large groups (which can be dangerous for them and is quite a disturbance).

Here are a couple of pictures of the large masses of pinnipeds I saw. The four species (California and Steller's Sea Lion, Elephant and Northern Fur Seal) do some inter mixing but stick together for the most part.




This is looking out from the highest point on the West End down over much of where they hang out


Mostly Cali Sea Lions


Fur Seals


There are not many Stellar's Sea Lions, but here is a female with her pup


Elephant Seals


The best part of the trip is getting to see all of the pups! The Fur Seals were obviously the cutest:








Cali Seal Lion pup is also cool


The views back the the main island were also outstanding

Tahoe Day 3

Throughout the three days we had amazing weather, if you're into clear skies and the sun. Temperatures varied quite a bit, getting pretty hot during mid-day when we were walking around exposed, chilly in the shade with some wind, and maybe freezing after the sun went down. Other than the fact that we didn't bring sunscreen the conditions were perfect for what we were doing.

Day three was kind of a long one. We got moving by 7:30 and retraced a couple of miles we had hiked the day before so that we could get to fresh trail going up Mt. Tallac. Kanner read somewhere that it has "the best 360 degree view in the US" or something like that. I was skeptical, but it was spectacular indeed.

On the way up we stopped at Lake Gilmore for breakfast and then again on the way down for lunch.


Some kind of ground squirrel with a huge mushroom to munch on


Kanner at the top


View from Mt. Tallac




This video is also just all wind, so turn the volume off:


We then hiked back to our bags and out the the cars, 18 or so miles for the day.