Above, the king’s crowns have emerged from their bleach bath and a good scrubbing with an old toothbrush. They were FILTHY, inside and out, but most of them cleaned up really nicely! Other shells, still soaking in the dishpan. You can see above that I picked up a couple of decent sized whelks in good shape, among other things. You may be wondering why there’s one lonely king’s crown in there, separated from his...
Above, the Lighthouse is all done up for the holidays, with bows and everything. Below, Kim finds a beautiful live whelk. Back in he went. By this time, it was about 2:00 PM. We’d been tramping the beaches all day, since 7:00 AM. We were DONE! Kim drove me back to where I’d ditched my car, and there was a the inevitable transfer of gear and clothing. It had been spitting on us on...
Here we are at the pier. We found some small, satisfying stuff here at the Lighthouse Beach. Also more dead fishies I don’t know why Kim changed clothes. She only got wet again. By this time, I was in sneakers and socks, and playing chicken with the waves, trying to scoop stuff with my net-on-a-stick. Kim was in flip flops, and despite rolling up the jeans, the waves nailed her a few times.
Lots of dead fishies – we’d heard that there was a massive kill due to the cold front. Saw lots of dead crabs, too. Don’t know what all of these are. Kim thought the one below was a puffer fish, and maybe the upside-down one was a trout. I kinda like the last one, with the yellow tail.
After Dixie Beach, we lit out for the little beach down at the end of Bailey. Here’s one of the many starfish Kim found. Some were rejects because they were sort a chewed up, or else looked like they had freezer burn. Was surprised to see construction at the Causeway on a Saturday. This machine was picking up a large cylindrical object that appeared to be made of metal, and dropping it repeatedly upon...
At Jerry’s, Kim had the blackened salmon sandwich, and I had my “usual” – the “Sanibel Boat”. It’s half a pineapple that’s been hollowed out (they give you the chunks they removed) and filled in with FRESH seafood salad. You get other fruits on the plate, and cottage cheese too (which I never eat). Also a little loaf of wheat-ish looking bread. We both slugged down mass quantities of iced tea as well. After...
I never realized Santa was such a sloth-and-loafer! Was also pleased to see Mickey and Minnie cavorting amongst the palm trees.
Kim blindfolded me again and led me out of the sooper sekrit undisclosed location, once again making me promise not to tell. Soon, we were back in the car and heading back to the home of her hosts, where we deposited Noelle for some much-needed rest. Then we went to Bonnie’s to get cleaned up and change our clothes. At some point, Kim called Gary and Tootie to let them know we were headed...
See that vast expanse of wasteland? No, it’s not the surface of Mars. It’s a mud flat, and yonder’s where we found an amazing amount of king’s crowns in really pristine, if muddy, condition. Below, we find an egret, a couple of little blue herons, and three birds that had beaks like the ibis, but their feathers were not all white. Perhaps they were juveniles? Anyhow, we spent a good hour or more here,...
