Heart with a View

I stopped to enjoy the view and snap a few photos.

When I turned to continue my walk I spotted hearts!

 

Windy Beach

One day last week I spent a wildly windy lunch hour at the beach.  I only stepped out of the car long enough to take a few pictures. I almost got blown away!  By the time I got back in the car, my glasses and my windshield were coated with ocean mist.

Notice the shaky camera work?  I was struggling to stand still in the wind.

Joyful Hearts

 I found joy at the beach.  It's a little lopsided, but I'll take it.

Make Love Not War

This little sea anemone looks like a lover, not a fighter.  Wait? What? Don't be ridiculous.  Sea anemones don't fight.

Actually, yes they do.  Hubby and I learned that while watching The Nature of Things' Kingdom of the Tide. Not only do they defend themselves from predators, colonies of anemones wage war against each other. Yikes!  Maybe this heart-shaped anemone isn't as sweet as it looks. 

Smoke

 It's hard to believe there are mountains in the distance.  

I assure you they are there. They're just hidden in the smoke. 

Shell Heart

A true heart of the ocean washed up on the beach, and I was lucky enough to spot it.  

Cue Titanic theme music. 

Back Soon

Thought I'd let you all know that I'm extending my blog break.  I missed sharing here, and was feeling ready to return, but the talent* was injured in an unfortunate incident involving a malfunctioning wheelchair.

She's recuperating, but would like a bit longer for her texting wrist to heal. 

I don't mind waiting for my sister to recover.  We finally have some summer weather here.  I'll take the extra time away from my keyboard to enjoy it.

See you all soon!

*In spite of her wrist injury, my sister still managed participate in the writing of this post.

Beach, Beach, DUCK!

Someone had a large, inflatable duck at the beach on the weekend.  Seeing it paddling around in the distance made a great day even better.

Low Tide

Another day, another beach walk.  This time the tide was quite low, so there were tide pools to explore.

Hubby spotted the hermit crab in its spiral shell, but neither of us saw the little fish until we saw the picture on my computer.  Do you see it there to the left of the calm shell?

There are starfish sheltered on the undersides of the rocks below.  It was so nice to see them.  For many years, starfish have been scarce.

This was the only starfish out in the open.  Such a beautiful colour.

Beach Dreaming

Wish I was at the beach.

Wish you were there too.

Wish we were there together. 

Someday.

Breezy Burgers

Yesterday we picked up burgers, fries and colas from our favourite burger joint then we headed out for a seaside picnic.  It was wildly windy. We almost lost our bag of fries to a particularly forceful gust.  Still, it was beautiful, and after we ate we had the beach to ourselves before the the clouds and the rain blew in.  

(*Note:  I don't get anything for the links above.  They're there for your information.  Hope you find them useful.)

Caffeine and Clear Skies

This morning, as I sipped my home-pressed coffee, I wondered what the line-up was like at Starbucks.  It has been months since Hubby and I have indulged.  First, we weren't going anywhere, so it didn't occur to us.  More recently, every time we've thought of it, the line-ups were too long to bother.

Today, since I was up early anyway, I decided to go check it out.  I was third in line. Success!

The car smelled so good that, even though it was a beautiful morning,  I rolled up the windows to better enjoy the aroma.  

Later, since we were caffeine fuelled and since it was such a lovely morning, we headed out for a short ocean-side walk.  We purposely chose a less-popular beach.  Again, we practically had the place to ourselves. 

Outing

Hubby and I went for a short drive today.  It was good to get out of the house, particularly when our outing included an unplanned stop at the beach.  

As you can see, we pretty much had the place to ourselves. Other than distant birds, this little crab was our only company.

I almost missed it.  If it hadn't moved when I stopped to take the photo below I wouldn't have known it was there.

The crab is actually in the photo.  It's in the lower right corner, and is no bigger than my fingernail.  I can't believe I spotted it.

I also spotted a couple of hearts on the rocky beach, though I'm less surprised that I noticed them.  As we all know now, hearts are everywhere.

Weekly West Coast 2016 - At the Beach

Sometimes it feels good to putter around the house.  There's satisfaction to be had in crossing items off my to-do list.

And sometimes it's best just to walk away from it all and head to the beach.

Have a great week all! Sending you warm thoughts wherever you are!

Overheard at the Beach

OK, I think we've established that I'm an introvert who likes quiet. I can also be fairly quiet, and as such, I hear things. No, not like that. I overhear things. Sometimes what I hear is sad, or disturbing, and sometimes what I hear makes me laugh. Quietly. To myself.  

The following snippets were overheard on a recent trip to the beach. Hubby and I both laughed over the comments of these two young beachcombers. 

 "Spider crab! Spider crab!" 5-6 year old boy

This one led Hubby and I to a rousing, but quiet, rendition of "Spidercrab! Spidercrab! Does whatever a spidercrab can!". We didn't take it any further. The song loses something when it doesn't rhyme. And we don't really know what a spider crab does.

 "I found a geoduck! It's squirting my balls! It squirted my junk!" 8-10 year old boy 

This one wasn't really difficult to overhear. In fact, there was no avoiding it. I'm sure the entire beach heard about this boy's intimate interaction with the wildlife. Still, it made us laugh. And watch where we were walking. 

Not a spider crab.

I'll likely share more of the things I overhear when I'm out and about. It gives me the opportunity to listen better, and it gets me off the couch and out the door.

Also not a spider crab.