Early morning walk to the beach

Yesterday at 5:45 I woke up and looked outside. The welcome sight of clear skies all the way to the coast was like a jolt of caffeine. It had been a long spell of cloudy drizzly, rainy weather and spring seemed like a distant memory here in Marin. But this morning, this morning was made for walking.

I got dressed and headed out to the trailhead to head out for a pre-work walk.

It was early enough that during the whole 4 mile walk I saw only three other people, two runners and one fellow on a bike. It was so early that the wildlife didn't expect to see me in my pink hat marching along.

The first of the critters was a pair of turkeys. They were scavenging on the trail near the parking lot. I discovered, that even though they have wings and can fly (I have seen them), on a morning like this on the trail, they choose to power walk.

They probably walked 3/4 of mile at a brisk pace trying to keep ahead of me, until there was a fork in the trail. They went left, I went straight.


Quails.....

Jays....

California Quail....

Ladies in pink hats......

Quail......

Bunny and quail.....

Bunny and quail....

Even the quail choose to walk instead of fly. They would run along the trail and then head into a bush. Only two of them decided to fly.

After the rains I was surprised to see, not a big raging creek running to the sea, but the creek spreading out and then disappearing into nearly deposited sand.
This was one day in which I could walk easily to the other side of the beach (usually not possible because of the creek. When I got close to the end I saw a small seal. I was debating whether I should call the Marin Mammal folks, because frankly I thought, either this one was dead, or really hurt. I looked carefully to see if it was breathing and I could see an uneven shallow movement of its chest.

Until it woke up and gave me a wide sleepy eyed glance.
"Good for you!" I said to the seal...as I backed away and headed back down the trail to a full day at work. I got back to the house at 7:45. A great way to start....