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My friend Brett called me this morning at 8:15. He said “Where are you?” “At home”, I said.
I was still in bed, though not asleep. My four year old had come in for a little snuggle and he wanted to play with his basket of plastic animals.
When I heard the cell phone I jumped out of bed to answer it, knowing about the plans to see the whale.
I rushed in to my boy to say ”We have to hurry.” He doesn’t like to be hurried. I had 45 minutes to get me showered, dressed and ready and him fed, clothed and dropped of at school (which can take 20 minutes of solid kisses, hugs and goodbyes). Somehow I did it.
I showed up at the meeting place 5 minutes early. Brett was no where in sight. I called his cell phone to say I was heading to Marshall and would meet him there. I decided to make a quick trip around town to look for him and sure enough there he was packing up the van.
We jumped in and drove to the meeting place in Marshall. Our plan was to take out the motor boat to find the grey whale who had been hanging around the last couple of weeks. We got to the site and there was a lot of hub bub with tying kayaks to a trailer and getting all the necessary gear for 7 or so people to kayak.
I was getting the feeling that I might end up kayaking instead of going in the motor boat. This was ok except for the fact that last week I had taken a roll in the winter frigid waters of Tomales Bay and was a little gun shy.
I told John, the owner of the motor boat, I thought I was going in the motor boat. He said “You have two arms right?” I told him about being scared because of the roll and he said something about getting back on the horse and I explained that I was afraid of getting on the back of a whale.
Anyway, I was willing to go.
I packed up an extra spray skirt and vest and found a mismatched pair of soggy gloves and waited for the motor boat to get hitched to the van.
I talked with Pam, the other owner of the kayaking company, about banking and smart meters and the reality of the situation dawned on me. The motor boat was not working. They were running water through it and trying to jump the battery with one of the cars, which struck me as dangerous.
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There were other people waiting for us and the gear at a site further up the bay and time was passing. The wind was starting to pick-up and my enthusiasm was waning. I ended-up getting a ride with Pam back to Point Reyes Station.
On the way, we stopped for clam chowder at the Marshall Store and talked with the guy working there who used to work as a guide for the kayaking company. We enjoyed a painting of a salmon done on the back of an old wooden pallet. The story goes that half was painted by the store owner’s daughter and half by the owner’s son.
An interesting testament to cooperation.
They gave us some good garlic bread packed up in foil and we headed off to drop Brett stuff off in Point Reyes. He had decided to bike back and we thought he might need his stuff for a birding outing later that day. We ran into him a little way down the road. He had stopped to take a picture for his brother of the hottie chica on the oyster farm’s sign.
He didn’t need his stuff right away, so we headed back north with a plan to try to see that whale from the Lawson’s Landing Pier. Turns out they don’t sell gas in Tomales, so we wouldn’t make it. We turned again and headed to the kayaking offices in Point Reyes Station.
We sat on the cement outside the front window taking in some sun and anticipating the oncoming storm. Finally, I went home. I stopped at the store to talk to my boy’s dad and work out about picking him up from school and went home to check my e-mail and take a nap.
Winter is pressing down especially hard and the sky is now gray. The storm will be here soon. I have a Spanish class tonight and I am glad to have a chance to see my cute teacher. I hope the whale is ok. I feel kind of relieved that we were not hunting him down and annoying him with a motor boat. He can wallow in the shallows in peace.
I wonder what a storm is like for a whale.
