Heading North to kayak Elkhorn Slough

 We enjoyed our adventure heading north. Elkhorn Slough is an interesting area and we were able to kayak about 5 miles up before fighting the wind to return to our put in next to the Moss Landing KOA. We don't usually stay in a KOA but were thankful for the full hookups to run the heater. 

Where the Salinas River enters Monterey Bay

The small town of Moss Landing 

right opposite the Moss Landing KOA

It was windy the first day

Like our Morro Bay, the distinctive 

Power Plant stacks. 

This plant is for Natural Gas.

Heading up the Slough

So many sea otters all around.

A few weeks ago we were looking for river otters

in the Salinas River in Atascadero.

Now we see Sea otters

 where the Salinas river enters 

Monterey Bay.

And lots of birds

That old Dairy barn is where the visitors center is.

That marks the 5 mile mark

And a rare sea lion on the sand bank

Birds diving for fish

And a harbor seal...or sea lion

I always get them mixed up.

And this mama and her baby

 followed us for quite a while.

And back under the bridge to the harbor

Lots of interesting boats

As we left moss landing we stopped at

this great farm stand to pick up some fresh goodies

 We always enjoy exploring the back roads.

We followed the Slough up to where

 we had kayaked to...

the barn at the visitors center

Heading south on Hwy 101

there was a dusting of snow

on the mountains.

And another back road led us to the Soledad Mission

I always love seeing the original walls

There was a display of some of the same

Native American articles and games

 that Mike and I use with our Nature Club kids. 

To complete our trip we stayed 2 nights at

San Antonio Lake. The water is low 

so we were almost the only campers.

We celebrated our 50th wedding anniversary

with some hearty toasts and a tasty meal

and a few card games while

polishing off a box of Girl Scout cookies.

All good stuff.

We did some hiking and exploring

We found evidence of wild boar

And then, there they were in our camp.

Fresh scat....

And then they disappeared into the bushes.

Before we left for our trip we had Nature Club

I love facilitating these outings.

This time we went into the Fiscalini forest.

Mike showed us some Native American games

 Mike read a story at the Grandmother Oak

We explored the native site

We tried the whirring stick

Mike played his flute

We thought about how our early peoples

harvested and used used the plants...