..Great places! Lotsa eagles, shallow waters, delicious bread and nice woollen shirts! Going to write a short story, if I do find time. There was this seal trying to climb to my deck...Anyone else been there? Ari PS: The island of Vilsandi was one of the places we stayed there - is the white lighthouse at the most western end familiar to you? *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced/forwarded outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
Several years ago I met a guy while at work that was working as a electrical contractor. One day I noticed that he was gluing some felt soles on the bottom of a pair of chest waders and we got to talking about flyfishing. A couple of weeks later he invited me to join him and about six others from his church to go flyfishing. We headed up from the SF bay area to the middle fork of the Toulumne river in the Sierra foothills. After a great day of trout fishing we all sat around the fire to talk about our day. There was this one guy (let's call him Mark) that started telling a fish story so I countered with one of my own. We went back and forth until he told the following: Mark and two other guys took a 17' fishing skiff off the coast for a day of salmon fishing. The area they were fishing in was known as "the triangle". The triangle runs from about Half Moon Bay (where they launched) out to the Farollon Islands (just north of SF) and up to about Bodega Bay. The triangle is known for having quite a few sitings of great white sharks. It was a calm day on the ocean and Mark was sitting near the stern gazing off towards shore and waiting for a bite. All of a sudden he heard a splash behind him and one of the other guys (let's call him Bill) in the boat came flying back and bumped into him, almost knocking Mark into the water. Bill said, "did you see that? That sea lion came almost completely out of the water." The all turned around and looked toward the water as the sea lion came out again, no more than 5' from the side of the boat, coming completely out of the water and nearly slamming into the side of the boat. Mark said, "I've never seen a sea lion jump out of the water like that...I wonder why he's doing that." Before you could say the words "great white shark" the sea lion came up again, this time, right next to the boat, landed on one of the gunwales and flopped into the boat. They now had about 250 pounds of frightened female sea lion in their small boat, already crowded with three large men (Bill was a former lineman for his college football team). The sea lion bared it's teeth and went after Bill toward the bow. The skiff had one of those free standing center steering consoles and Bill tried to keep it between him and the sea lion. As he went toward the side the sea lion tried to cut him off by going toward the stern then saw Mark sitting on the raised transom next to the motor and directed his attention toward him. Mark held out his fishing rod horizontal and tried to fend off the sea lion and actually had it partially in it's mouth to keep the sea lion from biting him. Mark shifted over toward the corner of the boat and the sea lion followed him up onto the transom. Bill saw the opportunity and charged the animal, lowered his shoulder and body blocked the lion back over the side as Mark sat there in shock then said..."let's get the hell out of here". I threw up the white flag and said "ok, Mark, you win." I could neve top that one. *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced/forwarded outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
John Fereira wrote: > > [snip] Mark said, "I've never seen a sea lion jump out of the water like > that...I wonder why he's doing that." Before you could say the words > "great white shark" the sea lion came up again, this time, right next to > the boat, landed on one of the gunwales and flopped into the boat. [snip] A guy I paddled with the last three weeks tells a similar story, from the days when he was a NMFS observer on a large foreign trawler, fishing offshore waters, except that the sea lion was a larger variety. The pinniped was feasting on the throwbacks from the net, as the trawler moved slowly through the water, and then suddenly snuggled right up next to the trawler's hull. The cause? A pack of orcas off the stern, following the ship. When finished with the trawl net offloading, the ship slowly sped up, with sea lion working its best to keep up, a battle it eventually lost, falling astern. And, yep, the next thing they saw was the sea lion being flipped into the air, as the first orca took a shot at it. Was not pretty, he allowed. BTW, John, the phrase in Oklahoma which applies to these story-telling sessions is: "The first liar doesn't stand a chance ..." -- Dave Kruger Astoria, OR *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced/forwarded outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
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