Afternoon walk on our beach

Yesterday we went for an afternoon walk on our beach. We have to walk down this trail on a cliff north of us to get there.

We are so used to being the only ones on "our" beach, so it was very strange to see people there. What's with that! We must have seen eight people. I know, we're spoiled. I can't say I blame anyone. It was a gorgeous day, the tide was out, though not quite far enough to reach the cave, but it was very nice. I just walked around in a T-shirt most of the time. We did get a picture of us which was kind of nice, I guess. Dare I put this up!!!

Quick, scroll down! Usually when the tide is out this far we find tons of sand dollars, so we were excited and both brought our own bags to gather. There weren't any! Not even one! We were so surprised, there were no shells of any kind. There have been times when we have picked up 35 at a time, for 3 days in a row, or some crazy number like that. It isn't usually that good, but last year it was. What there was however, that was also very different, are those sand crabs. You know, the ones that come in on a wave and dig down into the sand. In Newport they are just tiny, these were all pretty big, maybe 1.5" long. Big things. There were hundreds of them, all looking like dinner for all the seagulls lurking about. I took it on myself to "save" as many as I could see. Some of them couldn't dig down deep enough to be hid because the sand was to compact. They were like kids that hid their heads and thought no one could see them. The picture is a little blurry, but you can see how big they are. This is just his hiney.

When I was a little girl my dad used to put me on his shoulders and we used to go out in the ocean in Newport Beach, CA. He would reach down and bring up these same crabs but they were almost as big as his hands. I have to tell you, it freaked me out, they were HUGE! So, I spent the afternoon digging up a bunch of them and putting them in pools of water that were everywhere, where they could dig deeper into softer sand. There were so many I finally had to just not look down anymore. I think Bill thought I was nuts. So what's new.

We also saw some star fish, I know we are supposed to call them Sea Stars now, but whatever.

Here are a couple more pictures of the day. See, people on our beach! :)

These are all over the side of the cliff. You can walk by them and they are making spitting and popping noises.

Relaxing on the cliff with the warm sun on my face. It felt so good!

You should all come with us next time!