August
5th: :Kayaking: Homer and Kachemak bay
(Rob) I point my camera up at the bird
colony up on the sea cliffs of Gull Island just in time to snap a few
photos of the Kittiwakes feeding their baby in the nest. I'm on a kayak
in
a clam bay off of Homer Alaska. I've been paddling a long ocean kayak
around filming and observing some of the amazing sea life in the bay.
The shores around here are full of steep cliffs that plunge into the oceans.
The sides of the cliffs are full of grasses and shrubs that as the sun
hits the sides, turns the cliff a brilliant emerald green. Scanning from
the lush green of the cliff to the black rock faces, I'm intrigued by
the twisted patterns of the rock. Its as if you took a big book and burnt
and twisted it. The pages would then look all twisted and half stuck together.
Our guide Amy tells me that the area was built up by Radiolarian skeletons
deposited on the ocean floor millions of years ago and have been contorted
as the Pacific plate has mashed into Alaska and the North American plate.
Still on the edge of the bird colony filming, I'm suddenly aware of the accumulating horde of flies flying all around me. Then the smell of the rookery hit me! If you've ever been repulsed by the stink of a Zoo cage, imagine it ten times worse. The smell and the bugs, combined with bird guano falling all around me made it exceedingly difficult to concentrate on getting my shot. After awhile I gave up and paddled away to observe the wildlife with my own two eyes and not through the camera lens.
