Sea Adventures

Today was a great start to our long weekend. We woke up and Sonja made us some pancakes for breakfast, starting off the weekend on a high note. We have had pancakes a lot in the last week. I think this was breakfast number five of pancakes. We are almost out of the syrup that we bought when we got here last Thursday. After breakfast we cleared the table and got ready for Sonja's first kayaking experience. It was a gorgeous day already by 10, clear and sunny. We went to the hospital to get the paddles, life jackets and water skirts to keep us dry. We then went down to the water and got the kayaks. I gave Sonja a crash course in kayaking from what I remembered from grade 12 gym. How to get out of the kayak if she flipped, how to sit to stay steady and how to paddle yourself. She got in the kayak and was a little bit scared. I pushed her just into the water so she could get the feel for what it was like. She practiced paddling a bit on the spot before I let go of her and pushed her completely into the water. She had to keep telling herself that it was just a lake that she was on, which is reasonable because it doesn't seem like the ocean here. You can see more land around here than you can at most respectable lakes. After Sonja was in the water she paddled around between the piers to get the hang of things while I got ready in my kayak. I took some pictures of her paddling around and then joined her on the water. We went through a rescue situation just in case. Told her and demonstrated how to unsubmerge a flipped kayak. We paddled around the pier a little bit until Sonja got enough confidence to go beyond that. She finally did and we started paddling south along the island so she would feel safe and where I am sure that it is to shallow for whales to be swimming in. That is the last thing I needed today is a humpback getting curious and popping his head beside her. Not on her first day of ocean kayaking anyway. So we continued along the shore getting farther and farther away from the town and the island. We went south to the ferry terminal and sat there floating for a while on the current. when we got there Sonja spotted a head bobbing looking at us. I looked and it was a seal swimming there watching us. We tried to get the camera out to get a picture of him but he went under. After 10 minutes sitting there we decided to head back and take it easy for the rest of the day. We started heading back and the seal showed up again. However I was still to slow to get a picture of him.

We came back to town and made some lunch. I had leftover soup from last night and Sonja had a piece of toast and jam. As we were eating Sonja thought she spotted something whale-like across the bay towards Shearwater. I looked and saw a whale spouting. We stood on the deck and watched for him to resurface, camera ready fully zoomed in, hoping to get a picture of him. The ferry went by while we were watching for him and he eventually dove under, flashing us his tail and that was the last we sa

w. After lunch I played some Wii and Sonja cross stitched some more. Then watched some hockey highlights from Montreal's whipping by Philly. Supper came and Sonja made us a chicken and noodle salad. It was really good, but like all salads not quite filling for me. After cleaning up and doing dishes I looked out the window, which it seems I do a lot of, and saw another whale spouting and swimming. This time just a little farther out than where we were kayaking. I tried more pictures, but he was a little far away. I can tell there is a whale in them, but then again I took the pictures.

As of now Sonja is playing Wii and we are planning to watch Invictus and eat a large bowl of popcorn.

The rest of our weekend we are going to try to do some more kayaking as the weather is supposed to hold up and stay sunny. My supervisor was telling me of some cool spot to kayak to so maybe we will try to get there and see some new things.

We are also glad that you all are reading and enjoying our blog.

Tyler

Sorry I am trying to add pictures to this post but being a Saturday night everyone in town is on the internet and slowing it down. I will post it as is and try to add pictures tonight overnight.