One of my favorite things to do while at Pillar Point RV Park is to watch the birds....especially the pelicans. They're big, but agile in the air and amazing fishermen. You can watch them turn their huge bodies into thin arrows as they plunge into the ocean and emerge with their long beaks and gullets full of fish.
On a recent walk, we had a bit of a wake up call to remind us that pelicans are wild animals and while they are fairly used to people here and enjoy getting hand fed fish entrails by fisherman cleaning the day's catch at the boat launch, you don't want to get
too close....or have them get too close to you!
Hamilton and I were taking a walk along the bike path that runs in front of Pillar Point RV Park to get to the harbor to get some fresh fish for dinner. While we didn't venture out to the docks, we stopped at Princeton Fish Market who get their fish directly from the fishermen who were out that day. Randy, Princeton's local fishmonger picked out some fine halibut, wrapped it in ice and a couple of bags and we headed back down the bike path to our RV.
The Pillar Point boat launch is located between the RV Park and the Pillar Point Harbor.
There's a real nice fish cleaning station there and since it was about 4pm, pelicans, seagulls and other birds were hanging around waiting for the daily arrival of some of the local fishermen who would soon be cleaning their days catch.
Unfortunately, as Randy said, it wasn't a fishing day. The sky was grey, the fog heavy and the major boats just didn't go out that day. At the boat launch, the road leading to the launch had been closed to have it re-paved....so the double whammy gauranteed there would be no freebies today for the birds.
Here come Bob and Pamela, fresh fish in hand, walking down the path and we decide to sit down on the bench near the fish cleaning station and take time to enjoy the ocean view and watch the birds. It wasn't more than a couple of minutes before we noticed the pelicans waddling toward us... Over a dozen of them...clapping their long beaks together.
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The photographer in me was delighted and I started clicking away. In the meantime, more and more birds are coming and its then we realize we have a bunch of fish in our hands! It was like the Hitchcock movie all over again, except these birds had such long beaks! We started to laugh and got out of there fast!
To make a long story short, be aware of the birds when you're walking around with fish in your hand. Keep that in mind as well when you're on the docks. There's a sea lion or two who can jump on the dock and will follow you, trying to get your fish... Where else can you have an experience like that? It made for a great day.
Another bird photo I took on the same walk....
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