Monday, April 13, 2015

Paddling around the Noyo River harbor and two more days at the cabin. 04-13-15

 

Bob and I left the cabin around 11:30 and drove down off the hill to Highway 128 where we turned west and headed for Hwy. 1 and the coast. When we got to rout 1 we went north. We crossed the Albion River, Little River, and Big River and came to The town of Fort Bragg and the Noyo River. 

We stopped at the local McDonald’s to use their wifi to post our blogs.
Couple of nerds eh?

We got on the water around 2:30 and paddled down stream.

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On our left is a high metal wall. It took me a little time to figure out that the wall was protecting a large marina. 
Paddling along the wall; we could see boats and buildings ahead of us.

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We got to the end of the wall and turned left into the marina.There were lots of large and small fishing boats stored here and they were well protected behind their metal wall.

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We left the boat yard and continued down stream through the harbor.

This harbor is a pretty busy place with lots of boats coming and going. You see everything from Kayaks, a wooden double ender being rowed by a gang of women,

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and gigantic diesel powered fishing boats like the Jesse Ann

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There are pristine well taken care of boats like this crab boat.

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Then there are some boats that have had a harder life like this old scow.

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The mouth of the Noyo River

We continued paddling down stream until we came to the Hwy. 1 bridge where we stopped for a while to watch boats coming in from the ocean.

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The channel is pretty deep here and the boats come charging into the harbor. Right at the bridge they cut there engines back and drop their speed to 3 mph.

Here is one of the boats coming in.

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There are several restaurant’s along the harbor. This sign caught my eye. Apparently you can call this number, order your food and pull up in your boat and be served.
Kind of cool eh?

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Seals and Sea Lions

We spent the day just paddling around the harbor watching what was going on.
There were lots of seals and sea lions feeding around the docks.

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The sea lions had the water in front of  one particular fish processing place staked out.
Apparently the processer throws fish remains in the water and the sea lions feed on it.
I saw several times where a sea lion had a sizable piece of fish in his mouth but of course I never got a picture of it.

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One sea lion surfaced right in front of my yak but all I got was  a picture of the swirl of the water when he dove again.

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Unloading fish etc.

We watched a couple of boats being unloaded.
Here are some guys unloading baskets of sea urchins.

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Here are some guys unloading a large plastic gondola of fish.

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Eventually after spending hours in the kayak my butt was hurting so we started back toward the boat ramp.
On the way we noticed this old landing craft that had been converted to a work boat.

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We passed the stern of this old boat and I wondered if the missing “S” in the name might be because the owner found out after buying the boat that he got sea sick. 

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Eventually we got back to the ramp and got off the water.

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It was a fun day.

 

Saturday at the cabin.

Friday night we decided that on Saturday we would cut down a couple trees for firewood. The trees we wanted to cut where going to fall on the road so we would have to clean them up right away.

After breakfast I split up some firewood for the cabin; by the time I was finished with that my back was telling me that, that was all the fire wood I should mess with today. so I canceled the tree cutting. I still have a month or so to cut down the trees.

I the afternoon Bob and I went up the hill to rough in a new trail that will connect the
“cabin loop trail” to the cabin.

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You can see the top of the dining hall from one place on the trail.

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We got the trail pretty well defined, now all I have to do is grade it so I it will be flat enough to walk on. 

Sunday:

Bob and I were sirring out in front of the cabin discussing where to  put a trail to the bench.
After a much discussion Bob said “Ah, hell just get the tool and we can make the trail in a few minutes.”

I got the tool

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and in about 15 minutes we had a trail up to the bench.

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Bob Left shortly after we finished the Trail to the bench.

Moving the barrels to the spring.

I wanted to take the barrels up to the spring but like my friend Jerry says “any time you want to do something you always have to do something else first.”
This time I had to remove the shelf from the back of the jeep.

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That turned out to be easy just 2 bolts and it’s out.

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The barrels didn’t really fit very well but a heavy duty bungee will take care of that.

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I took the barrels up to the spring.

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After delivering the barrels I split some firewood for the evening fire and goofed off for the rest of the day.

Monday:

Today I am going to Ukiah to do some shopping, laundry and to publish this blog.

When I got to Ukiah I found a laundry next to a gas station and a deli. That worked out quite well as I was able to top off all my gas tanks, Have lunch and get my washing done all within an hour.

Now I am at a McDonalds trying to publish this…

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