Epic Paddle

Gumdrop Island

Full Moon and Emily and I before we were leaving the night after our camp!

The seals after they had slide off the rocks (not quick enough to get them on the rocks)

            The otters before they saw us!

So when I wokeup yesterday morning I knew it was going to be an adventure day.  The sun was up, the full moon was on its way and nether Emily or I had to work the following day (rarity).   So when Emily got back from her bike and hike up Mnt. Edgecombe we were off!   I called John and Barb my boss to arranged for kayaks and we set sail  as the sun was began to set.  We paddled somewhere between 10-13 miles past Battery Island, the Parker Group (my typical trip), past the Chai Chis to Gumdrop Island following the sunset and hoping to find a place to pitch our tent.  

In vain we hoped from island to island only finding rocky cliffs.  We tried to find a camping site as we watched the sun sink on the horizon, the only option was to do an about face and head south back towards town.   We continued on in the moonlight landing on our first and original island camping option.  Though although small and covered with the "scarest bugs ever" according to Emily, it ended up being exactly what we needed, and the tent was bug free, with small exceptions, and extremely soft place to camp (better than any bed).  And it the perfect night to sleep out under the stars.  After strange dreams we awoke the next morning to rain.  I thought we were doomed for a dull creatureless paddle back to town.

Ha... that ended up being understatement of the century!  The creatureless paddle ended up being the most epic paddle of our lives (up to this point anyway).  No whales were sighted in the the paddle so this leaves us a glint hope that future paddles can be as impressive because what we saw on our return home will never be forgotten.  

A rookery of about 15 seals were on rocks sliding down on their bellies, and a raft of at least 150  male otters were playing and wrestling.  At one point Emily and I were 10 feet away from the raft undetected.  When they did see us finally about half of the little otter heads just turned and stared and the other otters took off to safer waters.  They sent the alpha male otters to stare us down and give us mean looks while all the other otters hung back.  The otter congregate in una sex groups called rafts.  

According to Wikipedia (I did some reading post trip) typically the males hang out in rafts anywhere between 10-100 otters, but rafts have been spotted of up to 2,000 otters!  The females outnumber the males 5 to 1.  They are polygynous creatures (sad) and the mating takes place in the water.  Often times while mating the males will bite the females on the nose leaving scares and many times keeping their heads submerged.  Yikes!  

After that otter raft nothing seemed as impressive.  A pair of porpoises swam with us back and a seal lion lay asleep unaware of our presence, other momma otters appeared with there young, but we were fairly unphased, our minds were still with the hundreds of little otters that let us paddle with them and that rookery of seals sitting on the rocks soaking up the fresh air.  

These pictures are compliments of Emily, I hope they help you feel like you were among the adventure.