Mangroves, birds, and beach

Each day brings a new challenge for the crew of SV Madrona (that's us).  There is always work on the boat to get her ready for sea - things like putting new gaskets on ports so they don't leak, or marking out the  lengths of chain rode that our primary anchor is attached to - and making sure that the bitter end is in fact attached to the boat (it wasn't - but it is now.  No comment about the previous captain).  And school along with keeping food flowing from our cramped galley keep the co-captain quite busy too.

So, with those things in mind, we decided it was time for another outing to the mangrove swamp on El Mogote peninsula, and this time we brought a camera.  Rather we brought three cameras.  Our big Canon camera, and each kid brought a digital underwater capable camera that they got for Christmas.

So this is a picture post with comments of course.

Our morning started out visiting with this little puffer fish.  He hangs out under the dock.

And the laundry was still hanging from the previous day.

On to the field trip.

The Eagle has landed.  La Paz is in the background.

Our noble steed - now seemingly repaired.

General MacArthur.

Mangroves!  At low tide.

Young explorers.

La Paz and the beautiful cathedral dome.

A male and female Heron - of what kind I do not yet know.

I watched this diving bird catch three fish in a back channel.

Sandcastles are part of every good outing.

Pure happiness.  

Splashing at high speed is good fun too.

I snuck up on one of those herons.  

Carrie's got the camera.  Ripples.

The sand patterns were amazingly beautiful.

Light and shadow.

Lots of yachts and the old mountains.

Some sort of underwater insy tube worm things.

An oyster bed in the mangroves.

Stepping out.

Moonrise.

Griffyn accosting our friend Steve.

A couple minutes later.  Dusk falls quickly this near the tropics.

Now it's time to see what pictures the kids took.  First Griffyn.

First picture!

Mangroves.

Mom.

An interesting - something.

Now it's time to see what Tamsyn shot with her camera.

One small step...

There's my family.

The love between them is very evident in this picture.

A really nicely composed landscape.

How cool is that?

So that's our photo post, but it isn't all of the story.  Shortly after I pushed our dinghy back out into the water and got the engine started for our return journey to Madrona, everyone started yelling "Dolphins!"

Sure enough, about eight dolphins were swimming past us about four or five boat lengths away.  We didn't get too close, but it was hypnotic watching their slick sides arch out of the water and slide liquid back into the silver sea.  All in all it was a very fun afternoon.  And on the way back the wind had died down so we didn't even get wet.

We'll talk more later.

P.S. The rigging wire and associated hardware all crossed the border Friday, and we should have them Monday.  Yeah us!!! 

Owen