Of course my blog will focus on the outdoors but will include a lot of topics associated to it. Like my column in the Outdoors Guide (published by the Chronicle Journal newspaper, Thunder Bay, Ontario) it will be humourous, insightful and thought-provoking.
I am starting this blog after much encouragement from many of my readers, and especially my son, Timothy.
You'll note that I keep repeating the phrase "my son". This is not an example of poor writing, this is on purpose. Tim is the kind of guy that I am proud to say is "my son".
So far I have avoided Facebook and other social medias because I think too much is written about peoples' personal lives, whereabouts, and day-to-day activities. Some of it is pure drivel. I don't want to slide into that realm.
So to stay on point, I have just returned from a vacation in Hawaii. We spent one week on the island of Kona (known as The Big Island of Hawaii), and one week on the island of Maui. What an experience! I spent the majority of my outdoor time snorkelling in the warm Pacific waters looking at fish and sea turtles.
I saw my first green sea turtle at a beach in Kona that is known as a snorkelling hotspot. I went there alone one morning and did my first dive. I saw hundreds of colourful fish on the coral reef and saw my first sea turtle paddling around in the shallows with a number of bathers. There are signs there that warn people not to touch them and even folks that volunteer to keep an eye on the turtles and intervene if people get too close. The turtles don't help matters much. They are totally comfortable with humans and only swim off if you grab onto them. Otherwise they paddle about without regard to human activity. Actually I think they feel safe with humans.
I also saw humpback whales breaching in the ocean as I sat on the beach. I noticed that the lifeguards were pointing out towards the ocean. After I heard one of them say "whale" I began scouring the distant waters until I saw a splash. It was at least 5 miles out - maybe 10. I kept my eye on that spot and then a whale jumped out of the water exposing his entire body except his tail. I say "his" because I later learned that it is the males that breach, both to attract and show off to females, and to intimidate and spar with other males. Us male mammals are pretty much all on the same dance card when girls are involved.
Later in the afternoon I returned to that beach with my wife, Antonietta. We made another dive - this time at low tide. We spotted our first sea turtle underwater. A small juvenile with a shell about 16-inches long. What an exciting find! To see these peaceful creatures underwater is an amazing thing. We watched that little fellow/gal (not up on what turtle plumbing looks like) for ten minutes or so. Then we swam a little loop into a hollow between two formations of coral where some grass was growing on the sandy bottom. There we saw a larger turtle feeding on the grass. As we floated quietly on the surface we were amazed to see the aforementioned little turtle swim over to the bigger fellow (as we'll call it), gracefully circle around him and touch noses. The little turtle was spunkier than the larger, and it seemed to pay its respects but touch his/her nose as if to say, "Want to play?" It reminded us of our two springer spaniels. Cypress, our baby, is a little black and white four-year-old that is constantly playing and teasing our older, Maggie, who is eight. Both are females but they get along famously.
The little turtle eventually swam on. We continued to watch the larger turtle graze on the bottom. We watched in amazement as this turtle grazed for at least 25-minutes at which time it slowly rose to the surface and took two separate and deliberate gulps of air - without making any noise or splash - and then return to the bottom.
That day was the beginning of our two-week romance with green sea turtles and hump-back whales.
Great to see you have started a blog page. I thoroughly enjoyed your first post. As always your writing put a smile on my face.
ReplyDeleteBlog on!