The Traveling Widower

Tag: travel

  • Whales can fly! A trip to Moss Landing

    I can fly!!!

    I have to include a little of the sad stuff here, since it relates directly to the loss of my wife. April 27th was the first year mark for her passing and as expected, I was an emotional wreck on the days leading up to that day. I had been stressing out for some time on what to do – have a celebration of life party, try and ignore what happened, or do shots of vodka all day. None of those worked for me. Eventually, I came up with a good alternative to an all day drinking binge – go somewhere that we both loved. Since I had just been to the coast, I was reminded of something we did all the time – whale watching tours, out of Moss Landing. Jan loved being out on the ocean, and watching Humpbacks was something we did in Monterrey Bay and Hawaii. So, I booked an afternoon cruise, planning to stay at a really nice hotel close by afterwards.

    My plans changed the day I was set to head out for the afternoon tour – there was a storm way off the coast, and Blue Ocean (tour company) had to cancel the cruise due to high waves in the bay. Not a problem – I rescheduled for the following morning since I would be staying close by at a hotel that evening. I drove out to Moss Landing anyway to look for otters, and just hang out on the beach for a while. It was really windy and cold and would have been awful out in the bay.

    Windy day at Moss Landing beach
    Sea Otter….always cute

    My plans for that evening were pretty simple – dinner at the hotel bar, and a martini toast for my wife. I asked the bartender for my usual dry vodka martini, and to make a lightly dirty martini, my wife’s favorite, which I’d keep to the side. When I explained why, she had everyone at the bar toast to my wife’s memory. Nice. Made me cry a bit. I wound up talking to a lot of folks at the bar, and to the bartender for a few hours – turned into a nice celebration of sorts.

    Mine is on the right

    OK – enough sad stuff. I had to checkout and hit the road early for the cruise – it was only a 20 minute drive from the hotel to Moss Landing, but you never know with traffic on the Pacific Coast Highway. It was a bit foggy at first, but the sun was already out and the skies cleared when I reached the Moss Landing Harbor, so it looked like it would be a beautiful day. I like going with this outfit – a nice boat, with small groups, and a great naturalist and crew. I headed straight for the bow when I boarded, and found a good spot where I could brace against the railing – I was using the, heavy 500mm lens, so this was going to be a good experiment to see how it handles (by hand) on a boat. A family moved to bow in front of me, but they were all short….perfect. 

    There always seems to be something interesting to see in the harbor – sealions are always there, and sometime otters are hanging around. Here’s a pile of sealions

    Moss Landing is in a great spot for whale cruises – the deep Monterrey Canyon actually starts at the mouth of the harbor, so there are usually whales right outside of the harbor mouth. And true to form, we had spouts as soon as we left the harbor. Not only spouts, but active whales – tail slapping and breaching. Seeing a whale elevate almost completely out of the water is an amazing sight – the whales weight up to 45 or 50 tons, and they can get almost completely airborne with a couple of swings of their big tails (flukes). Getting shots of a breaching whale requires a great deal of luck – you have to be focusing near that spot when they begin to surface, have really good autofocus, and a fast shutter speed. And steady hands. I’ve been lucky in the past in Maui, but never really got anything worth showing here in Monterrey. My luck finally changed – and the new lens helped a lot. I missed out on a couple of breaches, one right next to the boat (I sort of got that) but the lighting was off.

    Big splash about to happen

    And then one breached too close, and I was not pointing in the right direction

    Too close….

    But then fortune smiled upon me, and I was pointing in the right place when a big one went airborne:

    Houston, we have liftoff
    Airborne!!!!
    Approaching landing (splashdown)

    The third one in sequence would have been perfect except for missing a tip of the fluke. Darn. But I was thrilled with the other two. We spotted a large group of dolphins and followed them for a while, and humpbacks were spouting and diving all over the place. After 3 hours or so, we finally headed back to the harbor. My hand was cramping by then from holding the heavy camera. 

    Heading down
    Tail Slap
    Risso’s Dolphins – they have blunt faces.

    I kind of like this long distance shot of a breaching whale – nice colors.

    This turned into a really nice trip for me – it’s not like I ran away from the awful memory of that day a year ago. My wife was on my mind the entire time. She is always a part of me and always with me in my mind and heart. But I was able to enjoy a few hours where I was focused on something so beautiful and amazing, that we both enjoyed together. 

  • Tariffs, Camera gear, and Hummingbirds

    Allens Hummingbird

    I mentioned in a previous post, that I had been planning to purchase a new long, telephoto lens sometime in the summer, before I went on the Alaska trip. Along came “Independence Day”, and excessive tariffs on just about everything that is not made in the USA. Almost all quality cameras and lenses are made in either Japan, Korea or Germany – we just do not make these things in the US. I currently have two Sony mirrorless cameras (A7II, A7RII), and a bunch of lenses for the two bodies – the equipment is pricey but you get what you pay for. The tariffs when announced, on Japan, were 39%…ouch. That made me think that buying now would be a good thing. So, I researched a few options, and wound up with a 100-500MM lens from Tamron. I was planning to buy a Sony G 150-600MM, but the beast just weighed too much to hand hold on a moving, small boat, so I opted for something a bit more compact. OK, enough technical photography stuff.

    Once I had the new equipment home, I decided to go somewhere to test the lens. and I really wanted to try it on wildlife, since that is what I bought it for. Since elk and moose are not an option nearby, I decided on a trip back to the coast, to the UC Santa Cruz Arboretum. No, not to take pictures of trees. The arboretum is a nice place to wander through in general, but the sections dedicated to South African plants are a haven for hummingbirds. My wife and I used to go there every spring for a few years, to see the little buggers buzzing around on the flowering plants and trees. So, I packed up my gear, and headed off to the coast (Campbell actually, where I stayed.)

    The peak of “hummingbird season” at the abroretum is in March, when all of the trees and bushes are in bloom. I missed that by a month, but there were still a lot of Allens and Annas hummers buzzing around. The secret for photographing these hyperactive, blinding fast birds, is to find one (or two) that have a territory they are protecting, and setup shop (tripod) at one of the places they roost to rest. You can then position the tripod and focus the camera on that spot, and just hit the shutter whenever it stops for a while (usually a minute or two). I was lucky right off the bat to find a male Allens that rested in two, really great spots, where the background would be a dense tree. I then spent a pleasant few hours, photographing one or two of the birds, and then just wandeed around in the arboretum, which has some amazing flowering plants. It really is a beautiful place. 

    The combination of the new lens, and the Sony camera with a huge sensor (44MP), and a little bit of luck, resulted in some remarkable shots. 

    The level of detail and sharpness of the birds neck feathers was amazing, given how small the birds are.

    I went back the next day and spent more time in the same location (and probably the same birds). The lighting was better that day, so I was able to get a few more good shots. I then wandered about taking a few picture of some of the strange flowers.

    Later in the day, I spent some time visiting friends in Capitola, and wandered down to the beach with their mutant golden retriever (huge). I so miss being near the coast. My wife and I spent lots of time visiting our friends there when we lived in Campbell. Sigh. Better times for sure.

    Capitola Wharf from below
    Old railroad bridge across Soquel Creek

    I did manage to help the local economy while I was there. My favorite camera store is in Campbell, so I decided to stop by and see if there was any gear that I absolutely needed to buy. I was amazed to see the front of the store covered in plywood. Apparently, someone drove a car into the store, and cleared out a lot of gear. Smash and grab. How sad. But while I was there, I decided I needed a a new monopod and ball head, for my upcoming trip to Alaska. I knew I’d find something. And I beat the tariff’s again.