Shackleford Sunrise

Sunday June 9.
After seeing the wild horses the evening before, we had dinner at our campsites - mine was a commercial backpacking meal in a bag, no clean-up, just pack the trash out - we went back down to the beach.  There was a really nice sunset, but my camera was back in camp.  If I get photos from Chris or Carl, I will post them.  The air felt great with the sun down.  I took off my still-damp shirt for a while and enjoyed the breeze.  There were a lot of clouds but we could see some stars later.

On Sunday morning, I was awake by 5:30 and left my tent to walk on the beach.  This time I took my camera and got some shots of the sun coming up over the island's east end.  It was wonderful being on the beach at this time of day.  After the sun was up, I did a couple of miles beachcombing and found some shells.

Here are some photos of the sunrise.

 If you look carefully, lower dead center, you will see the Cape Lookout Lighthouse - about seven miles away.  Click on any photo to enlarge it.

Atlantic Sunrise

I took a couple of short hikes this month out at Back Bay, but didn't encounter any wildlife or anything cool enough to write about.  But yesterday morning, I was up at dawn for a walk of the beach of a couple of miles, and thought I'd share a few photos - although Blogger still is not making it easy to share photos.  I hope that they fix that soon.  I love time on the beach - or anywhere outside, for that matter - and was happy to see sunrise over the Atlantic Ocean once again.

One of my favorite birds, the common loon, is trying his luck here in the cold Atlantic before heading back north.

Fishing pier at Sandbridge Beach

The sun is up on another day.

By the Beach and the Marsh

Over the weekend, I combined two short marsh hikes in Back Bay National Wildlife Refuge with a short beach walk, over two days.  I would guess I covered maybe 7-8 miles in all.  So these photos are from all three little hikes.  The first was Saturday afternoon near sunset, the beach walk was Sunday morning just after sunrise, and the second marsh walk was Sunday afternoon.  I saw wildlife - typical beach birds, two kingfishers, three species of snake, a turtle, and a leaping white-tail deer - it's "flag" high in the air as it made a spectacular jump.  I also saw a "V" of snow geese in the distance.

I'm putting some photos out here, and will have more later - these hikes were good for at least two or three of my "what am I?" series.  Oh, what the heck - let's make it three!  Here is one.  Here is two.  And here is three!

There is such a wide variety of habitats in this wildlife refuge.  You can see several of these in this one photo.

Mother Nature is already putting our her Christmas decorations:

I've seen a number of nice sunsets, some spectacular, over Back Bay in the past few years of hiking here.

The next morning, I watched these sanderlings work hard for breakfast in the waves.  I wish I could move my legs as fast as these little birds do.

I don't know much about the life of a razor clam, but they have a really interesting shell.

Black backed gulls are about twice as large as the more common herring gull.  While they are scavengers, they can also be predators.  I once saw one in Maine swoop down and grab a eider duckling from the surface of the sea with its bill.  It flew off with the unlucky duckling without even missing a wing beat.

On my second hike in the refuge, I hit the jackpot with reptiles.  Several of these will be "What am I?" posts later, but I will show a photo of this little snake.  I think it is a red-bellied snake, although its belly was a pale yellow.  According to my field guide, there can be a lot of color variation in the belly.  All of the other markings suggest a red bellied snake, so that is what I am going with.  You can also check out this recent post of mine.

Notice the dark spots on the back of its head.  This is one of red bellied snake's field marks, although it could be another species.  If so, I am not sure what - any takers?  (note by Art on 11/13/2012: after thinking this over, I think this is a northern brown snake - formerly known as DeKay's snake.  That fits the animal I saw better than a red-bellied snake with a pale yellow belly.  The northern brown snake also has a black mark on the back of its head.)

A Lucky Wildlife Sighting on Friday the 13th

The animal stepped slowly from the brush onto the side of the gravel road that I was walking along during a return from an hour and a half hike in Back Bay Wildlife Refuge. The creature was about 100 feet away as the day rapidly headed towards twilight. It did not appear to see me as I stopped in my tracks. "What is that?" I thought. "Maybe a feral hog?" I reached down to start up my camera and looked down to start zooming with the camera while simultaneously starting to raise the camera up. I figured I could get a better look through the zoom and maybe get a photo. At that exact instant, the animal alertly looked towards me, and a split second later, it ran across the road and disappeared into the brush. At that moment, seeing it move, I realized that I had just seen a bobcat, the first I have ever seen in hundreds of hours roaming around the outdoors. I didn't get a photo, but it is an amazing memory all the same.

It was a cool and very windy day. I did not see much wildlife during the first part of my hike, which started about 4PM and ended just after sunset. But later, the bobcat and some other spectacular wildlife sightings more than made up for that. I will write about some of those later, but here are a couple of photos of the sky today over the marsh and Back Bay:

Veterans' Day Marsh and Beach Hike

I gave thanks often on Veterans' Day to the many people who have served our country over the centuries. Included in this group are my late step-father Stuart Silverman (WW II, Pacific Theater), my older brother Chris Ritter (Vietnam), and my nephew Kelly Rainbird (Iraq War).

I was at the beach, and decided to hike in Back Bay National Wildlife Refuge, giving me some more time on foot in my new hiking boots. I hiked a little on the trails and gravel roads through the marsh, and walked a mile or so each way down the beach. Along the way, I saw a deer, a rabbit, a great blue heron, and large flocks of tundra swans back from their arctic breeding season. I also heard a kingfisher's rattling cry, and saw a few other kinds of animals, but we will leave those for later.

Here are some photos from my hour and a half of walking. This one reminded me a bit of a natural Christmas wreath in the marsh, along with some cattails:

I left the marsh to head down this long walkway over the dunes to the beach:
Here is a view of the ocean just past the dunes:
I found this small whelk shell on the beach:
A herring gull flies over the waves:
Before leaving the beach, I took a shot of the beach down towards North Carolina, about 8 or 9 miles of pristine beach away.
I found this deer's backbone, skull, a mandible, and a bunch of ribs in the marsh. The other mandible and several leg bones were scattered about. It is hard to know how it died, but it was obvious that animals fed on the carcass and scattered its bones about.
A flock of tundra swans soars over Back Bay:
Sunset over the marsh and Back Bay. It was not as spectacular as the sunset last New Years Eve that I posted about here and wrote verse about here, but it was still a beautiful way to end my hike:

Dawn over the Atlantic

Last New Year's Eve, I saw a spectacular sunset over Back Bay, and wrote about it here. This morning, I stood on the beach about 20 minutes before sunrise, and snapped photos every few minutes until the sun came up. I will let the pictures, from about 15 minutes before sunrise to about five minutes after sunrise, each be a thousand words, and speak for themselves....

Bay Walk, Beach Walk, Brisk Walk

Today, I took the longest continuous walk since my foot surgery just over a month ago. I walked 4.5 miles in Back Bay National Wildlife Refuge, most of it on the beach, although the first mile of the hike was along the bay and marsh.

I slept poorly last night and was awake by 5:30. I could easily have made this another dawn beach walk, but instead, I got up for good about 6:10, and relaxed with a mug of hot tea while listening to a Mozart piano concerto (#12, so lyrical and serene!), and read about great hikes in my latest Backpacker Magazine. Around 7AM, I drove to the refuge and started walking about 30 minutes after sunrise. The tide was ebbing, as shown by this screen shot from my GPS:

Here is my route, mapped onto my DeLorme Topo USA software from my GPS. I hiked south through the marsh, cut through the dunes to the beach, hike south on the beach about a mile and a half, and then reversed course to eventually cut back through the dunes north of my original beach access point:

There is something so tranquil about a early morning walk on the beach. It gave me some time to reflect on things in my life, think about the recent passing of my friend, Judy, and think about my sister and her illness. Along the way, I tried to be at peace with how things are right now. The wind was brisk and raw at times, but it felt good to be out walking and communing with nature. Here are some photos from my walk.

Cattails along the marsh:

Tundra swans, heading north towards the Yukon:

And resting in the marsh:

Boardwalk access to the beach protects the dunes:

This driftwood appears to guard the beach:

The ocean is so tranquil this time of day:

It is like this all the way to the North Carolina border about 9 miles down the beach:

Pelicans are such a cool bird:

This claw is all that remains of a blue crab, which survived against inconceivable odds to become an adult. Probably, some of his molecules live on in the muscle tissue of a gull:

This gull has managed to find breakfast:

Dunes protect the marsh. The dune zone here is about a quarter mile wide:

Swans fly in "V" formation over the ocean, heading north: