On Wednesday, Lee and I arrived in Morro Bay, close to the foot of Morro Rock, three hours south of Monterey.
Morro Rock was named “El Morro” by Portuguese explorer Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo in 1542, “Morro” being the Spanish word for "Crown", a reference to the rock's shape. "Morro" can also mean pebble. There are nine of these "pebbles" or rocks that stretch in a line from Morro Bay going south to San Luis Obispo. They are actually volcanic plugs, the hard rock core that remains after erosion and time.
(El Morro, the Spanish geographical term for a crown-shaped rock or hill ("the pebble"). From: Gudde, Erwin G. (1949). California Place Names. Berkeley: University of California Press. p. 225.)
The beaches here are lovely, but I find California water much too cold for swimming, even this far south. Perfect for walking, though.
Up until the 1960's, rock was quarried from Morro Rock for building breakwaters up and down the coast. In 1968, the Rock was declared an historic landmark, and today it is protected. No climbing is allowed, and it serves as home to peregrine falcons. A birder had a scope set up, trained on a peregrine. I got to take a look. The birder said the peregrine was near its nest, and there are four eggs in it!
In Monterey, the California poppies were in bud, but had not yet bloomed. Here, they are in full bloom and are so beautiful. They are the state flower, and I love them. California poppies are smaller than your typical Asian poppy, being 1 to 2 inches across. The bloom below looks multi-colored, but only because of afternoon shadows:
They are so cheerful:
We found other wildlife at the Rock. We saw seals, sea lions, and sea otters, although none close enough to photograph. There were also seagulls (of course), the most common being the Western gull (Larus occidentalis). This, by the way, will be my one and only photo of a sea gull, mostly because they all look the same to me (my apologies to ornithologists and birders everywhere):
California ground squirrels (Otospermophilus beecheyi) - those are my shoes at the bottom of the photo:
The ground squirrels sun on the rocks - so cute:
White-crowned sparrows (Zonotrichia leucophrys):
The ubiquitous great blue heron (Ardea herodias):
We have seen hundreds of great and snowy egrets in Petaluma and all the way down the coast, I just haven't taken any photos.
We saw murrelets here as well, but I didn't have my binoculars or Lee's super-duper lens, so don't know what kind:
There are also sticky monkey flowers (Mimulus aurantiacus Curtis) beginning to bloom. These are indigenous to the California coast. The leaves are the sticky part:
After walking around Morro Rock, Lee and I followed the path towards the fishing wharfs of Morro Bay.
And what did we see? Sea lions begging for fish from a newly-arrived fishing boat. I know it is not good to feed wildlife, but we did see one boatman throw fish overboard to rid the stern of hundreds of sea gulls:
Pelicans were also keeping an eye out for extra fish:
Finally, night settled on the bay:
