Tuesday's Walk

It was "hotter than heck" out there yesterday morning at 7:30.  Breeze was 5 mph or less and the Gulf was standing still with only the occasional ripple; and, those ripples were caused by a fish or bird -- "not nary a breeze" as my grandmother used to say.

We noticed the seaweed as we started walking toward the island.  Before we were through, the park maintenance people were out there raking it off the sides of the causeway.  They can use tractors on the beach, but have to rake the old fashioned way along the causeway.  Hot work, but somebody has to do it.  Just glad it is not I.

It was so calm and peaceful.  It seemed odd that there were not many birds around.  I don't think we saw a single gull.  Those feathered rats were probably up at the shopping center parking lots dumpster diving.  But we did see that egret and a heron.  A few of the cormorant colony sat on their favorite rocks but the tide was pretty high so the rest were probably still in the mangroves that you see in the distance.  There were a few dolphin in the distance but they didn't come close despite Dolores's whistling to them.

It was so hot that the causeway seemed extra long yesterday morning.

I was hoping for a breeze once we got to the island, but was disappointed once again.  Still no breeze.  So I stopped every once in while in a shady spot and took a picture with my cell phone.

Northeast end of island on the Sound side.

Path to the beach on the north end of the island.

View of the Gulf from the south end of the island.

As we were finishing the last leg of our two mile walk, we stopped to watch the water because there was a pod of dolphins roaming around looking for fish.  The cormorants had their eyes on them, too.  But no luck for the dolphins or the birds.  We gave up on getting the dolphin close enough for a photo op and headed back to the cool A/C of our cars.

This morning is the 236th birthday of our wonderful country.  As we celebrate today, I pray for reasonable compromise between the factions that are ripping our country apart at this time.  Hatred of anything Republican or Democrat is to me a completely unreasonable stance.  There is good on both sides.  And bad.  Our country was founded by men who believed in religious freedom, many of whom were not Christian.  They were Deists.  They were not atheist. They believed in God.  They also believed that so one should be persecuted for his or her religious beliefs -- whatever they were.  Some of us have forgotten that.

Enjoy your Fourth.