More cool stuff on the beach

Leslie and Dave came down Friday for another superb minus-tide beach walk. The weather cooperated with a perfect sunny day, and we rambled the 3 or so miles from Maxwelton back to Scatchet Head, barefoot most of the way. Sights of the day were: that same otter again, a half-dozen bald eagles sitting on the beach, many tiny flounders hiding in the sand in the tide pools. A large bright-red anemone(another Christmas anemone, maybe...?), many moon snails, and we actually caught this one laying eggs! If you double-click to enlarge th photo you will see.. On the right, the snail's shell. In the middle, and partially covering the shell, the snails "meat" (although I'm sure there's a more scientific name for it...). On the left, the rubbery-looking thing is the egg casing. You see these laying all over the beach, looking for all the world like big rubber gaskets that the tide has washed in from a shipwreck. But what the actually are, as I understand it, is a mixture of sand, mucus, and snail eggs. This is the first time I've seen a snail actually pumping one out.

After our long day on the beach, we retired to the deck with wine. Dave apparently got a bit chilled. We decided the title of the picture should be "Summer Evening in the Pacific Northwest".

Saturday we went on the Whidbey Island Garden Tour. This included only 4 gardens, but what with stops for lunch, a visit to the best thrift store in the world, and a stop for shopping at the dump (where we scored an antique fireplace poker set, and 5 big iron tiki-torch stands), it took all day.

The gardens were marvelous but man, looks like waaaay to much work to me. One of them, ust downt the road from me, was truly an estate: main house, guest house (far larger than my own), and a fantastic remodelled barn that I sooo wanted to go inside. But the buildings were off-limits, so we had to content ourselves with wondering through 20 acres of flowers, shrubs, ferns, and the like. This turns out to be the (retirement?) estate of Artie Kane, who was a prolific Hollywood composer and conductor. Although his last movie listing was, sadly, Waterworld, he's got composer credits going clear back to The Rockford Files, and conductor credits for well over 50 movies including Good Will Hunting, Alien:Resurrection, Men In Black, Sister Act. And apparently a truckload of money.