April 25, 2008

Fourteen dolphins! Bunny (a friend and neighbor) and I went out over to Blackbeard’s Island (and yes, there is supposed to be buried treasure there.—somewhere). We took her little inflatable boat (think miniature Zodiak, though it could seat three adults easily), and it was a rather harrowing crossing of the sound past Barbour’s Island. Took a long time till we figured out we had to use more power as the waves, tides, and winds were keeping us in the same spot more or less. We hadn’t wanted to go fast because of the waves, but once we resigned ourselves to getting soaking wet, it was fine.

 Unfortunately all my pictures of dolphins are—well, you know how there’s a couple seconds of delay on a digital camera after you press the button? By then, all the dolphins had submerged, and so I have about a dozen pictures of fins. Some of the dolphins were as close as six feet or so, though none of them stuck around to talk to us, or do the flipper thing.

 There’s something very peaceful about floating on the water, with sunshine (and sunscreen) all around, blue skies, pelicans diving for food close by, and hardly a sound of humankind anywhere near. Magical. And the playful dolphins just add to it.

 Now, it’s back to work. Still, it was fun while it lasted.