Moose and I got the same ball as last month on the first shot. While we were still on the deck, we saw something black swim toward us. We called out what we thought it was... turtle, ray, shark... ultimately, I said ray because it looked pointy. As it got closer, Hattie started barking at it and we found out it was a black garbage bag. Rescued it with the boat hook on the first shot, too!
The park warden boat came by on his way out. He said they open at 9 am tomorrow. Going to check it out then. We hope they have some shirts in our sizes... or at least a key chain or sticker or SOMETHING.
We got ready to sandbar. Low tide was at 1:32. We did the sand bars. Walking over to the nursery, there was a black thing in the sand. Ben pulled it up and found out it was a rudder from a SUP or kayak. Moose found a crab to play with. There were beautiful shells- possibly a milk conch?, sand dollars, and sea stars. Being a national park, this is a no take zone, so we took a few photos ro capture the beauty. This is a favorite place for all of us.
Brought my phone in a doubled up dry bag to take photos this time since I knew I would be swimming to and from the boat. It worked well! Didn't see as tiny of items at the nursery this time, but saw several babies. Hung out there up to, during, and after low tide. Moose was set on getting to the sea stars before the seagulls did and he kept running after them like his life was on the line. What a sweet little Moosey.
Swam under tunnel on way back to boat, in the current. That's always a fun swim! Moose swam to the beach, looked for fish, and explored.
Not much to see today from the boat. A turtle. A large stingray. Some yellow fin tuna. A reef shark whose attention we tried to get, but were unsuccessful. I really wanted to have the nurse shark visit the back of our boat again! Maybe tomorrow...
Squall at 7 am. A little after 8, Ben had to turn on boat to reposition mooring ball that was continuously hitting our starboard side hull. We were the only boat in the mooring field for a few hours.
Ben and Moose set off around 9:30 to see if the store was open and if there was anything we would be interested in purchasing there. Turns out the only shirts were size 2XL, 3XL, or youth small- sadly, not even big enough for Roo.
Several boats came in. Most were charters, making us nervous grabbing the ball in front of us and backing up to allow some space for the boat in front of them to back up and get their boat hook that fell off.
Didn't want to go to the beach with it so crowded. So we swam to the sandbar instead. Walked further out when a tour boat came in blasting music and full of drunk adults getting dropped off at the beach.
Moose wanted to borrow a kayak ever since we were here last month. He explored around and came to take me for a ride to the sandbar that was on the other side of the mooring field loop. We hadn't been there yet. Heard Ben yell for us from the Cartermaran and got back in the kayak to head back. Found out the nurse shark was at the stern for a while hanging out with him and Hattie. He knew I wanted to pet one and was too chicken last time. We didn't make it back in time.
Moose dropped me off by the girls at the closest sandbar to the Cartermaran so I could swim back with them. They told me about how they swam back from the Cartermaran to the sandbar. Roo nonchalantly told Bear there was a shark in the water when they were halfway to the sandbar and neither of them freaked out, but kept swimming. 😳
Because of that situation, they wanted to head back to the Cartermaran, but were afraid, so they waited for me... like I could help the situation 😂 I told them to swim straight across the channel and let the current push them to the swim ladder at the stern of the boat. We linked up, Bear in the middle, Roo closest to the boat, and kicked to the middle of the channel as hard as we could. At some point, we had to unlink, with the exception of Roo. We ran into our mooring ball, but made it under the boat. I grabbed the line and held it as Roo climbed up. Bear climbed up the ladder on the other side.
Moose was still exploring on his kayak. We dried off and had a few snacks, and Hattie started acting weird. That's when we saw the nurse shark was back. This was my chance! I shot up and went to the back step where we could see it. Moose came back on the kayak and we told him to just float right by so I could pet it. It took a few tries for the shark to get close enough for me to pet it but I finally did! Everyone said it felt like sand paper, but to me, it didn't feel as rough. It felt more like tiny, smooth pebbles. I was just so happy I finally got my chance and didn’t chicken out!
Swam to the beach that now had way fewer people on it. Thankfully, everyone left after a few hours. This beach is not very nice. The sand has a lot of little pieces of jagged shells and there are a million little divots to fall into while walking. We only lasted a little while here and all of us preferred the sandbar.
Moose found a dead white octopus on the rocks, so the girls and I went to check it out. It was gross. We thought it may still be alive so he poured water onto it, but it didn’t move.
On our walk back to where we were, the girls and I spotted several small conchs. We brought two of them together in the shallow water where they were and watched them eye each other and move around. Roo found a few more and brought them to these ones forming a circle- a little conchregation of 8. They all popped their eyes out to see each other and moved around. It was funny to see when one shell hit another and the one whose shell got hit popped its eyes out to see what the heck just happened to its home. 👀
We walked to the corner of the rocky area, a little past our Mooring ball, to use the current to our advantage to get us back to the Cartermaran. Again, we had to swim straight across so the current could take us to the stern of the boat. This time, none of us made it under the tunnel of the boat- we just couldn't get that far out before the current sent us. It was still fun!
Our underwater lights were on, so after the sunset, we could see some activity behind our boat. The minnows were attracted to the boat lights. The bigger fish came to eat the minnows there. The birds dove to get the bigger fish. It all was quite a commotion. When Moose realized what was happening, he grabbed the bucket to try to save all the minnows. We realized all of this was kinda our fault, so we turned the lights off and went inside.
We did not hike up Boo Boo Hill to see the status of our sacrifice. Both Roo and I wanted to. The heat has been so intense and as much as I wanted to see, I knew there wouldn't be much that changed in a month!
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