Oh, Canada!

So on Wednesday I managed to get to Canada. I spent hours on Monday night trying to figure out if I could get to Victoria or just to Sidney, and how I could get there, and what I might be able to do. I ended up just going to Sidney on the Washington State Ferry; all the private ferries that offer stops in both Friday Harbor and Victoria only go to those cities from some other point - they don't offer trips between Friday Harbor and Victoria. I suppose I could have taken a bus from Sidney to Victoria, but I didn't particularly want to add another step to my trip - I wanted time to actually see things! I ended up having to take a 6 am ferry from Friday Harbor to Anacortes, WA, before taking an 8:15 am ferry from Anacortes to Sidney. (The Washington State Ferry System only runs 2 ferries a day from Anacortes to Sidney and back, one in the morning that doesn't make any other stops and one in the afternoon/evening that stops in Friday Harbor.) I had to get up at 4:30 am to be sure I'd get to town in time to catch the first ferry! (Because it takes me about 30 minutes to bike into town, they tell you to be at the ferry dock at least 30 minutes before the ferry's posted departure time, and I had to actually wake up, eat breakfast, and get ready to leave.)

Anyway, I got into Sidney around 10:30 am. The Canadian customs people were really nice and quick; it took me less than 5 minutes to get through. I spent the day mostly walking around downtown Sidney. It felt very quiet, even when the shops got busy later in the day. They had 11 bookstores within a couple blocks of each other!!! Most of them were used book stores of the most awesome type, where you go in and they have so many books they have to make piles on the floor and on top of shelves (that don't necessarily match each other), and every time you go around a corner of a shelf or through a doorway you discover even more books. It was pretty much heaven, getting to wander through all the bookstores. I found a book about crocheting decorations for the home that was very obviously from the 1970s. Some of the patterns looked decent enough, except for the color schemes, which were largely olive green with orange or yellow - those '70s types of color combinations. I also visited Sidney's local historical museum, which gave the history of the town and a bit about the surrounding area on the Saanich Peninsula. I found a little bakery that actually had decently priced pastries!! At home, it seems like all the little bakeries charge you at least $5 for a small brownie. The one I visited seemed to charge much less for things. I got a huge strawberry rhubarb turnover - for $1.26!!! (After tax!) I had a great time just chilling, strolling past the stores and window shopping and being an actual tourist for once. Sidney was very nice; it was a quaint small-town without the feeling that it was trying to be quaint. It was a very unpretentious quaintness.

The one thing I can't figure out: I passed a gas station, and the sign was advertising the price as "144.9" I have no idea what that means! It seems impossible that they would be charging $144.90 for a gallon of gas (even a Canadian gallon, which is apparently larger than a US gallon), and of course a liter is even smaller than a gallon. Can anyone tell me what the "144.9" meant??

When I came back to Friday Harbor, the US Customs guy wanted to know every single detail of my travel. It would have been easier just to hand him a complete itinerary of my day!! I suppose it might have seemed a little odd at first glance, someone from North Carolina getting off a ferry from Canada in Friday Harbor, but the second thing I told him (after telling him that I live in North Carolina) was that I have an internship on San Juan Island. And I went to Canada to do sightseeing. And I just brought back some souvenirs (okay, what I actually brought back was a candy bar, a book, and some yarn, but I figured saying "souvenir" was close enough). And I just went to Sidney, I didn't go to Victoria, and only for the day. And I walked around in Canada. And I didn't go to Victoria, I just went to Sidney. And I got there by taking the ferry from Anacortes. And I got to Anacortes on the ferry. And I didn't go to Anacortes from Seattle, I took the ferry from Friday Harbor that morning because I'm living on the island for my internship, and then I took the ferry from Anacortes to Sidney, where I walked around for the day. -Then he said he'd forgotten about my having an internship on the island and let me go. He must've forgotten pretty fast!! Along with forgetting a couple times that I said I only went to Sidney, NOT Victoria. Honestly, I understand that they're trying to keep us safe, but he spent more time questioning me about my traveling than the Canadian woman in front of me! And I think they could stand to be a little friendlier, too.

We've also gotten in a new seal, Ocelot (sorry, no pictures yet!), as well as a young Coot. He's pretty cute - he's got feet that are as big as he is tall!! It's amusing to see this little tiny bird with feet that look like they belong on something 5 times his size, because he's got these long, super-skinny toes.

The past few days have been downright chilly! I do like cool weather, but not in the middle of summer! As beautiful as it is out here, I just can't see myself living in a place where you need to wear long sleeves and jeans in July because you'll be cold otherwise (unless it's south of the equator!).

We've also got a third otter kit in, sent to us from another rehab center. He's a bit smaller than the two we already have, so he's being kept separately. Part of that may be from poor nutrition - they were feeding him apples, carrots, quail, eggs, and corn on the cob at the other center. Everyone here was pretty flabbergasted by the diet he'd been getting - it's not the sort of thing you should be feeding a river otter. And I would think it wouldn't be that difficult to do a little research on what other rehab centers would feed a river otter, or to at least research otters' natural history to discover what they eat in the wild and try to find suitable alternatives. It's baffling, trying to figure out why they decided to give this poor kit the diet they did. (Also, I know several people who expressed a desire to own an otter. They are incredibly cute... but they are also very gross and smelly!! Consider yourself warned. ;-D)

I always know where my towel is.

The internet is finally working again!! :-D As promised, I have TONS to talk about - hopefully I can remember everything I wanted to say!

About 2 weeks ago, the night before Laura, one of the other interns, left for home, she and Jana and I decided to eat in town. (Who wants to cook the night before they leave? We wanted to celebrate!) We could have ridden bikes into town, but then we'd have been all gross and sweaty when we got there, which just wouldn't do. Instead, we participated in the "San Juan Rideshare" program, more commonly known as hitchhiking. There are Rideshare stops along most of the major roads around the island where you can wait for someone going the appropriate direction. The stops have signs posted with tips for using the program (including "Dress for success" - ie, don't look sketch - and only tell the driver your destination after they tell you theirs - so you can turn them down if you think they're too sketch). We waited for about 20 minutes before someone headed into town stopped for us, a nice older woman who lives on the island. (Apparently locals tend to be the ones who actually pick up people. Visiting tourists don't seem as keen on participating.) After dinner, we had an incredibly easy time getting a ride back out of town, the opposite of what normally happens! The second car to drive by the stop at the edge of town picked us up, a girl just a few years older than us, also a resident on the island. It was a pretty cool experience overall!

Since I last wrote about seals, we've gotten five more. Palila (named by Laura), a female, came in right at the beginning of July, followed quickly by Stilt (named by a staff member), a male.

Palila (taken 3 days ago), a brat if there ever was one!

Stilt (taken just after he came in), the sweetest pup so far. The green mark on his head was placed there by the Marine Mammal Stranding Network when they first checked on him. When he was still beached (and much skinnier!) 5 days later, they picked him up and brought him to us.

The last three seals came in over just two days, this past Friday and Saturday. Shrike, named by Alec, arrived on Friday, and she is the most gorgeous seal I've ever seen. On Saturday, another female arrived, which I dubbed Nukupu'u (the coolest name ever!). She was followed swiftly by a male, named Eskimo (short for Eskimo curlew) by Jana. Saturday was very hectic, with the arrival of two new seals!

Shrike. Isn't she gorgeous? One of the staff members told me dark seals are rarer, which is really too bad! We're joking that she should be set up with O'o so they can make beautiful dark-furred Harbor Seal babies! ;-)

Nukupu'u!! Supposedly, she's a real pill, but the one time I got to tube her she was perfectly fine! That may have had something to do with the fact that she'd been napping just before I fed her, but I'll take what I can get. ;-) Of course, she may turn out like Palila, acting like a brat for everyone but the person who named her (*knock on wood!*).

Eskimo. He seems like a pretty good seal, so far. He hasn't given people too much trouble with feedings yet, but that could always change! (Plus, he's being compared to Nuku, who makes Shrike and Eskimo look like angels.)

We actually got some garter snakes in this past week!! I was really excited. I think all my time with the reptiles and amphibians at the museum last year turned me into a herp person... or just brought out the herp lover lurking inside me all along! Both of them had been rescued from cats, so they got antibiotics for a couple days, along with some crickets. They recovered pretty quickly, and we got to release both of them! :-)

We've also got a baby gull, and it's absolutely adorable. Adult gulls? Kind of ugly. This kid? Cute as all get out. He's fuzzy and kind of awkward, and he reminds me of pictures of the Dodo, with a very round body, small stubby wings, and a stout beak. I really hope he gets better - I think he got hit by something (a car?), and it caused him to bleed into his right eye. He seems to have some vision problems because of it; if he's lucky, they'll go away as his eye heals. One of the staff rehabbers pointed out that a one-eyed gull should be able to survive perfectly fine anyway - I know I've seen one-legged gulls that looked pretty healthy, so a missing eye shouldn't be too tough to deal with.

Two weeks ago, on one of my days off, I got to go on a whale-watching tour. I managed to get on a really great trip! There are three resident pods - J, K, and L - that generally remain in the San Juans, and all three pods were hanging out in the same area that day. I got to see tons of whales, including a couple calves!! They exhibited all the typical behaviors, from spyhopping to breaching. The calves especially seemed to like jumping completely out of the water. A few whales also swam up really near to our boat, which let me get some awesome pictures. I wanted to enjoy watching the whales, so I was mostly just aiming in a general direction, shooting, and hoping something came out, but when the whales actually swam about 15 yards from the boat, I managed to get some really great shots. I will admit, though, a lot of my pictures are nothing but sea or sky, depending on which way the boat was rocking! It was a really awesome experience (but incredibly cold!) and, if I'm lucky, I might get to go again. The company giving the tours lets Wolf Hollow interns go for free when they have open spaces, so it's a really great deal! If I can't think of anything to do next "weekend", I might try for some more great shots - this weekend I'm going to try and visit Canada!

So much to say, so little time!

I'm sorry to disappoint anyone, but unfortunately I can't do a real entry right now. I have lots of cool things to talk about, but I'm borrowing a laptop and I've got brownies coming out of the oven soon! I had planned to update a few days ago, but the internet on the communal computer here at the intern housing seems to be malfunctioning - it hasn't worked in about 5 days!! I've got some great pictures to post, as well; unfortunately, they're on the communal computer! As soon as they get the internet working again, I promise a great post!