Seals

Well, we have lived at The Quay now for just over six months and last night I got my first close up of a grey seal whilst walking Gandalf, our dog. It was sleeping on a pontoon just off the jetty near the Yatch Club in full view of anyone who happened to be walking that path just after 21.00. It was kind of unfortunate for me that a very vocal American came up as I was taking photos and trying to get the dog in the shot as well. (I failed)

I was then subjected to about 15 minutes of monologue from the new worlder about seals ( it was a female apparantly) and dolphins.We then gravitated towards the ills of the world via global warming, the Israeli conflict, ISIS, Russia and all that stuff until at the end we reached Donald Trump and his advisors.

We headed there via what sounded like racism, anti-semitism, the gun laws (and how could you people walk around unarmed over here?). Please be assured that I support none of these things!

Frankly it all went on too long and if I had not been cradling a sufficiency of wine in my system, I would have brought the thing to a close a lot sooner. Even Gandalf let me down by failing to undertake his habitual barking whenever his walk is interrupted.

The next morning that ole seal was still there sleeping as seals do, I guess. Again I tried to get a shot with Gandalf in the frame ( and again I failed) but at least it was quite early and no garrulous males were wandering around. At that time of day. a "Good morning" is more than adequate.

Well, imagine my surprise looking out of the window later that morning when there she is again (after all I had been informed that it was a female and who am I to query?) This time she was swimming in a very leisurely manner around the boat float.

As we were going shopping anyway, we nipped out as quick as we could to see if we could have a closer sighting of her swimming around. We weren't disappointed as the video shows. It seems wholly weird to me to see a marine mammal of this size just chilling out in full view of everyone and with the town life and activity taking place all around. The pessimist in me says that perhaps it is sick and / or dying but hopefully that is not the case.

It is even more exciting to be able to see this going on from my own home. That is something other worldly even if the captured image falls short of the idea as can be seen below and could just as easily be a shot of the Loch Ness monster.

Still there were a few good shots that I haven't posted and I haven't yet had the nerve to get out my actual camera and lenses because I have watched others ( tourists mostly I think) walking about like that here and frankly it looks weird.

So, there you have it. All the excitement of a grey seal and not a reference to The Xandrian Quarters, or did I just!