thar she blows

Monterey was a nice little escape. We had two fine dinners, spent most of Wednesday at the aquarium, then went on a whale watching trip. It's not the season for what most people think of as "whale watching" -- going out to see the gray whales migrate between the Arctic and the tropics -- but humpback and blue whales live in Monterey Bay during the summer. And the whales cooperated -- we saw six different humpbacks, two of whom breached (jumped full length out of the water). It was quite impressive. We also saw a sunfish and tons of seabirds. Although I'd hoped to see dolphins too, I was still pleased with the amount of wildlife we got to see.

I'd never been that far out on the ocean before, and that was definitely an experience. Apparently the sea was somewhat rough yesterday morning; the ship was pitching and tossing so much that it was generally impossible to stand without holding on to a rail. There were a number of miserable looking people, too, lying down on benches, huddling up in little balls. Even I got a little queasy at points, and I am known to have an iron stomach. Unfortunately, T was one of the miserable ones. He got rather violently seasick, which put a real damper on the end of our trip. He seems fine now, recovering almost immediately after getting off the boat, but between getting up early and being very cold and ill on the boat he was exhausted. So we just came straight back home afterwards, and after saying hello to the kitty he collapsed and took a long nap.

Still, I'd say it was a good trip. It was especially to have several days of conversation that didn't focus on the wedding. We only talked about it once, when E asked about the planning over dinner on Wednesday.

And now, after less than 24 hours at home, I'll be taking off again for a quick weekend trip to R's family cabin (actually a house, I pictured a log cabin whenever I heard about it) near Mammoth. A few days at the ocean, a few days in the mountains: the perfect vacation week.