Ducks, Dodos And Loony Birds

The same day my sister and I went on our little cheese run, we also decided to go on a duck hunt. I live about a quarter mile from the shores of Lake Erie, so after we got back from the cheese house with our bags of goodies, we went down to the lake to find some ducks.

We walked down the hill and out onto the pier. Not a duck in sight. Only then did it dawn on me that maybe the end of September is not the best time to be looking for the little quackers, (duh dodo) soooo, disappointed and not wanting to go home empty handed or in this case, empty cameraed, I took one picture of the lake.

And being that it was very windy and quite nippy that close to the water we decided to head back walking along the beach and there they were……Loony Birds.
Two of them. On the beach in plain sight. Not trying to hide at all. Not wanting to miss this, I quickly snapped a couple of pictures as they strutted around on the sand. Then one decided to lie down in the water almost submerged, and wait for the wind to lift him up. It did and off he went. And here he is out on the water riding the wind and the waves

To give you a better idea of how big this sail was I circled the loony as he was standing on the beach before he decided to take the plunge. (I didn't actually circle the loony as he was standing there, I put a circle around him in the photo.)

I have to admit that guy knew exactly what he was doing. When we thought he was so far out that he might be on his way to Canada, he laid down and twisted that sail so that it turned and blew him right back in again. But you can see in these pictures that there are no boats out there. No helicopter hovering nearby. No waiting rescue just in case. He was totally alone on the water. And he had to be cold. Maybe his shoes, long pants, and jacket were water repellent but he still had to be cold. The other guy stayed on the beach the whole time. No need for both of them to be lost at sea and one of them had to be able to call 911 with a dry cell phone if the need arose.

After watching for awhile, we finally left them to their fun and headed back up to the car. On the way we did run into a duck and a couple of seagulls and of course I took their picture.

So although we weren’t successful in our search of real ducks, we did find something a lot more entertaining and throughly enjoyed ourselves. At least I did because I had a jacket on but my sister didn’t. She had to be a little cold herself. Dodo.