Last year when we visited Monterey to explore the museum and the city, I noticed that not only were there many sea otters swimming around in the Monterey Bay, there were people kayaking right next to them! I had no previous knowledge that this was a possibility, so ever since it had been on my to-do list for the near future.
As Will and I were thinking about what we might like to do to celebrate Valentine's Day this year, I noticed that I had a four day weekend from work due to Presidents' Day and Lincoln Day, and it would provide a good opportunity to go somewhere. And what better place to go than Monterey to play with the otters! Thanks to Will's frequent travel which results in points for everything from airlines to hotels, we got our nights for free at the Holiday Inn Seaside, CA.
As Will researched kayaking in Monterey Bay, he came across information about the Elkhorn Slough (pronounced "slew"), which is a little north of Monterey, and provides amazing wildlife viewing due to the condensed nature of the preserve. Monterey Bay Kayaks provides kayak rentals from Moss Landing, which is just down the waterway from the Slough, so off we went! We left Oakland, headed for Santa Cruz for lunch, and stopped off in Moss Landing for our kayaking adventure. We saw many sea lions on a pier in Moss Landing, including a stellar sea lion, which makes the rest look tiny! On our way paddling into the slough we saw a sea otter eating off a clam shell. Once we got into the slough we saw more sea otters than I could ever have imagined we'd see. We probably saw 75 to 100 of them! There were a few rafts of otters, and many individuals and pairs as well. One otter was putting on a great show, somersaulting, twirling, bathing (i.e. squishing his cheeks, sticking out his tongue, and rubbing his feet together; so cute!) There were many birds, and what we were not expecting to see: harbor seals! There were two that were following us for a while as we paddled, and one jumped out of the water about two feet behind us a couple times. They were very curious and wanted to check us out. One otter popped out of the water about a foot away from our kayak and got really startled and went right back under water; he was not expecting us to be there! As we were heading back in from our amazing time in the slough, we were paddling through the marina and saw a pair of otters next to a dock. One swam toward us and barked! The other one banged a mussel shell on the dock to open it and ate from it! It was a great end to our exploration.
We decided not to get an underwater camera just because the pictures
rarely turn out that well, and I really don't trust the waterproof cases
for cameras/iphones, or my clumsy hands, so we went without a camera.
This way we also got to fully enjoy our experience, rather than view it
all through a camera lens. I found some great pictures from a quick
google search that portray nicely what we saw on our trip.
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| Map of Elkhorn Slough from Monterey Bay Kayaks. We went in about 1.5 miles. |
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| Sea lions on a dock on the way into the slough. (pic from seemonterey.com) |
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| Otter in the kelp bed. (pic from news.ucsc.edu) |
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| Raft of sea otters. (pic from tripadvisor.com) |
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| This was like the little harbor seal that was following us! (pic from wowclicks.typepad.com) |
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| Marina where we saw the last two otters (pic from montereykayaks.com) |
After kayaking, we checked into our hotel only about twenty minutes away. We soaked in the hot tub before we got ready for dinner at The Market Restaurant which was a nice walk around a lagoon away from our hotel. We had an amazing dinner of scallops, fish, and seafood pasta! This was certainly one of the best and most memorable Valentine's Days ever!
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