Rusty's Beach

Re-entry

Watercolor of The Pacific Tuna King, a long way from Louisiana; September 2007.

I got back a week ago and am beginning to feel like I'm at home again.  There was quite a shock of arriving in a darker, colder climate from the always-warm south -- and also finding it hard to remember all the details of being here again.  I kind of wandered around the house in a daze the first day or so, feeling like a ghost.  At one point, I began to wash the dishes by hand... "This isn't the way I've been doing this, is it?"  Then I realized that we've had a dishwasher for the past 12 years.  Oops.

Bayou Bouef from the fishdeck/fantail of the boat.

This is where I like to sit and space out.

Dispatch -- Day 54

Watching the Bayou

I like to sit on the back of the boat and watch the bayou during off-hours, especially in the evening when it's cooled off.  Though the water is murky and a not a little polluted, the place is alive with wildlife.  Great grey herons, snowy egrets, bald eagles, seagulls and tweet-tweet songbirds are everywhere, and fish constantly jump and slap themselves back on the surface.  There are also turtles, watersnakes of some kind, and the occasional alligator.  This bayou, which I think is called Bayou Bouef, is also busy with all kinds of boat traffic. Tugs push barges back and forth constantly, supply ships head out to the offshore drilling rigs, while shrimpers, speedboats, sportfishing boats, and sometimes houseboats cruise by.  It's fun just sitting and watching the free entertainment.