While February is actually the shortest month of the year, it can seem like the longest, especially this year. With football over, movie theaters still closed, and day after rainy soggy day, the hours after dinnertime can seem to stretch on and on. Good thing that my husband and I are both readers. A good book is wonderful way to pass the time. Still, by late February, we are getting fidgety and ready for a change.
Just when we think that the rain will never end the clouds break, the sun comes out, and the bright clarity of the winter light brings the beauty of the coastal area into sharp focus. Greens are greener, blues are bluer, and the world looks brand new. We know there is still more winter coming, but given this opportunity, we get out of the house.
The little town of Waldport is right across the Alsea Bay bridge, south of Bayshore. It has its own bay beach and it is not unusual to see folks casting their fishing lines right from the sand. It is also not unusual to see a member or two of the resident harbor seals swimming just offshore, doing their own fishing and crabbing.
On the east side of town, heading out on Highway 32, there is a slough. It is still too early to see the Blue Herons nesting, but by April the trees around the slough will be full of them, flapping their great wings and calling their strange, reptilian calls. For now the slough is quiet and still.
