What winter leaves behind….

Posted on March 19, 2014 by admin

Tomorrow will be the first day of spring! I think we are all more than ready though it looks like the cold will be with us for another week or so. I’m concentrating on the light and the daily arrival of migrant birds to help keep me in spring mode.

One of the things that happens at this time of year is one big spring cleaning out in nature. You even see this at the beach.

Whelk egg cases and skate egg cases have been tossed up all over the beaches. The long segmented tan or gold colored strand is one kind of whelk egg case. Sometimes you can open one of the little compartments and still find tiny whelk shells but mostly the cases are empty.

There are lots of old raggedy feathers left behind. Looking at this one you have to wonder how that gull was even flying.

And the shells of all sorts of mollusks like this whelk wash ashore, creating sweet vignettes against the still cold sand…

And other times all the shells are gathered up together in big piles….I always like to think of these days as the days nature does her spring cleaning….now, if only I could be motivated to do the same!

Winter walking on Cape Cod beaches

Posted on February 25, 2014 by admin

If you were here on the Cape this past Sunday you know it was a real teaser. It still didn’t really look like spring. There was plenty of snow on the ground heaped up and left over from all that snowing and plowing but it sure felt like spring. Heck, the first day we had that the temperature was above freezing last week felt downright balmy and it was only 40 degrees! On Sunday it was over 50!

My better half and I headed down Cape for a day of playing hooky and beach walking. The laundry, vacuuming and other such chores could wait. A good beach day for walking has been very rare this winter so we knew we better take our chance while we could.

Our first stop, as almost always, was Fort Hill.

It is always beautiful there and it seemed like a good time to play with the new panoramic feature on my iPhone so here’s the big and wide view.

After walking around Fort Hill checking out the birds and the greening signs of spring we headed off to Coast Guard Beach. We were not alone. The parking lot was full and we soon found out why. It was a great day for paddle boarding and a tiny bit of surfing.

The views from the beach here are always spectacular.

That was looking in one direction. Looking in another direction the sky was a bit more ominous.

It was that way all day. One way sunny, the other darker and cloudier. We stopped at a few more favorite spots along the way and then headed into Provincetown to have lunch at Napi’s.

We had to visit the Provincetown Book Store, of course and walked around enjoying the winter sights before heading back towards home. We stopped at Corn Hill Beach in Truro.

Newcomb Hollow in Wellfleet

Cahoon Hollow in Wellfleet

Where the Beachcomber lost a lot of dune frontage and looks pretty forlorn waiting for winter to be over…..

We stopped at First Encounter Beach in Eastham….

Where it looked all warm and sunny on one side….

but not so much on the other side.

All in all it was a beautiful day for beach walking and it did our souls good after way too many days trapped inside by ice and snow and biting winds.

Snow at the beach….

Posted on January 29, 2013 by admin

Every now and then I hear that someone is surprised that it can snow at the beach….it may not snow on southern beaches but it definitely snows here on our Cape Cod beaches….and it is quite beautiful!