Sunday we took my favorite walk by the sea at the Avery Point campus of UConn. It’s good to visit on the weekends because parking isn’t restricted like it is during the week when students are in classes. There weren’t many people out and about, though, and the few people we encountered gave us a very wide berth. I think everyone is more cautious these days because southeastern Connecticut has become a coronavirus hot spot in the state, our numbers have been going up dramatically.
This sculpture was left over after the open air exhibition a couple of months ago. All the cairns were gone, however.
I need the sea because it teaches me.
I don’t know if I learn music or awareness,
if it’s a single wave or its vast existence,
or only its harsh voice or its shining
suggestion of fishes and ships.
The fact is that until I fall asleep,
in some magnetic way I move in
the university of the waves.
~ Pablo Neruda
(On the Blue Shore of Silence)
Flowers by the sea…
Although the main focus of Project Oceanology is educational, they do offer some public cruises. For years I’ve dreamed of taking one of the harbor seal watch cruises in March or April…
‘Twas a lovely hour-long walk all over the campus and now we’re tucked in for some rain. We might get an inch from the remnants of Hurricane Delta but we’re eleven inches behind normal. Our drought was elevated from severe to extreme. We’re going to need a lot of storms to catch up.
Once again, your seaside nature photos are beautiful, Barbara, and I love the lighthouse!
Thank you, Joanne! It’s a cute little lighthouse, only 55′ (17 m) high, built in 1943.
I thought it looked quite small, but sometimes photos can be deceiving.
I went down a little hill and turned around to get this shot, a different perspective from my usual shots from the level.
I wonder at the variety of flowering joys in October.We have almost none left in flowers here – and 20 years ago, there used to be snow already. And the birdlife at your beach – amazing! We use to have swans – lots of them – and many ducks – not so much else. So this is a real treat.
AND I dreamt about a light house right before i woke up today 🙂 just saw the image
Probably because we’re farther south in latitude than you are in Norway. When we visited Norway in the month of May I was freezing the whole time because I only brought clothes suitable for May weather down here. 🙂 Live and learn! We’re lucky I guess, that we have so many bird sanctuaries nearby — I never know what kind of birds I’m going to encounter on any given day. The Canada geese and great egrets are very common, though.
Sigh
I know…
Here’s to rain for you. We have a slight chance of rain today and need it pretty badly as well. It is so nice to see the sea with you 🙂 I hope you get to take that cruise one day. It sounds wonderful.
And thanks for the poem from Neruda. I just read a book by Allende in which his poetry featured fairly largely and I was thinking maybe I needed a book of it. It really speaks to me.
I hope you did get some rain. We got half an inch yesterday and might get an inch today – it’s a nice gentle rain so I hope it will sink into the soil. I loved *The House of the Spirits* by Isabel Allende and have been wanting to read another one of her books for years. I’ve only recently discovered Neruda and am loving his poetry, too. My goodness, he wrote so much of it!
Yes he sure was prolific.
Yes, we got about half an inch as well and ae maybe going to get rain today although at the moment the sun is shining and the sky is innocent of clouds. Still for the first time in days. It is a relief for the stiff wind to have died down. I’m glad you got rain too.
Woke up this morning to find we had an inch of rain overnight. Slowly we can chip away at the precipitation deficit. We plan to take a walk this afternoon so I’m hoping to find some fall colors. I hope your weather continues to be mild, with just enough rain to keep things in balance.
This was a true joy to walk by the sea with you, Barbara, thank you. Every photo displays the peace and joy you find along the path. I really liked the Neruda poem too. I hope someday you have a chance to go on the harbor seal cruise. Thanks for sharing your walk and the sea with us today.
I’m so glad you enjoyed this seaside walk with me, Jet. We actually had a seal come up onto our beach one day, but I missed that bit of excitement. They visit Fisher’s Island Sound every winter. We are getting sightings of humpback whales in Long Island Sound, too, after years of efforts to improve the water quality. Glimmers of hope.
Beautiful post. Love your photos.
Thank you so much, Peggy!
❤😊
🙂
The Canadian goose is beautiful. So tranquil which is not how I think of them, flying above me, honking to their hearts content. I like the Neruda poem. “I move in the university of the waves” Yes, please.
I love their honking sound! A flock flies over our home a couple of times a day, from one body of water to another, all year long. They don’t seem to migrate. “University of the waves” seemed to fit for a post featuring a campus that focuses on the marine sciences. 🙂
Ahhh, the gorgeous sea! I like how close you got to that goose, good job. Missing the ocean sometimes…thank you for sharing your walk.
Thanks Kathy! You must be having ‘ocean withdrawal syndrome’ since traveling east or west is not so easy to do these days… I couldn’t believe the goose stayed put and allowed me to get that close.
Lovely captures, I love being by the sea too!
Thank you, Donna! Being so close to the sea keeps me sane…
This was a lovely post Barbara. I went into my first lighthouse last year and enjoyed the tour. They only open it once a year by the Grosse Ile Historical Society. It is in an out-of-the-way area on Grosse Ile, which is an island, and it is on private property, and we had to go by bus to get there. I had a nice group of people who were on a tour of lighthouses in Michigan and Canada – I did not know that a group existed. They have special passports they get stamped for each lighthouse they visit The photos of the Great Egret taking off and wading were very good – you were close to him/her. Your Canada Goose was stunning and up close and he posed nicely for you. He was very tranquil – sometimes they are frenzied or hissing or flapping their wings. I hope you get the needed rain and it does not just run off from the dry earth from the drought. We have a week coming up of off-again/on-again rain as well.
Sounds like a good tour you took. I didn’t know there were lighthouse tour groups, either. A couple of years ago Cross Sound Lighthouse Cruises started up in our area, a round-trip cruise on a ferry coming close and pausing at 9 lighthouses here on Long Island Sound. We’ve been on it three times, the last two times taking relatives with us who were visiting. You don’t get off the ferry to go inside the lighthouses, though. It’s not operating currently due to the pandemic. There are some lighthouses you can rent for an overnight stay in New England. I bet you have similar tourist attractions out there on the Great Lakes. We got about an inch and a half of rain, and more will possibly be coming on Friday and Saturday. Yay! I was very pleased with that Canada goose, but of course I was fussing about the background, why did there have to be an ugly sidewalk in the picture??? 🙂
They were a very nice group of people and were surprised I had never heard of their group and when I wrote the post that night, a fellow blogger told me that she and her husband have a similar passport for the national parks. I am including the post here – it is really long, but I did the tour on Grandparents Day so the lighthouse was built the same year as my grandmother was born – 1906. I included a very old photo, from 1926, of my grandparents with my mom as an infant. This lighthouse was not very large. And the group was going to the Belanger Lighthouse next – it is not far away and I had never heard of it, so I went the following weekend to that lighthouse. It was not tall either and was closed to the public. The ferry trip sounds nice to check out all the lighthouses. The group was going to be traveling through Canada and ending up in New York at Niagara Falls the following weekend.
https://lindaschaubblog.net/2019/09/08/1906-it-was-a-very-good-year/
Thanks for the link! I left a comment there for you.
You’re welcome Barbara – glad you enjoyed it. I just commented back to you.
🙂