Kayaking in Monterey Bay

The last day of our adventure in California was definitely one of my favorite days. We were sitting around Rick and Helga's house trying to think of things to do for the last day. I was looking at things and saw whale watching in Monterey Bay. Helga and Nate discussed it and decided it was definitely an idea. We kept thinking and decided that was exactly what we were going to do. The next morning, we packed up the car with kayaks and we headed south to Monterey Bay. The weather forecast said it was going to be brilliantly sunny all day... unfortunately when we got there, it was overcast and cold... but we still got to see tons and tons of stuff. 

When we put the kayaks into the water, we noticed that there were some jelly fish in the water. We all decided that at no time would we be entering the water, besides the cold water and cold air temps. I stuck the underwater camera in the water to see what I could take a picture of without getting stung and I was able to come up with this one:

Not only do the sea lions bask on the rocks, but the monstrous sea stars too!! They were HUGE!!! 

As we were paddling around, you would see birds fly around and land in a few places. From my many whale watching boat tours that I have been on and seen ONE whale, I knew that where birds are means that the wildlife is around too. Where ever we saw pod of birds, we would paddle towards them to see what was out there. You can see the seal's head sticking up as he just threw a fish out of the water and all the birds trying to gobble up all the parts that flew as the fish was tossed out the water. It was pretty cool. 

We paddled through a kelp forest. The underwater camera was pretty awesome to have!! 

If you look really closely, you can see a momma otter holding her baby otter and paddling backwards!! SO CUTE!!!! 

Mr. Seal was fascinated with Nate's rutter. Nate was not impressed with the seal chasing him. It was the second time on the trip to California that I saw Nate somewhat uncomfortable. 

Then Mr. seal thought it would be a great idea to try and climb up on our kayak. Helga and I had made a pact not to go into the water so we started paddling like mad to get away from the curious seal. 

All smiles once we got away from the curious seal. 

The adorable sea lions basking on the rocks!!! And yes, once we got out of the kayaks, the sun started to come out and it was a nice day.