The Lady in Waiting

I paid a visit to the ship yesterday to see how Claudia and Charlie De Gull are doing with the nest and the eggs.  No progress to report, but she is getting very cranky.  I noted that some kind crew member had left some open cans of sardines right next to the nest, but when I tried to help myself she almost pecked my head off.  So much for the blessed principle of sharing with your elders.

Claudia patiently sits on the nest

After I left the nest I took a tour of the waterfront and found some interesting things as I flew up toward the Ferry Building.   The first was a big mess on one of the piers.  It seems that there must have been quite a large fire and the front of the pier is all black.  Workmen were climbing all over the building tearing out the burnt stuff.

Remnants of the fire at Pier 29

It wasn’t lunch time so I couldn’t mooch any food from the workmen, but I was hungry from having seen, and almost eaten, the sardines near the nest.

I kept flying up towards the big bridge looking for scraps near one of the waterside restaurants and I came upon the funniest sign that had just been installed.

America’s Cup Practice on the Bay

While we were cruising around the Bay for Memorial Day we came across a strange looking sailboat.  It has a very tall mast and what looks like an airplane wing for a sail.  Instead of one hull it has two and they are connected by a net that the sailors run around on.  Very strange!

The Oracle 45 foot catamaran doing test runs on San Francisco Bay during the Golden Gate Bridge 75th Anniversary celebration.

Rumor has it that there are going to be lots and lots of people for the sailboat races and that is good news for the avian squadron.  More people means more tourists and that means more food for the troops!

The ship is right near the area where the races will start and we hope that the bird population will benefit from the crowds.  

A Beautiful Month of May on San Francisco Bay

Mohandas K. Gandhi statue on the Ferry Landing

Now that the ship is back in action and taking cruises on San Francisco Bay all of the avian squadron is happy. I flew toward the big bridge and landed at the Ferry Building to take a look around.  One of my favorite statues is next to the Ferry Terminal and it was nice to see that the mess created by some of our younger members has been cleaned up.

The avian squadron hanging out on the ship

Across the street from the Ferry Building at the funny looking fountain, which never seems to be flowing, some of the boys were playing in the little bit of water left and scrounging food during lunch.

The Last Battleship

This is the first trip of the year for the ship and we are going to be cruising around in the Bay looking for another ship.  It seems that an old Battleship has been fixed up and is going to be towed south down the coast to become a museum.

Things are looking up in terms of food, however, since we seem to have lots of people on board and it looks as though there is going to be a lunch served or something.

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream coming on board

This is pallet is loaded with ice cream. What are they thinking?  Gulls don’t eat ice cream!  Maybe there will be some bread or fish somewhere.

Well, it turns out that we left the pier after waiting for a bunch of sailboats to pass by on their way out toward the Golden Gate Bridge.  We fastened onto a tiny tugboat and they pulled us away from the pier and we headed north past the islands in the Bay.  We cruised around for quite a while until we found this narrow channel near a bunch of big round tanks.

HAPPY 75th BIRTHDAY to the Golden Gate Bridge

San Francisco Bay Golden Gate Bridge

While eavesdropping  on one of the crew meetings I discovered that the ship has planned a cruise on May 27th to celebrate the birthday of the Golden Gate Bridge.  I also heard that 2012 is the 75th Birthday of the opening of the Golden Gate Bridge. This is all good news for your faithful author and the rest of the avian squadron.  This event will draw quite a crowd and that will result in lots of food both on board the ship and in the Fisherman’s Wharf area.