Sonoma County Parks Pass Owner

Well, it’s official. This household now owns a Sonoma County Parks Pass. With it, we no longer have to park in the free lot across the road from the Gualala Point Regional Park – we can now save about 15 minutes of walking and park inside !

The wife and I used to park outside the park and walk-in; by the time we got to the coast, we’d already feel a little antsy. I think we’re both good for about a 1 hour walk, and that extra walk from the free lot into the main park was costing us time ( and the quality of the walk, while OK, wasn’t as nice as inside the park.)

So we tested that new pass out twice this weekend.

Saturday we visited the actual park.

We finally visited the visitor center – worthwhile 30 minutes. Plenty of information about the native americans who originally inhabited the area, plus details on the whales that cruise the coast.

While we didn’t see any spouts, DeeDee pointed out a bird overlooking the ocean on a bluff. It was fairly far away, and the binoculars and camera didn’t give an immediate i.d. – although Red-tail Hawk was likely ( and it was.)

Tuns out he was snacking on a vole / mouse of some sort. That was a pretty cool encounter. We saw plenty of gulls ( I’m now thinking gulls are the hardest to i.d. – just when I think “yellow beak, orange spot, pink feet” = Western Gull – you find out the immature variants are gray, no color on their beaks. Ugh. We also saw a nice American Kestrel hunting on a lone tree in the main field of the park.

Sunday we decided to go directly on the other side of the the park and Hwy 1 and go down to the campground/river.

We found our way down to a sand-bar that lasted about 1/2 mile. Right out of the gate, I saw a Belted Kingfisher zipping down the river, hugging it closely. Cool! We also saw a grebe, a pair of common mergansers being pushed to us by a boat and a small group of Buffleheads. We ended up seeing two other Kingfishers – one on a branch fishing, the other zooming again down the river. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen a kingfisher and seeing three within an hour was pretty awesome.

I look forward to going back to both locations – the campground/river looks like perfect habitat to see Bald Eagles and/or Osprey fishing.