Elephant Seals- San Simeon, California

Landon and the elephant seals!

One bright beautiful morning, I decided to take Landon to see the elephant seals. I thought now that he was a little older, he would appreciate them more and man, was I right!

I know they all look dead, but I promise there was plenty of movement going on to take in!

My first regret is that I had packed my camera all up ready to go and take some awesome pictures of the coast, and then I promptly forgot it! So all my pictures are from my phone, which thankfully takes OK pictures. When we first got to the lookout point, I was pleasantly surprised that there were so many seals there. Seal season begins around New Years, and we were there around the 5th. We were also visiting my Grandma in Cambria, CA so we had a little bit of a time constraint. If we had had more time, I think Landon could have stayed for a lot longer!

We spied some seals in the water right off of the parking lot. We saw several males swimming, and fighting each other in the shallow water, and then three more seals sleeping on a bed of kelp on the beach. That confused Landon because I said, "Look, Landon, the seals are sleeping on kelp!" then he thought that all of the seals on the beach were sleeping on kelp and kept telling me that. That turned into a conversation about what kelp actually was and how most of the seals were sleeping on just sand. I love having conversations with my child! It's the best!

We also looked at a sign that told about all the different things that elephant seals do, like talk, flick sand on their backs, fight, and sleep. Landon then took it upon himself to find seals doing each of the things listed on the sign. We did see seals flipping sand, fighting, sleeping and talking. The male seals do this weird noise kind of like a deep burp. Landon thought that was the coolest. In fact, when he heard my Grammy burp in the car on the way to a doctor's appointment, he said, "Grammy, you burped like an elephant seal!" Out of the mouths of babes...

Although it was a short little trip to the elephant seals, the sun was shining, Landon was excited and it was just perfect! All of my favorite colors are included in the ocean water and I just love any time I get to spend on the beautiful Central California coast!

If you want to check out what the elephant seals are doing RIGHT NOW, here is a link to a webcam set up near the beach. Kudos to Aunt Net the Great for the link!