As I hinted in the last post, there’s a bit of a disaster looming, though, to be fair, it sort of worked out alright.
We arrived at the car park after a trek across Lindsey (one of the ancient divisions of Lincolnshire) and found it was full. Worse than that, there were a couple of people lurking round waiting for spaces so it was a slow job getting round and finding the overspill car park. This one costs £2 but they have portable toilets, and after journey of one and a half hours this was quite a welcome feature.
From the car park it only took a couple of minutes to walk over the sea defences and down to the beach. That was when disaster struck. I raised the camera to take a picture of the Donna Nook sign and…
…do you remember that I said in the last post that part of my plan for the morning had been to take my camera card out of the card reader and fit it in the camera?
Have you ever had that “Memory Full” message? I have. It’s a dreadful thing to see when you’re miles from home and you’re planning on a big photo session.
I suppose it’s already obvious that I managed to get round this, but for a moment I have to admit I was somewhat downcast. The solution was really quite simple – clear the camera’s limited memory (around 30 pictures) and use it to store a limited number of pictures.
Here are the results.
There will be more seals in a few weeks, as this is just the start of the season. The best season on record resulted in over a thousand pups, so I deduce there could be ten times as many seals by the end of the month. That’s a lot of seals.
There was also a warning notice, as Donna Nook is still an active RAF bombing range. I have heard them bombing sometimes when travelling in the area, though they don’t bomb when the seals are ashore.
There was plenty to see other than seals – including Pied Wagtails,Skylarks, Starlings, Shelducks, Redshanks, Crows and Great Black-backed Gulls. There was plenty of sea buckthorn too.
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Donna Nook is fantastic. It’s a bit of a trek for us, so we haven’t been for a while. Did you see any of the bull seals fighting? They move with surprising speed across the beach.
No yjey were all being quite lazy and well behaved. We were planning on going again but with one thing and another we seem to have missed the peak now according to the weekly report.
Great to see the seals!
Yes, it was an enjoyable day. 🙂
I think we’ll go towards the end of the month 😊
The overspill car park (£2 a car) is the one to go to if you want toilets and fresh vegetables. 🙂
Thanks for the tip!
So glad you were able to get a few photos of the seals. Nice to see the sea buckthorn too.
Yes, it all worked out in the end. The sea buckthorn was quite impressive.
Nice photos! I’m sorry you had to empty the camera. I have had the limited memory problem too.
I also have limited memory – it’s not just the camera! 🙂
Disaster averted, hooray.
I’m hoping to go again when there are more seals about. I will check my batteries, cards and camera before setting off.
Even that doesn’t always work I have found.
I may have to pack a bucket of fish in that case.
In Maine, I occasionally see them swimming in the ocean, but I have never seen them on shore with their babies. What a thrill! No wonder it was on your bucket list.
After the events of the morning and the camera card debacle I wasn’t that thrilled to start with, but a day later, it’s finally sinking in. Now I want to go back and do it again. 🙂
I certainly understand.
🙂
Phew! Great results
Thank you. 🙂
Wow, the seals look comfy. Were they talking?
Yes, there was a constant mooing sort of sound with the occasional outbreak of squealing, quite eerie in the middle of a marsh.
Then there were the Redshank calls, which are supposed to be the cries of drowned sailors…
AAIIIEEE!!!!
🙂
Oh, precious photos of seals. I don’t often get to see them around here. (once)
We once saw one in Whitby Harbour but apart from that hadn’t seen any others in the wild until yesterday. If we get good weather when we have a day off we’re going to go again.
Yes – that’s worth a trip back for sure.
Keeping my fingers crossed for good weather…