I’ve been meaning to take advantage of the UCLA Marine Aquatic Center for awhile now and finally got around to doing that today.  They rent out kayaks to students for free (and of course I never got around to it while I was a student), so they can go enjoy a little paddling around the marina.  I went with Ninja, who’s always up for any sort of adventure or new thing, and we got a two-person kayak so I would only have to pay $5.  If I had gotten my own, it would have been $15 an hour!  Ridiculous.

We got our paddles and sat into the kayak, then went off on our way.  I think I took a paddle that was not quite long enough, since the motion kept getting in the way of my legs and I’d hit the side of the kayak as I made my paddles.  Perhaps it was just lack of arm strength though.  As we went along, we saw a sheriff’s boat pulling up to one entering the marina – was it “pulled over”?  We also saw seals diving for fish and birds congregating where fish were being netted.  A few items of trash floated near us, so we navigated so I could pick them up and put them up front to take back.

In the area where the water was very still, we managed to get a decent rhythm and speed going, which felt really good.  At times it seemed we could just glide upon the water with our feet (and so we stuck our feet into the water to simulate that).  We saw many boats with fun names or really cool designs, and many very fancy ones.  Some were from the local area and others had come from other cities.  There were even two or three floating homes at the end of some of the docks, complete with couches and dining tables and beds and pets.  Now there’s a lifestyle.

As we approached the exit to the open ocean, rocks on the shore were covered with barnacles and scurrying amongst them were little crabs that looked like spiders or scorpions.  A few seagulls were floating near the shore and we quietly approached them, gliding closer and closer until they decided we had invaded their personal space and took off.  After we made an entire circle, we got back and cleaned off the equipment, got rid of the trash properly through the trash bins and recycle, and guzzled down some drinks to recover to from the two-hour effort.  It was a nice little excursion and a fun way to exercise a bit and enjoy some nature-y sights.

Later at night, we came across a spider who had built a web in a parking garage.  One of his web’s anchors extended straight to the ground, which was not the best idea, since it will get broken when residents arrive and drive that way.  Ninja decided to help him out by relocating that thread to the ceiling, but unfortunately it wouldn’t stick.  Instead we got to watch in fascination as the spider dropped himself down to the floor again and rubbed his butt against the floor to re-anchor his web.  He then began to climb up again, using only his four forearms.  His two hind legs dangled and from one of them, another thread was emerging.  He then used that thread to attach to another part of the web to create a triangle and continued breaking up parts of the web and extending it with triangles.

It was a really cool process to watch and he didn’t seem to mind our intent stares.  It’s unfortunate that he chose a poor location and will soon have to deal with another wrecked web (and probably worse, since Ninja was very gentle in how he moved the thread).  Hopefully he will eventually learn that he will need a new place to stay permanently, or else he’ll be making a whole lot of extra work for himself, repairing that web all the time.  It must have looked kind of funny, the two of us staring at what looked like nothing in the middle of a parking structure, then squatting down and staring at the floor, then standing up and staring towards the ceiling.  It was all worth it though – we got a great first-hand view of how spiders make their creations!