Birds of Moss Landing

If you are not familiar with Moss Land, go back one post.  Yesterday I published a map and links that tell you where and what Moss Landing is.  Yesterday the otters were featured, but Moss Landing is populated by a large variety of birds as well. 

We only scratched the surface, as we stayed right on Jetty Road and didn’t drive around Elkhorn Slough where most of the wildlife can be found.

This is looking across the inlet back towards the road.  There is a cliff here but a nice path down to the water and the beach.  The jetty is off to the right and the ocean beyond that.




I took those two pictures (above) while standing near the car.  The area is very accessible and you can walk as little or as much as you want.  The road is a bit narrow but there is room to park and maneuver a small motorhome (as long as the parking lot is not full!).   I think you could get a 25 footer in and out easy enough.
There are shore birds and ducks aplenty here.  Russ caught these guys on camera.  I am attempting to learn how to identify birds so please correct me if I am wrong.

Willet

Marbled Godwit

Male and female Merganser (maybe red-breasted merganser?)  I think they were having a bad hair day!


And from up on the cliff,
I enjoyed watching this snowy egret.




I don’t know much about birds but I sure enjoy their antics.  Each one is so different and there is such an abundant variety.  Always something a bit different to see.

After we had taken all the bird and otter pictures we could possibly ever need, Kate and Terry showed us the way to a great seafood restaurant.  Phil’s Fish Market is both a retail outlet for fresh fish and a restaurant.  The fish is up close and personal the minute you walk in the door.


It doesn’t get much fresher than that!

If I had brought a cooler, I might have been tempted to take some of that good stuff home.  But we contented ourselves to ordering off the menu.  I had clam chowder and it was some of the best I have ever had.  For those of you from Oregon, this certainly put Mo’s to shame (haha)!!  It had LOTS of clams and was not just creamy potato soup with a bite or two of clam.  It was really good.

Kate and Terry shared a great looking crab salad and Russ shared his fish and chips with me.  To top it off, Kate, Russ, and I shared a piece of some kind of raspberry mousse cake.  The mousse was good but the cake would have been better if it was just a graham cracker crust.  It was delicious but so rich that even sharing it three ways, we couldn’t finish it.

This restaurant may not look like much from the outside but apparently it has quite a reputation and has been featured on CNN and Bobby Flay’s Throwdown show.  I don’t know much about it’s fame but the food was good enough to warrant a return trip.

I highly recommend a visit to Moss Landing.  It’s not a big place but there is a KOA campground there and perhaps some other places to stay nearby.  It is definitely worth a couple of nights and we will be certain to make a return trip next time we are going south.

Tomorrow I’ll tell you about some good eats in the Santa Cruz/Felton area and about all the bloggers we visited with on this trip.