It was windy on Friday and again on Saturday morning, thanks to a low in Canada. I sailed on only the mainsail on Friday afternoon. Even so, I made it to Davis Park in an hour, which is close the the fastest time I've ever had. It was a spray-filled beat to buoy 34, then a fast reach to the vicinity of Watch Hill buoys 1 and 2. I didn't get any photos on the way over, due to the wet conditions. Once in port I found some interesting subjects.

The first is a shot of surf casters at the ocean. I am told that the best times to fish are the late afternoon and early morning.

From there, I went back to my sailboat, Harmony. It was too rocky in the harbor to write, so I played some guitar. Around sunset, I took a walk to another dock and got some shots of the boating activity. Here is the Kiki heading back to Patchogue after unloading some of the weekend's visitors.

Here is one of the Suffolk County Marine Police vessels coming in to port.

I went to have a chat with the police about the new vessel. While talking, I noticed something out in the channel that begged for a photo. It was a family of mallards heading back to their nest for the night. Although not visible from the photo, the waves were active. The little tykes were bobbing over the waves. It didn't seem to bother them.

After getting some shots of the mallards, a doe walked out of the woods, followed by this buck. The deer on Fire Island are somewhat tame. In the Fall of every year, the wildlife managers are faced with the prospect of either culling the herd with a very unpopular hunt or allowing deer to starve to death over the winter. There's no easy solution. Please, those of you who like to hunt Bambi's father - as one hunter once revealed to me - leave your firearms at home until the end of the sailing season.

With that, the darkness settled. My next shots were from the next morning. The sun rises before 5 a.m. these few days before the summer solstice. I can't bring myself to get up that early on a weekend. The sun was well up by the time I got around. Here's a shot looking north toward Great South Bay from the main boardwalk.

A walk on the ocean beach often brings some interesting sights. Here is a shot of a polished fragment of a clam shell that washed up overnight. In my youth, I thought to bring home these beautiful gems. However, they never look as good as they do on the beach. I haven't been able to figure that out.

The summer time residents, probably the kids, like to put their touch on their community. Here's a shot of one of the artistically decorated street markers to aid visitors in finding their rental or the home of their guests. There are no house numbers at Davis Park - just quaint names of the thoroughfares.

Here are some Delphineums. These are in a few places. I'm not sure if they are wild or planted.

Then it was back to sea for me. The next few shots were taken of some of the baymen as they raked for clams. I had other shots, but they weren't worthy of putting up. The wind was still strong, although I did manage to raise both my mainsail and my working jib. You can see from this photo how much Harmony heeled - about 20 degrees, which makes one think about shortening sail.

For the baymen shots, I had to brace myself with one leg on the cockpit deck, a knee wedged into the corner of a seat, and steering with the other knee on the tiller, all the while keeping an eye out for sea spray that would destroy my camera. It's a wonder that these shots came out okay.

This one is my favorite:

Just as I entered Browns River, I got a shot of this runabout heading out.

And that was it for this weekend. Come back next week for more.