Allow This Beautiful Bald Eagle to Highlight Some Geology

So no shit, there we were at Discovery Park on a foggy winter day, and I was taking photos of a bit of the bluff that will soon be a bit of the beach. Just then, a bloody ginormous bald eagle came sailing in, majestic as you like.

Image shows part of the bluff at Discovery Park. There's a sliver of it eroding off the main part, looking like a splinter. To the right, against a foggy gray sky, soars a bald eagle.
Bluff and Bald Eagle.

I saw him from the corner of my eye, although when I snapped this photo, I was completely focused on the bluff. Here, I will crop the photo, and you can see how blithe and bonny he is.

Image shows the eagle, wings outspread. It looks very majestic indeed.
Eagle crop I

And now I’m suddenly in love with the fog that was spoiling our intended views of the Olympics across the water, because I don’t think this eagle would’ve unintentionally photographed half so well in normal conditions.

At this point, I was still busy with the bluff. South Bluff is never the same. Bits of it come down all the time. I knew if I didn’t capture this awesome hoodoo-like sliver eroding away from the main part, I would never again have the chance. I didn’t yet realize something even more ephemeral was flying through the frame.

Another photo of the same part of the bluff, zoomed out a bit. The eagle is flying closer.
Bluff and bald eagle again.

That’s our old frenemy the Lawton Clay, getting ready to do what it does best and fall down. I like the way there’s this splinter shearing off. I like watching the work erosion does. I’m just glad I don’t live at the top of the bluff, because then I’d probably not enjoy watching the bluff face erode.

The bald eagles would still be sweet even if my house was ready to go slip-sliding into the Sound, though.

The same image as previous has been cropped to show only eagle. It's wings have raised in a shallow v.
Bald eagle crop II

So I’m all mmmm, erosion and then holy-crap-in-a-hat-ola, huge bald eagle!! because it was about that instant it swept across my field of vision. I slung the camera around, zoomed in for all I was worth, and got a semi-decent shot of it as it soared toward the lighthouse.

Image is a silhouette of the eagle as it soars away.
Buy-bye, birdie.

Have I told you lately that I love bald eagles? Seeing the little buggers fly about in real life is a thrill every time. So is the geology. And then to have a bald eagle do the Vanna White thing with the bluff, thus combining two things that make me squee so very hard…. I love this place!

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Allow This Beautiful Bald Eagle to Highlight Some Geology
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2 thoughts on “Allow This Beautiful Bald Eagle to Highlight Some Geology

  1. rq
    1

    “The little buggers”? :D
    This one’s probably the local guide, showed up just in case you might miss the fantasticness of the bluffs.

  2. 2

    I have a photographer buddy whose thing is birds and he managed to be at a lake one day when 2 bald eagles were having an aerial tangle over a fish that one had caught. Amazing!! They’re big and actually pretty ungainly. Crows harrass them until they leave; they can’t touch a crow on the wing.

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