Crabbing

Each year several members of my family go crabbing during our reunion. A few years ago, they encountered a rather large crocodile which led them to find a new place to go crabbing. I had never gone crabbing and all 3 of my children wanted to go this year, so I decided I would go and just take pictures. Well, I got caught up in the idea of catching one, so I grabbed the net, stood on a small rock, and fell in. I did catch a crab, or rather a small crab landed on me when I fell, but I managed to cut my thumb open , scrape up both hands, and bruise my back way up high right along my spine. Needless to say, I am quite sore, and struggling to type this with a bandaged, throbbing thumb.
March of the crabs... This is near the area that we went crabbing. These little guys are much smaller than what we were after to catch. When we got too close, they would all disappear into the sand en masse. I had never seen so many crabs altogether in one place.












When we first arrived, Jerry caught a small crab that he let the kids hold. Sarah got pinched so she dropped it and then picked it back up again, along with a bunch of sand. Erin decided that she was going to try to grab a crab herself but instead, one grabbed her. When she pulled her hand back, the crab had such a grip on her finger, that it's claw broke off, but the pincher didn't release, so she had a crab leg stuck on her finger. She was very calm, but obviously uncomfortable, so I called my father over to pull it off. I did not, however have the presence of mind to take a picture of the claw on her finger with either of the 2 cameras that I was holding. I was too concerned for her poor pinched finger. After the claw was removed, she carried it around for a while because she thought it was cool.












This shows a much bigger view of where we were. Just to the left of the center of this photo is a blue heron standing in the water. Great Blue Herons are among my favorite birds.













The jetty where we were crabbing is very near the lighthouse that Sarah and I visited the other day...


















This crab did not want his picture taken. I sat very still waiting for him to surface. Once he surfaced, he kept moving and turning just so, so I could not get a good picture of him. He is just left of center in this photo.












Irma was trying to catch a crab using Alan's shoe. She was not very successful in her endeavor. Right behind Irma is where I fell. You can just see that there are a few rocks in the water.












I did manage to get a picture of the guy that I was trying to catch. Fortunately, I had handed my camera to Taylor when I took the net. I really want a new camera, but that was not the way to get one!












This is very similar to the rock that I cut my thumb on in the water. I don't think I cut myself until I tried to get back up. Everywhere I tried to put my hand it was sharp. I didn't even realize I was cut until I noticed blood all over my shirt.












Although slightly out of focus, this gives a pretty good idea of how big my thumb laceration is. The picture is from about 15 minutes after it happened. I had managed to get the bleeding stopped as long as I kept it up in the air. Now it only hurts a little, unless I bump it or forget and put too much pressure on it grabbing something.


















Yesterday the kids and I drove to Ft. Lauderdale to visit my friends Gail and Israel who live in Israel. It just happened that we were all going to be in Florida at the same time, so I decided to take the 4 hour trip down to see them. It was a very nice visit and the drive down and back gave me some good discussion time with the kids. Since we got here we have all been doing things with other family members so we have not had a lot of time together as a family. The trip gave us some time together which was good.
Israel and Gail pose for a picture. It was so good to see them. The last time I saw them was about 10 years ago for Gail and almost 20 for Israel.