Our bright yellow kayaks bob in the choppy water like bits of cracker cast out for ducks. Paddling slowly around the Hiram M. Chittenden Locks, one of Seattle's most popular tourist attractions, we're waiting for the signal from our guides that it's time to maneuver into the larger of the two.
The massive structures, informally known as the Ballard Locks, help link freshwater Lakes Washington and Union with the briny waters of Puget Sound. Right now the larger lock is lowering its westbound cargo from Lake Union's lofty perch above.
While we wait for the lock to finish its job, our guides Devon and Jay help us keep an eye out for wildlife. We easily spot several seals, whose shiny black heads rhythmically pop in and out of the water, when Devon suddenly shouts that Herschel is at the fish ladder.
We crane our necks to spot the stout, bristly-whiskered sea lion, but all we see is the splash he makes as he swims away. Herschel, Devon says, is a bit of a legend in these parts. First spotted in the area around 1980, the crafty, rather gluttonous sea lion quickly learned he could nosh on all the tasty salmon he wanted if he hung around the complex's fish ladder and trapped them against its cement walls. The salmon congregate at the ladder to rest for a few days before climbing it to spawn in the area's freshwater lakes and rivers.
Herschel was soon downing dozens of salmon per day. Then he got greedy, attacking other sea lions and even kayaks — yikes! — which he deemed a threat to his piscine bounty. Fisheries employees and other wildlife experts fought back against the flappered, 800-pound beast, shooting rubber-tipped arrows and metal pellets at him, and tossing underwater firecrackers into the sea. They also tried tempting Herschel away from the ladder by feeding him other fish — fish they had spiked with nausea-inducing lithium chloride — and even tried frightening him away with a mechanical orca whale, orcas being sea lions' sole predator. But nothing fazed Herschel.
Eventually they tranquilized him and trucked him far out into Puget Sound, but he swam back in a few days' time. So they trapped him again and ferried him some 1,000 miles south to his home in Southern California. He returned 11 days later.
Devon doesn't say what happened to Herschel after that. But as some blamed him for a dramatic decrease in the watershed's steelhead run, the rumor that he ended up at Sea World in Florida might be true. No matter his fate, his memory lives on at Ballard Locks, as any sea lion spotted near the fish ladder is now called Herschel.
I crane to spot the ladder in case Herschel returns, but our kayak has drifted too far away. No matter; the large lock is now open, awaiting its new cargo.