We see this flock of wild turkeys out on Jeans Road almost every time we go anywhere these days.
They don't pay any attention to cars and will cross the road anytime they want to do so, no matter what's coming.
It doesn't look like they're a bit worried about the upcoming holiday. Maybe they know that nowadays most people prefer to do their hunting at the supermarket down the road.
Today just feels like a bird-watching day. And a day to celebrate the fact that I just recently learned to crop by using Picasa. That means I was able to rescue these pictures that were ready for the trash bin otherwise. It's never too late to learn! And its always fun to remember good birding trips.
Ospreys. These ones were in Louisiana. We often see them here in Oregon as well.
Two Florida birds: Curlews and a Roseate Spoonbill
Texas Laughing Gulls
Whooping Cranes on the Texas Gulf Coast, near Rockport/Fulton (above right and below)
These cranes are endangered and the Texas Gulf Coast is where most of those that are left spend the winter. These birds are as tall as a grown man.
We enjoy birding, but usually I have binoculars instead of a camera. It's hard to manage both at once. But I've enjoyed remembering these great birding places so much that I'm going to work harder at taking pictures from now on.
Click on the links below for a couple bird photo albums that we made earlier. In these two places, we got some good pictures (that didn't need cropping as much).
New Mexico birds Louisiana birds
Ever since we saw the sculpture of geese in flight on North Dakota's Enchanted Highway, I've been thinking about one of our best bird watching experiences ever. In 2006, we stayed near New Mexico's Bosque Del Apache Wildlife Refuge during Fall Migration. That was our second Autum visit — it's such a beautiful time to be there. (Check out our Bosque photo album on top of the right-hand column.).
I thought it would be fun to compare the North Dakota and New Mexico flights:
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Maybe the Enchanted Highway sculpture was Art imitating Life — maybe. At the very least it was craftwork that we enjoyed both for itself and for the memories of a lovely time in New Mexico.
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The major difference between the two experiences, though, is this: We're glad we went to see Enchanted Highway and the story behind it was interesting, but having seen it once, we probably won't go again. But we'd go out of our way to go back to the beautiful Bosque — and we really hope we do someday.
At this point in time, our Spring road trip is winding down and we're ready to get back to places that feel like home and people we miss. As a result, we really didn't give ourselves enough time to thoroughly explore Theodore Roosevelt National Park. But we loved what we did see. The entry to the South unit of the Park was about 30 miles from where we were staying in Dickenson. When we got within a couple miles of the entry, the terrain changed from the gentle, flat farmland that is most of the State of North Dakota to beautiful rocky formations and chasms. The Missouri River did a pretty darn good job of carving here.
We took some easy hikes and saw some beautiful scenery. 
We also stopped at several other places for short hikes. This Park has the clearest air of all the National Parks. (I wonder if this might not be true of the whole State of North Dakota as well. Not too many people and not too much industry here.)
We saw some wildlife. There are quite a few prairie dog villages and several herds of wild feral horses whose ancestors have roamed these lands for centuries. (The one below is standing in the Little Missouri river bottomland.)
We also saw quite a few bison. (But nothing like what we saw last year at Custer State Park, in ND's neighbor to the South.) (Click on the blue if you love bison/buffalo pictures as much as we do!)
We learned some history.
This is the cabin where Teddy Roosevelt lived during his time in North Dakota. The cabin has been moved to the Park's main visitor center from its original location, the Elkhorn Ranch unit of the park, which is less accessible. When he lived at the Elkhorn, Teddy led a simple rancher's life. He learned about the badlands and nature and let the beauty and quiet of the area heal him from the recent death of his wife and mother at their home in New York. Roosevelt came to North Dakota to recover. He said later that he would never have been President if not for the time he had spent in North Dakota. As President, TR was instrumental in establishing National Park legislation. He wanted all Americans to experience some of what he felt about these beautiful spaces.
We are always happy when we can see another one of our National Parks and we'd like to explore this one again sometime.
FOR WORLD BIRD WEDNESDAY, this repeat post. A few weeks ago, ourwonderful host Springman suggested that we consider re-posting bird pictures from before joining WBW. This post was originally written the summer before we went to Florida for the first time …. and we see lots of egrets there too.
When there's a group of birders, the good spotters give directions by saying things like (for instance) "I have an orchard oriole in the tree at about 3 p.m…" Or "Do you have the blue heron at the edge of the marsh?" It really helps beginners like me to know where to focus the binoculars (and to learn what it is that we're seeing). I don't know why they always say "I have.." instead of "I see..". I guess because when you spot the bird, you have added it to your list of birds.
During a winter in Port Aransas Texas, one of the resident experts at Paradise Pond asked me if I had egrets. I misunderstood her for a minute and ever since then, a certain Frank Sinatra song has run through my head every time I see one of these beautiful birds. So I thought maybe I'd take the song out of my head and put it in yours.** (See note below if you need any help.)
We have actually had quite a few egrets.
There are cattle egrets in fields along the road in lots of states. (These are the smaller cousins of the family.) When we were in Louisiana, they were in their beautiful breeding plumage. Louisiana is also where we saw the most Great Egrets that we've ever seen in one place. This was at Bird Island where the McIlhanely Family pretty much saved the species from extinction.
There are even a few of these beautiful birds here on Fern Ridge Lake. Which is why my head is singing that song again.
It's harder to get a good picture here, but this is an Oregon egret flying over the marsh at the edge of the Lake.
The ones in Louisiana and Texas posed better for us:
Bird Island 
Our RV Park in Fulton TX
** "My Way" Lyrics by Paul Anka.
"I've lived a life that's full
I traveled each and every highway
and more much more than this
I did it my way.
Regrets, I've had a few
But then again too few to mention
I did what I had to do
And saw it through without exception
I planned each chartered course
Each careful step along the byway
And more much more than this
I did it my way."
Mount Evans is one of quite a few 14,000+ feet peaks near where our son Geoff and his wife Lisa live (and also near where we live when we're in Colorado). But this Mountain is different from the rest because it has a paved road all the way to the top. It is said to be the highest paved road in the world.
This is really a lucky break for us — believe me, we're not going to be climbing anything that high ever. Just getting out of Geoff's Jeep and walking around is enough high-altitude hiking for us.
The wind was blowing very hard. We really noticed the difference in altitude and temperature as we "climbed".
We are glad that we got to experience a little bit of what it's like up on the top of the world.
Real climbers probably kind of hate that there is an easy way to get to the top of this mountain and I really couldn't blame them. But this real mountain climber didn't seem to mind us being there as he looked down from his even higher perch.
This building on top of the peak, called Crest House, was built in 1939 and was the highest structure in the world at 14,260 feet. It was destroyed in a propane explosion in 1979. Only the outer walls remain; it's now an observation platform. You can see for miles.
Reading the warning sign actually made me feel good — as if we were in pretty good shape just to stay alive up there!
It was a beautiful weekend on the Texas Coastal Bend.
On Thursday evening a “Nor’easter” blew in, bringing strong winds and heavy rain during the night. In the morning, there were puddles like creeks running down the streets and sidewalks, but by noon the sun had come out and all the standing water was totally gone. This disappearing act never ceases to surprise us. (Because when it rains in Oregon, it stays wet and drizzly for days and days.)
Down here in Texas when this Spring weather condition happens, it forces all of the migrating birds to land and wait over until the weather clears. This condition is called a “fall-out” and it creates an incredible birding opportunity. So on Friday afternoon at Paradise Pond (in addition to the usual local birds) I was able to identify five varieties of warblers (this one is a prothonotary), a chat, hummingbirds, a cuckoo, and two kinds of vireo. There were others I can’t remember right now and and, I’m sure, dozens of other species that the real experts found during the day. It was lovely to see and to hear. (UPDATE: Today’s paper — on the following Thursday — says that 38 different species of songbirds were spotted at Paradise Pond on that day.)
On Saturday, we strolled to Roberts Park, next to the ferry landing, about 4 blocks from home. We hopped on a free shuttle (a school bus) to the beach. The annual Texas Sandfest was this weekend.
We had debated whether to go on Saturday in order to watch the sculptors at work or wait until Sunday to see the finished creations — and decided it was more fun to watch people work. After quite a long and sandy walk viewing the sculpture area, we were happy to find a covered music tent where we listened to a fun Austin-based blues band called JT Coldfire. What a great place for a concert.
The dragon and castle was our favorite entry.
Sand artists come from all over to take part in the festival. The sand here is said to be ideal for sculpture. There is an internation circuit of similiar events. This entrant was from Portland, Oregon (see the state flag). Sponsoring businesses provide food and lodging for participants and prizes are awarded.
Lots of people were here to enjoy the lovely day on the beach as well as to see the festival. The Sunday paper said that thousands of cars were lined up for the ferry. Much better to be on the right side of the landing already as we are!
You can see the saragasso weed on the forebeach. It comes in this time of year and creates some controversy between the tourist people and the environmentalists. It’s needed for erosion control and bird habitat. Most people just rake it away from the spot where they want to relax.
It was a great beach day. We had enjoyed visiting with the shuttle bus driver on our way. And when we came home, he wasn’t very busy and delivered us right to our door. Nothing like having our own big yellow limousine ride.
This week, when we’re not outside playing here at the beach, I’ve been working on sorting pictures and making photo albums. So instead of putting pictures on this post, I’ve put in some quick album links.
We get to watch animals pretty often in different settings. We don’t always get pictures (once we had a bobcat right at our window, but of course no camera close by). But the pictures we do have are fun reminders.
http://travelingrainvilles.typepad.com/photos/the_animal_album/index.html
(Click on the gray bar at the top of the albums to get back to the main blog page.)
We’re often treated to pet shows from our RV window. There’s a park kitty here in Port Aransas who likes to sit on our porch in the evening. Where we stay in Coburg, Oregon, there’s a cat who goes on a deliberate slow patrol of the whole park every morning. We suspect it’s on the payroll. At breakfast nearly every morning wherever we are, we get to watch the RV dogs taking their masters for a walk. (And often, we feel like we’re the only RVers who don’t travel with a pet.) Most of the time, the dogs are well-behaved and a pleasure to watch–on rare occasions, the masters are less so, when they pretend not to see the pile of poop their dog just deposited!
In any case, since we had already been pet-free for several years when we started RVing, we continue to enjoy our animal-watching without any of the responsibility of the owners.
We always used to feed birds when we had our house and loved watching them — we still watch, but now we don’t have to clean the feeders.
Here are links to the bird photo-albums.
http://travelingrainvilles.typepad.com/photos/birds/index.html
http://travelingrainvilles.typepad.com/photos/bird_watching/index.html
http://travelingrainvilles.typepad.com/photos/birds_of_louisiana/index.html
Last winter was our second stay on the Texas Gulf Coast. We spent four months, staying at Waters Edge RV Park in Fulton. http://www.watersedgervpk.com/
In this picture, you can see our Texas home, where we were just a few steps to Aransas Bay. We liked this little park a lot and we loved the area. The RV Park is not too large and had activities that kept us busy with new friends when we were not out exploring the area. Pelicans and other water birds swam by every day. The picture on the right is the Water’s Edge fishing dock. 
Fishing wasn’t very good while we were there, but it was nice just to walk out and watch birds and occasionally dolphins.
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Fulton Harbor is within easy walking distance of Water’s Edge. It’s a working harbor, mostly for harvesting oysters (during the months we were there) and shrimp.
We always enjoy watching other people work and oystering is fascinating. I wouldn’t want to go out on the ocean in a boat like the one in the third picture, but it is typical. There will be a crew of three men and a pile of sacked oysters on the deck when it comes in. Then,the buyer will pay the boat’s captain, and the sacks will be moved off to waiting reefer trucks to be transported back east. (But sometimes, the sacks stand around for quite a while in the warm weather–that kind of makes you worry.) The guy at the fish market told me that all of the oysters sold in restaurants on the east coast come from here. Would he lie?
Moon Dog at the Harbor was our favorite “dive”. More a local hangout than a tourist place, it served good, fresh seafood. It was very pleasant to sit out on the deck and watch the boats and water birds. Especially on a warm sunshiny winter day!
Our very favorite place to explore was the Aransas Wildlife Refuge.
The volunteer at the Refuge Headquarters said that if we saw an alligator lying across the path, we should turn around and go back rather than attempt to step over it. (Like I needed that advice!) We didn’t see any on the path, fortunately, but we saw a lot nearby. I wonder what this one was thinking.
Armadillos are supposed to be very common, but this was the first one we’d been able to get close to. I think they are probably nocturnal (and we aren’t). We took a tour boat out to the offshore islands to see one of the few remaining stands of Whooping Cranes. These birds are 6 feet tall — there’s nothing to compare them to out on these islands where they feed, so the pictures we have don’t really get across how amazing they are in “person” . 
This turtle and bird pond is in Port Aransas on Mustang Island. You get there by taking one of the car ferries which are operated by the Texas Highway Department.
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We love the Gulf Coast of Texas. It makes us smile too, just like this guy seems to be doing!!
