Whooping Crane Tour

Last night I slept with the window open and no electric heater for the first time in ages! This morning when I woke up it was 58F (14C) and quite foggy but sunny for my walk around the neighborhood area.

Yesterday we had made reservations to go on one of the Whooping Crane Tours out of Fulton. We left Fulton Harbor on The Skimmer under Captain Tommy Moore at 1 p.m. Captain Tommy knows his birds. We saw several families of whooping cranes, saw some flying and then got really close to a couple of young whooping cranes. It was an excellent tour, well worth the money. We were out for 3 ½ hours. We saw lots of birds but most were too far away for my camera.

Gordon and I with the Whooping Cranes in the background

Cormorants drying their wings on the breakwater in the harbor

When we returned to harbor the oyster fishermen had returned and were unloading their catches. Lots and lots of oysters!

It was mostly cloudy for our tour but the sun came out on the way back and made for some nice photos of the fishing fleet.

Some of the fishing fleet

Unloading oysters

More Places to Go

These are the black pigs (javelina??)

Today was a really nice sunny day with no wind and 55F (13C) when I got up this morning. I walked around the area starting out going east on Lone Star for a change. I saw a great egret walking right along the road on Tenth Street and a cardinal in the tree just as I was entering the park.

After breakfast and shower, I headed over to WalMart to pick up a few things then came home for lunch.

This is the part of the sign I wanted

This is the complete sign

After lunch we headed north to the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge hoping to spend some time there. We were there two years ago but I had a really bad back then and wasn’t able to walk very far. However, it was not to be. They were doing a prescribed burn so we couldn’t go very far into the park. We stopped to see the alligator behind a fence and then started on a trail but it was very muddy so we came back and drove as far as we could into the park. We took some photos of the burn and then left and headed for Refugio where I wanted to take a photo of a sign I had seen. On the way there we saw all kinds of deer and quite a few sandhill cranes. We took our sign photos, looked around Refugio again, then drove on.

At one spot, we pulled off the road going toward a fishing pier and saw two black wild pigs (could have been hjavelina, hard to tell). We drove back via Bayside and took some photos as we were close to sunset. We did a bit of back and forth from Rockport back to the sunset spot. We got home just at twilight – very tired!

Our high today got to be 72F (22C) and it was sunny and beautiful all day!

Seeing Some of the Area

This morning was nice and sunny and 53F (12C) and I did my usual walk along Lone Star and then around the RV park.

It is so sad to hear that 18 one year old whooping cranes were killed in the tornado that hit Florida last week. All 18 had flown with an ultra light plane from Wisconsin in the Fall. To read the story click here.

Late this morning we went out and stopped at the Chamber of Commerce in Rockport to get information on birding spots. Then we started out for one of them, Aransas Woods. It turned out to be a dud for birds. All we saw was one great egret far in the distance. We did however walk about ½ mile through supposed trails with grass and bushes and wet spots so we didn’t stay long. We then took FM1069 which is the road we sometimes take to Bayside and where we’ve seen sandhill cranes before. The birding hot spots map showed some roads that run off of FM1069 and the first one we took we did see sandhill cranes, but only three of them. We took another road and saw some other birds but most of them too far especially for my camera.

Photo taken at Aransas Woods

On our way back we stopped at Camping Clinic and they received our microwave today but can’t put it in until later this week. He’s supposed to call us.

We took the Beach Road part of the way back and saw lots more birds especially at Little Bay which is within the city limits. We stopped at Fulton Mansion as well which was the home of the man that the town of Fulton (where we are now) is named after but it’s closed on Monday and Tuesday. So our final stop was at a little fruit market along the highway where I got some oranges. Prices of oranges in my opinion is way too high. They are cheaper at home! HEB wanted $1.99/lb for naval oranges last week so I didn’t buy any. The guy at the fruit market told me navals were out of season but there were still a few in the bin so I bought a few and the price was much better. It cost me $1.34 for 4 oranges. Now we’ll see how they taste.

Looks like a bird convention!

Fulton Mansion

Sandra on the grounds of Fulton Mansion - note my new hat

Our high today was 66F (19C) but after a sunny morning and early afternoon it got cloudy during the later afternoon however there was a sunset that Gordon took some photos of at the bridge at Copano Bay.

A Slow Relaxing Sunday

I didn’t feel well during the night so got up and came out to the couch and eventually fell asleep. When I woke up I didn’t feel like walking so stayed on the couch and read, did puzzles, watched TV etc. It was really too bad as today is the nicest day we’ve had for some time. The high reached 65F (18C). Around 3:00 p.m. I decided to go for my walk so I walked to where the pavement ends on Lone Star then came back and walked around the campground and sat for a while on the swing at the pond enjoying the day.

This pond is right across the road from the entrance to our RV park

We went out for sunset tonight and ended up near Bayside as that’s the best place to get a sunset over Copano Bay. Even though it was still 63F (17C), I was glad I had brought my wind jacket as once the sun goes down it turns cold.

Tonight's sunset

We won’t be watching the Super Bowl tonight but I expect there are a lot of people who will!

Today We Got Some Exercise

It was 43F (6C) this morning and mostly sunny with no wind. Gordon walked with me for a while and we saw these pearl guinea hens.

I walked almost to the end of Lone Star Rd and found these beautiful horses.

I think I told the dappled one below on my way past that she was a pretty girl because on my way back he showed me in no uncertain terms that he was a boy horse without question!! I didn't take a picture. You'll have to use your imagination.

I also found these tracks which could have been dog tracks but then again….

The picture below is from our walk on the trail at Goose Island State Park. It was very pretty there with lots of live oak trees.

We didn’t see any wildlife or birds on the trail but it was a nice walk. On the mudflats we saw a great blue heron, an egret and a couple of roseates.

The two pictures below are of me and the live oak trees.



This beautiful old live oak is also at Goose Island State Park along the road but it also happens to be where the trail ends.
While we were walking on the mud flats we came across this majestic blue heron. He let me get really close to him and then...

he decided I was too close so he took off squawking all the way.

After that we went into Rockport where there is an area called Demonstration Gardens. We didn’t walk the whole area, maybe later. We did see some white ibis, a couple of egrets and a kingfisher. There are also supposed to be butterflies (too cold today) and hummingbirds but we didn’t see any of those either.

This is a bamboo tree at the Demonstration Gardens.

And here's the kingfisher.

I’ve recently heard that to remain heart healthy you’re supposed to walk 10,000 steps per day so I bought a pedometer and so far today, I’ve walked 11,937 steps since I got up this morning. I don’t think I walk that many every day though so I’ll have to start making a point of it.

End of the Week

After I finished posting my blog yesterday, we decided to head out for sunset since the sun had actually come out. We headed over to the Bayside area but didn’t have much luck with birds. There were some egrets and we did see a flock of spoonbills but they were too far away. We saw one immature spoonbill that was closeby but that was about it. The sunset wasn’t great as all the clouds had gone away but the moonrise was beautiful (photo below)!

It was 46F (8C) this morning and mostly cloudy. I did my walk on Lone Star and Farmers Circle again but only saw the horse.

This morning I went out to get a few things. I’ve started replacing our cheapie dishes with Corelle. I bought four plates last week so got two more today and six bowls. We needed something that would work in the microwave. I got plain white so if I need to add to them, it won’t be a problem. I bought them singly rather than buying the package of four place settings as I didn’t want the mugs. All I really needed was dinner plates and bowls. After that I drove to the other side of Rockport to Dollar General. I hadn’t been there yet and got a few things, then back to Family Dollar – nothing there and on to HEB where I picked up the groceries I needed.

Gordon went out to take some photos when I returned but didn’t find any to take, then out again at sunset. I stayed at home this time.

Not a very exciting day!

I took this photo last evening in Bayside. I guess Kinky didn't get voted in as governor!

Nice to See Some Sun

Pelican at the mud flats

White pelicans against dark sky and water

It was 47F (8C) and cloudy this morning. I got up late again as I heard it raining around 7:00 a.m. so decided to stay in bed. I walked along Lone Star and Farmers Circle but didn’t see a donkey or the long-horned steer or the horse. As I approached the pond across the road from the RV entrance, a Great Blue Heron flew off. I hadn’t seen wading birds there so wasn’t really even looking for them. I thought the pond was too deep. Guess I was wrong!

Gordon received his new lens via UPS this afternoon so we went to Goose Island State Park to see if we could find any birds. There wasn’t much in the park. We stopped by the bridge that crosses Copano Bay/Aransas Bay and took some photos there of pelicans, shore birds and a lone heron. While we were on the mud flats by the bridge the sun came out for the first time since Sunday. Sure is nice to see it again!

When the sun came out, it warmed up and we reached a high of 61F (16C) which is nice after a high yesterday of 49F (9C).