HIT THE ROAD, JACK

"Hit The Road Jack", Ray Charles

Hit the road Jack and don't you come back no more, no more, no more, no more.
Hit the road Jack and don't you come back no more.
What you say?
Hit the road Jack and don't you come back no more, no more, no more, no more.

Hit the road Jack and don't you come back no more.

Woah Woman, oh woman, don't treat me so mean,
You're the meanest old woman that I've ever seen.
I guess if you said so
I'd have to pack my things and go. That's right.

(Gale is really MUCH nicer than that!)

RUBY BEACH, OLYMPIC NATIONAL PARK, WASHINGTON

May 18: After sad goodbyes to the sweetest, smartest little girls on the planet, we crossed the Columbia River bridge in Vancouver, Washington.  We had planned on continuing north on “The 5”, as Interstate 5 is routinely called in the west, and we did for a while, but with a quick change of plans, we turned left at Olympia, Washington.  The new plan was to circumnavigate the Olympic Peninsula instead of just touching its northeastern edge.  This is country less traveled, roads less wide and tourists less common.  The roads are bounded by either a) beautiful tall conifers that almost touch, forming a cathedral-like feeling, or b) clear-cut wastelands, where every tree has been slashed from the earth and the debris piled up to rot.  Mountainsides are either verdant or rapidly eroding brown mounds where all the vegetation has been removed.  Beautiful and rapidly moving rivers cascade throughout, today very clear, but when it rains... not so pretty.  We stopped at a few locations along the route, mostly where the close proximity of the road allowed views or venturing onto the Pacific Ocean beaches.  The best by far was Ruby Beach, where graceful sea stacks and rock formations emerged from the falling tide like Atlantis rising from the deep.  Huge  logs that had escaped the lumbermen were washed ashore by the sea and littered the beaches. Signs warned that at high tide, these former trees become potential killers once they start to float and get knocked about by the tidal currents.  We spent about an hour walking the beach at low tide, enjoying the occasional sunlight that pierced the marine layer of fog that mostly prevailed.  Bald eagles soared overhead, gulls and sea ducks searched for food in the surf and a black oystercatcher worked the anemone encrusted rocks.

RUBY BEACH, OLYMPIC NATIONAL PARK, WASHINGTON

We carried on to Sol Duc Hot Springs Lodge and Resort, in the northern part of Olympic National Park.  They also have a small RV park, where I am comfortably sitting in our camper, providing you, dear readers, with this account of our day.

SOL DUC SPRINGS TRAIL

SOL DUC SPRINGS RILL

May 19:  Woke up to pouring rain and 45 degrees.  Not conducive to doing much of anything outdoors, but intrepid souls that we are, swaddled in fourteen to twenty layers of insulation and water repellent gear, we walked the 1.6 mile Sol Duc Falls trail.  The path wandered up and down through pristine and ancient temperate rain forest.  Towering Douglas firs, rising so high through the mist that we couldn’t lean back far enough to see their crowns, Sitka spruce so massive that they blocked out what little light there was.  Because of the rain and high mountain snowmelt, cascades of water poured down the hillsides, roiling over moss-encrusted stones that were reminiscent of “middle earth”.  In places, it was so perpetually wet that the moss had moss growing on it.  The falls themselves were a raging torrent of the clearest blue water you could imagine.  Not a plummeting cataract, but a crystal cascade that tore through the narrowest of slots in the chasm.  Not deterred in the slightest by this deluge, a pair of American dippers flew up and down the gorge, plunging into the white water to ferret out insect larvae hidden in the underwater rocks.  Later, on the return walk, a varied thrush, looking like a very fancy version of a robin, sang its long monotonic notes, sounding like a cell phone ringing through the giant conifers.

SOL DUC FALLS

Still raining, we returned to the RV for a catered luncheon, then over to the lodge.  The feature here is the hot springs, which have been corralled into several swimming-type pools of varying temperatures for guest use.  It was still only 46 degrees, with an ice cold rain pelting down, but I went for it anyway.  First the 101 degree pool for a half hour and then the 105 degree tank for a similar period.  Sitting in these delightfully warm baths, I “took the waters”, as if at Lourdes and was cured of all my worldly aches and pains, diseases and deformities.  I am now 28 years old.  Just kidding.  Actually, I felt like a par-boiled spaghetti noodle when I finally gave it up.  Guests are warned to stay hydrated and to not overheat.  Oops.

We carried on to Port Angeles, a small city on the southern side of the Strait of Juan de Fuca, which separates the state of Washington and Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada, where Vancouver is not, but Victoria, the provincial capitol, is.  (Nice sentence structure, eh? I must be getting too close to Canada.)  We drove part way up Hurricane Ridge, in Olympic NP, selected a camp site at the Heart O The Hills Campground and drove back down into Port Angeles for a local seafood dinner (king salmon and Dungeness crab).  The restaurant overlooked the Strait and Gale got two lifers while were enjoying our repast - pigeon guillemot and rhinoceros auklet.  Why should such a diminutive creature be compared to its larger namesake?  Because it has a small orange “horn” sticking out of the top its its beak!  Then out on the adjacent City Pier, with our spotting scope, we got even better looks at these two little alcids and also saw all three scoter ducks, plus Brandt’s and pelagic cormorants sporting their fancy flank feathers of breeding plumage.

SOOTY GROUSE (F)

Before it got too late (sunset is now 8:52 PM), we we went back up the Hurricane Ridge road and found a number of black-tailed deer, browsing placidly roadside, a 180 degree rainbow, AND a pair of sooty grouse, which is what we were really after.  We tried driving to the top of the ridge, but the road was wet and the temperature dropped rapidly to near freezing, so, two miles from the top, we acted with some sensible caution, turned around and retreated to our campsite for the night.  As Scarlet O’Hara once said, “Tomorrow is another day”.

OLYMPIC NATIONAL PARK

May 20:  Still damp and cold, but at least the rain had stopped.  We headed back up the mile high mountain, which is very steep, considering that it rises directly from sea level.  Part way up, we, being serious techno-geeks, finally figured out where “the cloud” is, as we passed through it at about mile marker 14.  So that’s where all that information is going!  Continuing on to the top of Hurricane Ridge, where it was a brisk 34 degrees, we were now above the clouds.  The view was expansive as we could see most of the snow-covered Olympic Range.  It was like being on top of the world.  Going for a little walk, looking like the Staypuff twins wearing all the clothes we owned, we caught sight of snowshoe hares, already in their lush brown summer pelage, tiny Olympic chipmunks, juncos and a lovely golden-crowned sparrow, tuning up on a migratory ride from California to its Alaskan breeding grounds.  

SNOWSHOE HARE

HURRICANE RIDGE, OLYMPIC NATIONAL PARK

OLYMPIC CHIPMUNK

WASHINGTON FERRY

Returning to the lowlands, we stripped off several layers and headed toward Port Townsend, WA, to catch the 5 mile ferry ride to Coupeville, WA on Beautiful Whidby Island.  After putting all the layers back on, we  stood on the open upper deck and looked for sea life during the crossing.  Steller’s sea lion, and harbor seal bobbed on the surface.  Hundreds of “rhino” auklets formed feeding rafts, surrounded by glaucous-winged gulls and some common murres.  A flock of about 10 tufted puffins zipped by off the bow.  

THOMPSON RIVER VALLEY, BRITISH COLUMBIA

We wandered through rural Washington for a while, then left Bellingham going northeast toward British Columbia, Canada.  The border crossing here was a quick piece of cake, compared to the 1-2 hour delays trying to get through at Vancouver, just to the west.  The final part of today’s  journey took along the awesome Fraser and Thompson River Valleys.  These massive rivers, fueled by snowmelt draining the surrounding peaks of the Cascade Mountains, are deep, wide and dangerous.  I have never seen such powerful flows except the Niagara River below the Falls.  Roiling, boiling, currents and eddies going in five different directions, giant rocks in the middle of each river, all combine to make these streams absolutely terrifying.  Yet up and down each were signs advertising rafting trips.  Not for the faint of heart!  We finally pulled into Skihist Provincial Park for the night, a lovely little park along the former Gold Rush Trail to Cariboo, where in 1859, thousands sought their fortune in this very rugged country.  The road they poured through is still visible in the campground and is a path for your imagination to take over, putting yourself back 157 years, wondering what it must have been like for those intrepid souls.

WORLD'S LARGEST FLY ROD!

May 21:  British Columbia is huge!  We drive and drive and barely make any headway on the map.  Our goal over the next 5 days is simply to get to Anchorage, to meet our friends Doug and Shirley Beach, from Connecticut, to spend the next three weeks birding in Alaska.  Two great things happen today.  As we speed by, I spot a goldeneye duck in a small roadside pond.  We turn around to check it out and find that it is a Barrow’s goldeneye, a lifer for Gale.  Upon close inspection of the pond and the one across the road, there is a total of 11 duck species!  Barrow’s, northern shoveler, gadwall, American wigeon, ruddy duck, mallard, redhead, canvasback, surf scoter, bufflehead and greater scaup.  Amazing!  The next great thing, believe it or not, didn’t involve birds.  We stopped at the Visitor Centre in Williams Lake, BC, based in an amazing three story log building.  Not only were the local displays and information excellent, they had espresso and tons of maps about all of northwest Canada and Alaska AND they had wi-fi, so we could catch up on email, news, golf tournament results and Yankees and Cubs scores.  Being tourists, we stopped at the "world's largest fly rod" for a photo op.  Continuing on through Prince George, BC, where it seemed the entire town’s economy was based on timber - cutting it down, milling it into boards, making huge piles of sawdust and chips and turning them into plywood, particleboard and pellets for wood burning stoves.  A lot of smoke and smelly air is also involved.  We ended up at Beaumont Lake Provincial Park and were extremely lucky to get a campsite, since this is Victoria Day weekend, a national holiday in Canada.  

We have kept several lists of things seen thus far during the trip:

Bird species: 354

Mammals: 29

Road kill: 22

OUR FIRST GLACIER

May 22:  Our goal today is to get somewhere about 400 miles from where we are now.  This is not easy to do in Canada, since they annoyingly do everything in metrics.  We have no idea how many kilometres we are getting to the litre, either.  At least time is measured in understandable increments and we have noticed that the sun is now going down around 9:15 PM and shining again by 5:00 AM.  

BLACK BEAR

We hit the road early, traveling west on Route 16, then north on Route 37.  This is a long and very quiet road of some 450 miles, going from northwestern BC to the southern Yukon Territory.  We took one lengthy detour down Route 37A to visit the tiny towns of Stewart, BC and Hyder, AK, which are connected at the end of a long fjord.  The idea was to see some glaciers and a beautiful little fishing community.  There was one glacier along the way, more of a fingerling that extended from the giant Bear Glacier atop the snow-capped mountains.  It was a mini-glacier that slipped from the mountainside in a classic flow pattern, made a left turn and dropped into the narrow steep-sided valley.  We could see from the terminal and lateral moraines that the glacier had previously been much larger, conforming to modern shrinkage patterns.  The towns were a decaying bust, very tacky and no real fishing going on.  Oh, well.  

KINASKAN PROVINCIAL PARK, BC

PINK LADYSLIPPER ORCHIDS

We continued north and came across three small black bears playing next to the road and munching on some dandelions.  They were covered with mosquitos.  When we opened the windows for photos, we were instantly similarly embraced.

Night at lovely Kinaskan Provincial Park, BC, where we have a campsite right on the lake.  It is 9:52 PM and I am actually sitting outside at our picnic table watching the sun set behind the hills as I write.  Amazingly, no bugs.

May 23:  Got out early again today as we really had to cover some ground.  We still had 220 miles to go north on very rural Route 37 before hitting the Alaska (AlCan) Highway, with another 250 miles to reach Whitehorse, the capitol of The Yukon Territory.  Fortunately most of the day the weather was perfect and we cruised along, making occasional stops for scenery or black bears.  OK, I’m holding out on you.  There was one moment that will go down in history, if you are a birder.  If not, suck it up and pay close attention.  We stopped at Lower Gnat Pond (I’m not making this up), a lovely shallow body of water that was partly marsh and partly open and started scanning.  There were greater scaup, Barrow’s goldeneye, mew gulls and a lesser yellowlegs that started singing! (remember how far north we now are).  Then, with a loud OMG, I saw the motherlode - a breeding plumage yellow-billed loon, cruising along the far shore!  These birds are so uncommon and live so far north above the arctic circle that I didn’t even put it on our list of birds to hopefully see.  They winter primarily in Alaskan coastal waters and then nest in the high eastern arctic.  This one was probably crossing from A to B and we got lucky when it made a one-day stand.

YELLOW-BILLED LOON

The rest of the day was ho-hum driving, not counting amazing snow-covered peaks amidst magnificent boreal forest.  Dodged a few rainstorms and pulled into Whitehorse, on the banks of the Yukon River,  by 7:30 PM.  Dinner of fresh caught wild halibut and sockeye salmon and it’s time to call it a day (night is an increasingly scarce commodity around here).

WE'VE BEEN EVERYWHERE, MAN

"I’VE BEEN EVERYWHERE, MAN"

JOHNNY CASH

I've been everywhere, man.

I've been everywhere, man.

Crossed the desert's bare, man.

I've breathed the mountain air, man.

Of travel I've had my share, man.

I've been everywhere.

ZION NATIONAL PARK, UTAH

ZION NATIONAL PARK, UTAH

May 7:  It did NOT snow at Bryce Canyon last night, despite very cold temps.  We managed to get up and out fairly early and made the two-hour drive to Zion National Park, still in southwest Utah.  The entrance road to the park takes you higher and higher, through different zones of vegetation, transitioning from high desert with little but creosote scrub through sparse juniper/pinyon spotted hills and finally to the incredible massifs of Zion.  If Bryce was delicate lacework, Zion is Thor’s Hammer, nothing dainty about it.  This is just BIG!  Towering vertical sandstone cliffs, gigantic arches that would make McDonald’s blush, twisted, checkerboarded walls that simply take your breath away.  All while you’re attempting to drive a narrow, winding mountain road against opposing traffic.  Not fair.  And overwhelming numbers of people.  It seems that Europe and Japan are all on holiday.  English is spoken by perhaps 20% of the people.  Rental RVs are everywhere and most of the license plates are on California rental cars.  We headed straight for the campground and were fortunate to get a nice spot in the South Campground near the Visitor Center.  For the afternoon, we boarded the shuttle bus for the Zion Canyon trip.  Unless you are staying at the Lodge, private vehicles are not permitted along this road.  The shuttle is free and makes about eight stops along the canyon floor to allow visitors to get off and on as they wish.  We opted for the Emerald Pools Trail, about a 3 mile round trip walk up the side of the canyon.  The pools were formed by “curtain” waterfalls above each, where a sheet of water cascaded over the rock rim so gently that it dissipated into mist before hitting the ground.  The bad news was that the trail was so crowded (it was a Saturday) with families and their VERY young children, loud screaming teenagers and other reckless hikers, that respectable people such as ourselves were not quite able to get full enjoyment from the place, despite out best efforts to do so.  A cold rain started falling as we neared the end of our walk, so we did what made most sense - head for the Lodge, hot chocolate and some time with our cell phones.  The rain never abated, so we finished by riding the shuttle all the way around the canyon and enjoying the dreary but most impressive scene.

May 8: Happy Mother’s Day to all you mothers out there!  

We decided that one night at Zion was enough, but wanted to enjoy one more good walk, so we took the Watchman Trail, so named for the towering white mountain it overlooks.  The trail was fairly easy, following many switchbacks up and into a beautiful canyon.  The sheer cliffs above rang with the descending liquid son of a canyon wren, while less well-trained rock wrens harshly criticized their cousins’ more eloquent repertoire.  Magenta flowering prickly pear cacti graced trailside, along with a multitude of asters and many other flowers we couldn’t identify.  Near the bottom, a bird we had been looking for finally appeared - cordilleran flycatcher.  Just sat there, eye level, entirely pleased to be so admired and regaled.

SAND HOLLOW GOLF COURSE, HURRICANE, UTAH

On a whim, I called a golf course near St. George, Utah - Sand Hollow Golf Resort, to see if we could play there that afternoon.  We could and did and what an amazing experience!  The course was carved out of wild  red-rocked sandstone desert.  It was an stunning visual and golfing treat, one of the most fun golfing experiences we have ever had.  And unlike Zion, nobody else was there, so we had the course to ourselves.  Violet-green, cliff and northern rough-winged swallows were swooping all over the fairways, eating all the insects they could muster, while common ravens nimbly demonstrated their flying skills, doing barrel rolls and flips as they negotiated the desert air currents among those red rock hillsides.  

To complete a perfect day, we drove west through the stupendous Virgin River Gorge and ended up, where else? Las Vegas, baby!  A delightful Mother’s Day dinner at our casino hotel, followed by some heavy gambling.  I invested $1 and after about 20 hands of video poker, walked away a winner, with $1.25 in my sweaty palm.  I’m framing that quarter.  I beat the casino in Vegas!

May 9:  After such intense involvement in games of chance, we could only recuperate by sleeping in, enjoying our luxurious accommodations.  We spent the rest of the day driving through the southern part of California’s Central Valley.  Incredibly boring, unless you enjoy close observation of growing vegetables, pecans and almonds.  There apparently has been an immense proliferation of almond growing, spurred on by recent massive consumption of almond “milk”.  I confess to imbibing this stuff, but watching it grow makes eyeballing drying paint look like being trackside at the Kentucky Derby.  Night at a Walmart parking lot in Visalia, CA.  Can’t beat that with a stick!

May 10:  Early start (despite all the attractions Walmart has to offer) to head up into the mountains and spend the day at Sequoia/King’s Canyon National Park.  OK, so we’re just beginning our ascent, still outside the park, a long way from anywhere except a couple of tiny villages, when an icon flashes on the dashboard that looks like two heads riding a snowmobile.  We instantly knew we were in deep doodoo, since we had no idea what potential disaster this symbol pre-ordained.  Whipping out the Owner’s Manual, we figured out that the symbol meant our DEF was low.  What the hell is DEF?  Reading on, the manual carefully explained that we had either 1) 1000 miles to get this straightened out OR 2) in 16 starts, the engine would seize up, would never run again, the earth would implode and everything would fall into some sort of black hole.  We stopped at a tiny service station that surprisingly did not serve Hostess Cupcakes or donuts, but not only had an owner who knew what DEF was (Diesel Exhaust Fluid), but was willing to sell us 3 gallons at only triple markup.  Our manual advised that the DEF tank capacity was 3.2 gallons.  We poured in 3 gallons and it was still sucking it down like a milkshake.  Nonetheless, we motored along, the two guys on the snowmobile went elsewhere and we all lived happily ever after.

SEQUOIA NATIONAL PARK, "THE SISTERS"

Back to the story.  We climbed and climbed and climbed through switchback after switchback.  The views down to the raging river below, torrential from snowmelt, were stupendous.  Most of the mountain scenery was heavily filtered by air pollution.  Eventually, our ascent delivered us into the heart of the highest forest, composed of very large Douglas firs, massive ponderosa pines and THEN, the largest trees to grace the earth, giant sequoias.  These trees are so huge they shake you from the ordinary world, leaving you standing there with your slack jaw, saying clever things like, “Holy shit!”  Up to 30 feet in diameter, 200 feet tall, with upper branches that those pines and firs would love to have as their main trunks, sequoias enter into the realm of disbelief.  But there they are.  Wholly dependent on fire to open their cones, clear the ground for seedlings and to take out competing tree species, many of the gargantuan trunks were severely scarred by recent and ancient blazes, only adding to their mystique.

"SENTINEL", SEQUOIA NP

We continued on through the park, seeing a black bear run across the road in front of us, back down the northwest exit and returned to the dusty central valley toward Del Puerto Canyon, near Patterson, CA, our campground for the night.  As we drove up through the canyon, leaving the agriculture behind, our only views were of the glowing yellow grasses of rolling, gently rumpled California hills.  The very beautiful campground was virtually empty and we blissfully called it a night.

DEL PUERTO CANYON, CALIFORNIA

May 11:  At 6:30 AM, we met my high school friend Joe Mikulsky and wife Annie, who live in not too far away Felton, CA, at the entrance to the canyon to chase birds all the way up to its highest reaches.  I had last seen Joe at our 50th HS reunion, held last June in New York, but you know how that goes - you talk to a lot of people for about 5 minutes each.  We had a wonderful time, on a warm, sunny day, winding our way back up the narrowing defile, looking at birds, flowers and a few inquiring cattle.  Yellow-billed magpies, California’s only endemic bird species, taunted me while I gallantly, but unsuccessfully, tried to obtain a photograph.  We watched a common raven catch and then eat a mouse.  Eventually, we returned to the campground and the true spirit of wilderness, we all took naps.  Late afternoon was spent wandering around the area, seeing Nuttall’s woodpecker and phainopeplas, which are black silky flycatchers with glowing ruby-red eyes and white wing patches.  Enough birding, already!  Barbecued steaks, a few cold ones and sitting around a campfire was the real treat of the day, as it gave us a chance to really catch up and all get to know each other.

CINNAMON TEAL

NUTTALL'S WOODPECKER

AMERICAN BITTERN

May 12:  After some dawdling, we broke camp (meaning we disconnected out electrical cord and water hose) and parted ways.  Our destination was Portland, OR, some 666 miles distant, but some zigzagging was in order.  First we visited the San Joaquin River NWR and then, much later in the afternoon, the Sacramento NWR, which was quite spectacular.  I had been there once before, but in winter, when hundreds of thousands of waterfowl crowd onto its ponds and flooded fields.  Now it was much quieter, but the 6 mile drive through the refuge brought us next to many bullrush-lined lakes that are kept full throughout the stilting summer heat and play host to many species of breeding birds.  A normally very secretive American bittern put on a show, followed by a brief glimpse of a flying least bittern.  That completed our having seen every species of wading bird in North America on this trip!  Exciting, huh?  There were even a few lingering geese on the refuge, both snows and white-fronted, which was a “lifer” for Gale.

WALMART ROOM WITH A VIEW

We pushed on into the Cascade Mountains of northern California and southern Oregon and ended up pulling into, YES!, another Walmart parking lot in pitch darkness.

May 13:  We awoke and looked out the rear window of the Albatross to see a beautiful flower-covered meadow with a mountain backdrop.  Walmart?  Are you kidding?  Most RV parks couldn’t hold a candle to this view!

Onward to Portland, Oregon to visit my son, Matt, his wife, Alice and the two grandgirls, Bonnie and Eloise.

May 13-17:  Visiting and fly-casting for rainbow trout.

GRANDDAUGHTER BONNIE EARNING HER KEEP

A STRINGER OF RAINBOW TROUT

GRANDDAUGHTER ELOISE ALWAYS HAPPY

RAWHIDE!

RAWHIDE!

Keep rollin', rollin', rollin',

Though the streams are swollen,

Keep them dogies rollin', rawhide. 

Move 'em out, head 'em up,

Head 'em up, move 'em on.

Move 'em out, head 'em up:

Rawhide.

May 6:  We took our time getting going this morning, since it was so cold outside.  We’re camped at 7500’ elevation, so when the weather turns south, it gets really chilly.  It is absolutely wonderful having a comfortably heated and self-contained vehicle, where we simply don’t have to go out into the elements if the elements are acting in a hostile fashion.

Today was a dream come true.  I was here 34 years ago, when Matt and Becky were only 4 and 2 years old, respectively.  I recall looking down on the hoodoos and desperately wanting to hike down among them, but Becky was in a backpack, I had bronchitis and it was too dangerous to take Matt.  So no hike.  But today - Gale and I descended into the heart of Bryce Canyon’s magical world of color, spires, formations.  Walking down steep switchbacks through a narrow red canyon along the Navajo Loop was an insanely amazing experience.  Both mysterious and majestic, it never seemed real.  We reached the valley floor, wandered through an array of ponderosa and 1000 year old bristlecone pines, watched a family of Clark’s nutcrackers and then began our ascent.  (Side story: The only other memory I have of our previous visit was picnicking along the canyon edge.  Matt had a hard-boiled egg and had just finished eating the white part when a Clark’s nutcracker swooped down, speared the egg yolk right out of his diminutive hand and flew off, looking like Bozo the Clown, except with a yellow honker!)

The walk up through the formations was equally impressive and we made it more of a stroll though wonderland than a hike, pausing frequently at every astonishing vista.  The "Queen's Garden" was a beautiful little side trail that brought us to the foot of "Queen Victoria" dressing her minions.  As we exited the trail, snowflakes started to gently fall through the pines.

We spent the rest of the day visiting other viewpoints.  The most spectacular was Inspiration Point, with about a 300 foot elevation gain to the topmost platform.  Our ancient lungs were gasping for oxygen, but we made it!  Bad weather was sliding across the neighboring plateaus, so we hustled back to the RV.  Onward to Bryce Point, where we never got out of the vehicle because it was hailing sideways.  

The following are some photos from the Vermilion Cliffs Condor Site and Bryce Canyon.

CALIFORNIA CONDORS

VERMILION CLIFFS

BRYCE CANYON

"SKI SLOPE" DESCENDING TO QUEEN'S GARDEN TRAIL

BRYCE CANYON

BRYCE CANYON

A couple of notes:  When we were at Desert View getting our first looks at the Grand Canyon, a peregrine falcon motored across the canyon like a jet fighter.  Our jaws dropped.

Yesterday, at Bryce Canyon NP, we watched a herd of pronghorn near a park road.  The alpha male was apparently trying to discourage another younger male from certain activities and had managed to lodge one of his horns right up his rival’s ass.  The problem was that he couldn’t seem to get loose.  Looked very uncomfortable for both, especially the “catcher”.

At sunset at Sunset Point in Bryce, a very photogenic spot, a group of 12 young colorfully dressed Japanese photographers lined up along the viewpoint, taking up the entire area with their identical tripods and cameras, using identical filters and taking identical photos.  Bizarre.

JAPANESE TOURISTS

  

Around our campsite, we have a group of golden-mantled ground squirrels and Uinta chipmunks.  Much fun to watch them chase each other around!  Tonight it is supposed to drop below freezing, with snow forecast all morning.  

YOU DO THAT HOODOO THAT YOU DO SO WELL

May Day, May Day!

SANTA RITA MOUNTAINS, ARIZONA

Decided to get up earlier today and hike the Carrie Nation Trail, this time to its bitter conclusion.  We need to find a red-faced warbler!  Do you want the bad news first or the good news?  Too bad - I get to choose.  Sad story - no warbler.  Happy story - heard a northern pygmy-owl, chased it up the steep slope, actually got to see it and while watching, a male elegant trogon flew into the same tree! Wonderful! The greater pewee was doing its delightfully musical “jose maria” call today and we saw our first Grace’s warbler, plus hermit warbler.  We made it all the way to the end of the trail to inspect the old mine entrance (adit, for you crossword buffs) and then limped 2.2 miles back down after my “good" knee went south.  All’s well that ends well, however, and the force was with us today.

ALBIE AT CATALINA STATE PARK, TUCSON

Continued on to the Rincon Mountain Division of Saguaro National Monument and observed the many twists and turns of these many armed cacti.  Finished up at very nice Catalina SP, just north of Tucson.  This park used to be in the middle of nowhere.  Now there’s a mall right across the street from the park entrance.  Kind of makes you want to never come back.

RED-FACED WARBLER

May 2: Got an early start, but not early enough, to beat the massive Tucson traffic.  After fighting our way to the entrance, we spent a most enjoyable day on the slopes and summit of Mount Lemmon. This hill is so tall that driving up its winding road passes through 5 different life zones, which is the equivalent of driving from northern Mexico in the Sonoran Desert to the Rocky Mountains in Banff, Alberta, Canada.  We started by birding somewhere in the middle, where desert had given way to delightfully cool ponderosa pine forest.  We kept moving on up, stopping at the various camping and picnic areas.  We pulled into Rose Canyon Lake Campground and listened.  A wonderfully pure sweet song cascaded through the pine boughs, the song we had been waiting to hear.  Moments later, a red-faced warbler was flitting all around us!  We continued on to the summit at 9082’ elevation.  Near the top is a restaurant which claimed to serve the best pie ala mode anywhere.  Naturally, we had to test that claim, and after a mountainberry/rhubarb pie and an apple strudel, we fully authenticated their assertion.  It was 54˚ at the top.  We rolled back down to Tucson, where it was 90˚.

SAGUARO SUNSET

PYRRHULOXIA ON SAGUARO

On the northwest side of town, we stayed at Gilbert Ray Campground, situated in the very dry Sonoran desert. Surrounded by saguaros and numerous other spiny plants, we our experience was most pleasant as the desert cooled off.  A Bendire’s thrasher was most kind in appearing and many other desert species were present, including gilded flicker and pyrrhuloxia.  The saguaros were in bloom and many of the birds were feeding on the white blossoms.

COSTA'S HUMMINGBIRD

May 3:  After an early walk around the campground, we made the short drive to the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum.  This is probably the finest LIVING museum in the country and anyone who visits this area absolutely should make time for at least a half-day visit.  The museum features virtually all of the fauna of the region and much of its flora.  

COSTA'S HUMMINGBIRD (F)

We hit the road again and drove to Tempe, AZ, just south of Phoenix and home to Arizona State University.  Our goal was to see the rosy-faced lovebirds, native to Namibia in Africa,  that had recently been added to the American Birding Association’s “countable” birds for your life list.  And there they were, right in front of “Old Main”, the first building erected on the campus in 1882.  I even got to see the lovebirds making more little lovebirds.

ROSY-FACED LOVEBIRDS

After resupplying, we were northbound.  Unfortunately, if we thought Tucson had bad traffic, Phoenix dropped the bomb.  Finally, we emerged on the other side and continued north to the Grand Canyon’s south rim for the night.

DAWN AT THE GRAND CANYON

VIRGINIA'S WARBLER

WESTERN BLUEBIRD

May 4:  As the sun rose over the eastern hills, we got up at 5:30 AM so we could witness the dramatic lighting of the Grand Canyon.  At 7500’ in elevation, it was freezing cold!  Watching the sun light the canyon with it’s many-colored hues made cold hands totally worthwhile.  I won’t even try to describe the Canyon.  It is beyond words.  

GALE SPREADS HER CONDOR WINGS

However, words can describe how cool it was to find a singing male Virginia’s warbler right on the edge of the abyss.  A male western bluebird in the parking lot was also no slouch.

VERMILION CLIFFS

We continued north through the vast Navajo Reservation, then swinging west to the Vermilion Cliffs, designated a National Monument during the first Clinton administration.  Even in mid-day, the 1000 foot tall vertical cliffs glowed red.  Our goal was to find California Condors, the largest flying bird in North America, with a wingspan of 10 feet!  After very nearly becoming extinct, all 6 of the remaining condors were captured in 1986 and brought into captivity, to breed them with the few birds that were in zoos.  Twenty years ago, captive bred condors from the very successful program began to be released into the wild on these crimson cliffs, which are perfect for their nesting requirements and part of their historical range.  Shortly after finding the viewing location, we saw our first condor in the air, being followed by a common raven, which looked like a gnat compared to its huge relative.  Then we saw an amazing eight at one time!  Hoping to get better looks and photos, we decided to spend the night at this remote location.  And that’s where I’m writing all this down, to be published once we get into internet range.  

May 5:  Feliz Cinco de Mayo!!  

First overcast day in about 3 weeks and the condors were not flying, so we pushed on.  Winding, climbing back roads ushered us through the Kaibab Plateau in Arizona, then on to southern Utah and Bryce Canyon National Monument.  

Friends, I am very sad to report the death of clean air in the American west.  From Big Bend in Texas, where just 40 years ago you could see 150 miles from the top of the Chisos Mountains, to southern Arizona, the Grand Canyon in northern AZ and now into Utah, despite clear sunny days, the air is so thick with pollution and dust that visibility is grossly reduced to about 20 miles at most.  There are no more clear and vibrantly colored panoramas as all colors are muted if more than a few hundred yards away.  I consider myself fortunate to have traveled out here 30-40 years ago, when the air was as clear as a bell.  Too many people, too much everything, of which we are a part, of course, but depressing nonetheless.

Back to the fun.  We arrived at Bryce at 10:30 in the morning and were lucky to get a campsite!  The place was/is swarming with people, despite the earliness of the season, that it will probably snow tonight and the winds are blowing at 40 mph.  There are busloads of tourists and it seems we have heard every language in the world being spoken at the Grand Canyon and here at Bryce.  Since they are the “Big Three” for bus touring, we expect more of the same at Zion National Monument, our next destination.  I can’t imagine what our most popular national parks are like in the summer, but will definitely find out when we hit Yellowstone in a couple of months.

We spent the afternoon driving the 17 mile route along the ridge that overlooks what is really a basin, not a canyon, filled with the reds, yellows, tans and whites of crowds of “hoodoos”, those spires of rock that have been created by the erosive forces of nature.  You almost can get as anthropomorphic describing the shapes of these rocks as we did with the giant saguaros of the Sonoran desert.  The sun more or less crapped out on us, but into each life some rain/snow must fall and we’ve been pretty lucky so far with the weather.

Due to the high winds, the only birds we’ve seen today are common ravens, waiting for a hot dog or other handout, and a western bluebird.  A few others were spotted, but hard to ID when they get blown by going 100!

Relaxing now at the Bryce Canyon Lodge with a cup of hot chocolate before returning to our house on wheels for the night.  Pix of Bryce Canyon to come.