Cape May Madness

 Well I finally made it to a birding weekend!  I attended the Cape May fall birding festival, which I have been hearing about for ages but never made it to while I lived super close.  I drove up to Jersey and stayed near the Great Swamp for a night, thinking I would get some good nature time in at the Great Swamp.  Sadly it was super windy and super quiet, I didn't really see anything there until I was leaving, and saw a couple of little cuties from the road.  But the hotel was quite nice and I got good rest, so that was good!

Then I went into the city and spent time with Erin and Vhary and Joy, including a fancy Italian dinner.  Stayed with them and met up with Maria during the day for the Edges of Ailey exhibit at the museum, and then headed to Kathleen's new apartment (amazing!!!) and went for fancy tapas.  It was a wonderful whirlwind of a few days with friend in the city, then off to Cape May!

Oh, also, I forgot my binoculars.  For a birding weekend.  Yup, left them right by my chair at home.  So I decided to go ahead and get some Monarchs for the weekend, found an REI sort of on the way to Cape May, and picked them up there.  Oh well, they are better and the car bins, and now I have nice back-ups!

Anyway, on to the festival.  I didn't go to any of the optional evening stuff.  I was too tired, and it sounded exhausting being social in a sea of strangers.  Friday morning I went on a bus trip and we went to Higbee by a platform, where we saw lots of migrants fly over.  A few cool things close up, including a bobwhite hanging out right by us, mostly flyovers.  This was where I really understood the difference between this type of birding and the type of birding I've been used to, where you just see what is nearby in the trees etc.  Here they are really paying attention mostly to the migrants flying by, which is a very different approach for me.

Next to the hawkwatch, which was by an inlet from the coast, so it had just tons of water birds.  Swans, geese, different types of ducks, herons.  Really beautiful.  And several raptors flew over, notably the harriers flying over the tall grasses next to the water.  So beautiful!  This was a really nice spot.  I was nervous that a hawk-watch platform would have too many steps for me, but that wasn't the case at all!

Next up to the sea watch at Avalon.  It was so so so windy!  Here we were mostly seeing flocks of scoters or cormorants fly by, migrating.  They were far away but you could tell what they were by their shape, flying patterns, etc.  It was cool!  A few sandpipers close by, and I did see a dolphin!  That was a highlight.  Oh and the bald eagle catching the fish!  That was awesome!

That afternoon I drove to a park for a session on learning birdsong, and on the way there the car alerted me to low tire pressure!  Oh nooooooooo!  Luckily I was talking to some guy and it turned out he was a mechanic for another brand of car, he offered to take a look, and checked all the tires and they were all fine.  So at least it's not an emergency.  Thank you stranger!  The talk about bird song was really helpful, just in building terminology about how to think about and talk about bird calls and songs.  

That was it for the day.  I was done, super tired and ready for some down time.

The next day I had to drive myself, which I didn't love, but it did get me out exploring for longer, so there's a tradeoff there.  I accidentally recreated the same first two stops as the bus trip, which is hilarious!  But we had a very different experience at the first one, we walked on some paths instead of staying by a platform, and it was much more the type of birding I'm used to,  The hawkwatch one wasn't as good, there was a super famous older leader and he wanted to spend 20-30 minutes promoting his books, which I really didn't need at all.  The other leader was great, and I had an okay time, but that one famous guy, I didn't like him at all.  The highlight that time I think was all the merlin, there were quite a few, I'm starting to be able to pick them out as they fly through.  One grabbed a swallow!  I can't say I saw it, exactly, I saw the merlin flying around by the swallows, and then I saw that it had one.  That middle bit of catching it I didn't notice at all!

Lunch (breakfast for lunch) at a diner near the beach, a walk on the beach, and then time for the next one!  Another beach birding trip, at a different beach, which was just littered with horseshoe crab shells.  Lots of ghost crabs.  It was not a good smelling beach.  But we did see lots of little cutie sandpipers of various sorts, and quite a few osprey!  We even saw two catch fish right there and fly off with them, which was really cool.   

Again, back to the room exhausted.

Sunday morning was another trip with transportation provided, just get on the trolley and go.  We went somewhere cool and saw a zillion yellow-rumps, a few other things, mostly it was just a nice time.  We did see a sharpie zoom through and pick up a white-throated sparrow!  Again, I can't say I saw the snatch, just saw it zooming quite low and then saw it had the bird.  These hunters are so fast!

After that, I got all my stuff into the car and headed home.  I didn't have energy for a bonus stop at the hawkwatch or Avalon, just wanted to get on the road.  I learned some things, and I'm so glad I went!

Costa Rica Sisters Trip, Full Day One

 What a day!  This place really is gorgeous, and pretty perfect for us.  I did not go to morning yoga, I was just too into exploring and finding those cute birds!  I started in the area across from our room, and eventually wandered all around the gardens across the little bridge, finding and then losing and then finding again the yoga site.  I saw so much!  Although the hummingbird feeders were not very active.  Oh well, I'm glad I found them!

I was feeling pretty ready for some breakfast when their class was over.  Except Deborah and I decided to take the long way, and got lost a time or two, before finding our way out of the gardens.  So coffee and breakfast sounded great!  I love a Costa Rican breakfast, and this one was a good one.  Fruit, gallo pinto, fried eggs, what a tired birder needs!

I did make it to afternoon yoga, by that time they had their tour schedules and spa schedules ironed out.  Afternoon yoga was pretty much all breath work, and I can't say I liked it.  I definitely had some resistance, and didn't feel able to do the holds like she wanted.  It wasn't great for me.  

After yoga I of course went back to birding the grounds until dinner, and I saw toucans at last!  It sounds silly since this was only day 2, but I was really missing them and wanting to see them again!  There were 4 aracari in a tree.  They are so cool! Also some parakeet drama.  A pair of larger parakeets came over, and the little ones did not like it one bit.  They were complaining loudly, but the bigger ones didn't care at all!  It was pretty funny.

Dinner and bed, looking forward to another day!  :-) 

Costa Rica Sisters Trip, Arrival Day

 Well the flights were as long as expected, and we got through them just fine.  We changed at the airport and got some snacks, and found the driver, and then headed onto the long rough road.  There were long stretches of gravel with brief interludes of pavement.  There were potholes of impressive proportion.  The roads I am used to seemed smooth and trouble-free in comparison.  At one point the car couldn't make it up the hill and we backed way down and tried again.  Eventually we made it, and it was all worth it!  What a beautiful hotel!  The rooms are basic but large, with AC, with every amenity that matters to me.  And my room was right across from a very nice garden area, so of course I headed right over!

I found a tody making a nest.  That hanging mess is its nest.  I know, it looks unlikely, but it seems to be true!  

There were woodpeckers nesting in this tree, I didn't see babies, but they were definitely using that hole as a home base, switching off, bringing things in.  So maybe they are on eggs?  Or they have little ones that can't stick their heads out yet?

There were plenty of oropendula, they were just all going through, there were more than the 4 I managed to get a group shot of!  And the video shows one of the few times I saw their call, with full dip.  So funny!

There were many parakeets.  Just so many.  Other places it's a struggle to find them, and it's not easy here either, they blend so well, but if you stick with it you will definitely find them
.  There were at least a dozen residents, and they were not particularly shy!

Walking around the rest of the grounds was also wonderful, and this was my first hummingbird of the trip :-) 

We saw the eclipse!!!!

 I had never seen a total solar eclipse before, and this was our best opportunity.  Probably we will not see another one in our lifetimes!  So I planned to drive about 5 hours to Ohio, stay a couple of nights to give us some good buffer time, and hopefully see the eclipse.

Well it turned out better than I could have planned!  The hotel I chose was accidentally absolutely perfect.  It was across from a college campus, and they were having a huge eclipse event, so the rest of the guests went there.  The hotel staff went up to the roof, leaving the sun patio, with chairs and tables and a perfect view, empty for just the two of us!  We had our eclipse glasses and eclipse binoculars.  And snacks and sodas.  And regular binoculars for during totality.  

The weather cooperated beautifully!  It was forecast to be super cloudy, and there were clouds, but just the high thin ones that didn't really get in the way.  We had a great view, and it was gorgeous!  Even though I had seen plenty of pictures and videos, it was still surprising how gorgeous it was during totality.  This picture is...... well, I took it on my phone with absolutely no skill, so there we go.  

It was definitely worth the trip!  Afterwards we ordered pizza from our room, and it was delicious.

Thank you Ohio!

This was the first long trip with the new car, and it was awesome!  The fancy new features make it so so so much easier and less draining to do a long drive.  Also the traffic wasn't bad at all, maybe because we had buffer days, but it was really much easier than I expected!  So that was wonderful.

I'm so glad we had a little getaway that was okay for Jack and something we both really wanted to do, and really enjoyed.  :-) 

Quick good-bye beach

 Time to head back to the cabin, with a heart full of love!  What a wonderful trip this has been.  I feel like I've had some really great family reconnection time, and seen so many things!  We went by Coronado for a last look at the ocean before heading to the airport.  Here's the pic I took, it's not great in the traditional sense, but it does reflect how it feels to visit.  Everything just layered up with happiness and love!

The day all of our plans changed

 Well, we had a plan, but we ended up doing totally different things.  We were going to walk around a meditation garden that Deborah has been wanting to go see, but when we got there, it turned out they are closed on Mondays.  So, I guess that's for another trip!  Luckily there was a gorgeous overlook nearby for us to regroup somewhere pretty.  H Street Overlook was awesome!  Easy parking, amazing gorgeous view, and dolphins!!!!!  A pod of maybe about 8, quite close to shore, just going along doing dolphin things!  

From there we went to La Jolla, trying to see leopard sharks in their nursery in the clear water, but we were too late in the day for that already.  We did have gorgeous views, and saw just ridiculous numbers of pelicans and cormorants!   A very nice walk which my knees did well on.  And then when we were getting back into the car, a juvie red-tailed hawk was right there!  So we paused again for that. 

https://ebird.org/checklist/S153421512

Then down to the sea lion beach, more great nature sightings.   There were ground squirrels there, my first time getting a good look at them.  And of course sea lions, chasing each other around, hanging out, they are always a treat to see. And look how beautiful the beach next door is!

https://ebird.org/checklist/S153422788

From there, back home and picking up Mom for lunch in Seaport Village.  As we were waiting for a table, a sharp-shinned hawk flew into a tree right by us!  So I reported that as an incidental.  Lunch was amazing.  Nice place on the water, again with the gorgeous view.  And I got huevos rancheros and they were so delicious!  I would definitely go back to that place again!  The rest of the day I just kept thinking back on that meal :-) We walked around Seaport Village, Mom wanted to look around and do some shopping and maybe find a treasure.  Well the treasure that we found was ice cream, thank you Ben and Jerry's!  

Another day, another boat

 We changed our plans.  Originally  from having a relaxing start to the day, hitting the boat for a couple of hours and then heading to nice dinner.  We ended up getting on the boat earlier, having a nice long wonderful boat ride, and needing a little bit of recovery time before nice dinner!  

This time the boat was a fast motorboat, and we did some zooming!  It was really really fun.  First we slowly got out of the harbor

Then it was zooming time!

I again took out my binoculars and we spotted lots of stuff, the highlight for me was a flock (raft?) of at least 175 surf scoters!  They are a cool looking duck with white on their necks that at first fools you into thinking they are maybe buffleheads.  But they are bigger, the beak is wrong, and they have other markings that will leave you doubting until you look it up, and find they are scoters!  That was pretty great.  We went super far, further than Deborah had gone before, so that was really cool.  Again a lot of sandpipers I wasn't able to ID, even though I looked at some in a guide last night.  I did see some that I was confident about, including a long-billed curlew, which was really cool!  Oh and some brant which were really hard to ID.  Looking up a black duck with a white neck ring was useless.  Merlin eventually came up with it, but only on try 3 or 4 of going through the process.  But we got there!  I really need to study my sandpipers and plovers etc. for next time I'm here.  Here's the checklist:

https://ebird.org/checklist/S153361223

Here's my best bird pic, of the brant. I miss my superzoom!  

Then we had a really fantastic dinner at a nice restaurant on the water.  I wore a skirt!  So fancy!  It was beautiful and delicious and I got to spend some really great quality time with Mom.  

Then back to Deborah's to again basically collapse exhausted!