Albatrossity

Albatrossity

A few more pics and commentary from our December 2017 trip to Big Bend National Park. On the way out we went through Terlingua YX, which was a trip by itself, and ended up in West Texas for a couple of days, staying at the Turkey Hotel in Turkey TX. If you ever get a chance to do that, it is worth the trip!. We spent a day in Palo Duro Canyon as well, and some of those pics are in a previous edition of On The Road.

Big Bend National ParkDecember 24, 2017

Here’s a longer and wider view of the Chisos Mountains, looking west from a jeep trail in the high desert. The Chisos Basin Lodge is on the other side of those.

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Albatrossity

In late December 2017 I had an opportunity to visit Big Bend National Park with Elizabeth and another couple who were in the College of Architecture at KSU. We had traveled with them before (to New Zealand), and it sounded like fun. Additionally, I had always wanted to visit that national park, which is huge, diverse, and perched next to Mexico along the Rio Grande in west Texas. The days had long passed since I was tempted to hike the canyons there, but the opportunity for some warmer weather, bird-watching, and time with some good friends sounded great to me!

It is a two day drive from where I live in Kansas to the park entrance, and we also planned to visit Marfa for a day before we got to the park. Marfa is an interesting place in its own right, and the Chamber of Commerce slogan “Tough to Get Here. Tougher to Explain. But Once You Get Here, You Get It” is pretty accurate. There are art galleries galore, but the real reason our architect friends wanted us to see it was the Chinati Foundation, founded by the minimalist artist Donald Judd. I do have pictures of the installations there, but they don’t do it justice. So we’ll go with some birds and scenery instead!

Big Bend National ParkDecember 24, 2017

We got to the park at sunset, and were able to stay in some of the rustic cabins near the lodge in Chisos Basin, the administrative center of the park which is nestled in the Chisos Mountains. This was our view of the mountains at dawn the next day.

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On the Road: Week of January 4  (5 am)
Albatrossity –
UncleEbeneezer – ‘Blossoms of Light” at Denver Botanical Gardens, December 2018
?BillinGlendaleCA – Fall Color at the Huntington
Sherparick – Pets who we lost
Origuy – Road Trip 2006, Part 3

On the Road: After Dark: Week of January 4 & 11  (10 pm)
We are back to Paris, with a set of 10 Paris posts from Steve from Mendocino

?  And now, back to Steve from Mendocino, for Provence, France

Steve from Mendocino

I’ve been to Provence twice, once int the early 70’s when Anne-Marie, her parents, and I drove from the Pyrenees (in two cars) through Provence and down to Florence and Venice, and once in the 80’s when I spent a week with my then girlfriend visiting my best friend in Mougin.  He had rented a house for a month, complete with housekeeper who arrived every morning to clean and prepare lunch.  I just didn’t have any family anchors in Provence, so we didn’t end up going there.  This group of photos is half of what I’ve set aside for OTR.

I look at a good deal of the architecture in Provence and think “no earthquakes here”.  The least little shake would bring these structures down.  Growing up in Los Angeles, it’s hard to conceive of a place that can simply ignore any possibility of earthquakes.

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On the Road: Week of December 28  (5 am)
Albatrossity – Winter Hawks of 2020
Kody Kastel – California Photos
?BillinGlendaleCA – The Great Conjunction
Captain C – Goes To Japan: Second Tokyo 2
Steve from Mendocino – Provence, France

On the Road: After Dark: Week of December 28  (10 pm)
Origuy – Road Trip 2006 Part Two
Mike in Oly – Mt. St. Helens National Volcanic Monument
KarenH – Great Sand Dunes National Park
Ghosts of Holidays Past – Christmas Snippets
Ghosts of Holidays Past – Christmas at Rockefeller Center

?  And now, back to Albatrossity, for Winter Hawks of 2020.

Albatrossity

Time for another installment of the Winter Hawks of Kansas, methinks. As you know if you have driven through the state in winter, we are blessed with a tremendous number and variety of raptors at this time of year.

Some are residents, many are migrants from the north. Some return to the same territory year after year, while others, particularly the youngsters who hatched out last summer, have to work hard to find an unoccupied territory and survive the winter. And every year, some don’t return, having succumbed to one of the myriad hazards of migration between here and, in some cases, Alaska or the Canadian Arctic.

So here’s a sampler from the season so far, with some familiar faces and lots of new ones.

Near Keats, KSDecember 19, 2020

Red-shouldered Hawks (Buteo lineatus) are one of the resident species, and are becoming quite common in my area, This one was photographed on our annual Christmas Bird Count, and was one of three I saw that day. But 30 years ago it would have been a hotline bird, and a report of this bird on the CBC would have earned me a grilling from the compiler about the details of the sighting, how I eliminated other species, etc. Today it is not exactly a ho-hum bird here, but the fact that I found three in my area tells you that they are doing quite well here.

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