Jan. 28, 2015 Birding Shots

Hiking this morning with the cameras:

Eastern Towhee

Brown Headed Nuthatch

Hooded Mergansers

The woods by the Gulf:

Old Turpentine Stihl

Jan. 28, 2015 Loon

We awoke to the cry of the loon out in the bay this morning.  Took me back to all of those summer  vacation trips to lakes in Ontario Canada as a kid.  A sound of the fabric of my life!  This loon is in it's winter plumage, not the bright black and white we would see in the summer season. 

Jan. 28, 2015 A "lifer" kind of a day

Brown-headed Nuthatch

Found only in this part of Florida/Alabama. We wanted to see and photograph to add to our life list.  Only took one day to find him in St. Andrews State Park...Panama City Beach area.

Had some great shots of Water Birds also:

Female Bufflehead Thanks for input from my birder friends.

Horned Grebe

Red Breasted Merganser

Jan 27, 2015 On the Road

Yesterday we spent 4 hours on the road to this new location on the Panhandle of Florida.  A good part of that 4 hours was a two lane road through the swamp (another one). Our Garmin GPS always suggests the highway. We like traveling the back roads, even in the Lark.  We get a lot of "recalculating".

It's not that we don't love the Garmin, we do.  Great in traffic and six lane highway ramps.  For us, there is nothing like the open road with little traffic as possible.  There is another strange but friendly tradition among RV'ers.  It turns out you need to consider waving to every motor home/trailer driver  coming the opposite way on a two-laner. I guess a sort of brotherhood (or sisterhood, lots of women drivers)  road warrior thing. It was so desolate yesterday on our route the Fed Ex driver even waved to us.  It's a rather nice human  interaction with strangers. Quick but nice.

We are getting our sea legs... can't drive 45MPH because we have a "harmonic" tone that makes you crazy.  Seems this isn't unusual when you are blasting through the atmosphere in a rolling bread truck. (So far impossible to find the source)

Can't go 70MPH because you are topping out with no extra speed for passing.

So we go 60MPH and that seems slow until you are in the cab with 14,000 lbs attached to you.  Seems like you are flying!  Best gas mileage is probably 55MPH, but Ed just can't hold her down to that. Have to remember for the last 50 years, starting with a 1967 GTO  455 8-cylinder 4 Speed on the floor...Ed has not been passed on the road, he does the passing.  A new world out there for him and he's doing great.

Mellowing a bit???

*****

Merlin   Bird Variet

Back to Garmin: on the lonely road yesterday we had to entertain ourselves. I have a habit of naming things near and dear. So..what shall we call our Garmin?  Needed to be a bird, of course.  But I like a double meaning.  So, after many miles we came up with "Merlin"  a fast and sleek falcon and a magician.   In the Lark we are fast and sleek in our own minds and we believe Merlin is rather magical, with it's uncanny road information.  I'll spare my readers how we got "sullmates" on another road trip to Virginia in 1995.

Jan. 27, 2015 St. Andews State Park Florida Carolina Chickadee

Arrived yesterday afternoon to this state park at Panama City Beach on the "Emerald Coast".  Now we are talking...the beach woman in me is happy!  Good bye forest..hello white sand. This beach has been named one of the best in USA.

Our site is Bay front with two palm trees.  Quite nice, have to admit  we are good "pickers" from the internet sites.  

My palm trees and water view!

The glorious Fl sun is shining and a bit of a cool breeze, 65degrees and flawless blue skies. Nice that this park is both wooded for birding and gulf front for beaching.  Biked and walked the beach this AM and will be doing some serious "shooting" later. 

Got a tour of a brandy new Airstream 25' trailer this morning. Ontario, Canada owners out on their first trip. Made in Ohio!  Thing of beauty and quite pricey.   Baby boomers are loving them and there was just a story on nightly news this week about the company expanding to produce 75 a week! Hand done, all of them.  

Southern Variety:  Carolina Chickadee
Slightly different from our Black-Capped Chickadee in Ohio
I can go into the difference: pretty boring. :)

Jan. 26, 2015 Red Shouldered Hawk

Some Turtle For Lunch?

Ed disappeared into the woods and came back with these great pictures of the Red Shouldered Hawk.  

Red Shouldered Hawk 

The sharp eyes of a raptor

******

Kestrels are hard to capture.  They are extremely fast.

Ed did a great job...I am so proud of his work.

He has amazing patience.

American Kestrel

Jan. 26, 2015 What is Blue and Large and Everywhere?

Back on the road in the Lark.  Realizing that Kissimmee State Park and St. Andrews State Park are a good 8 hour drive apart...we quickly grabbed a night half way between.  The first ugly state park in Florida, Manatee Springs is at least undergoing renovations.   The saving grace...A smoker with the very best bar-b-que pork dinner to be had! The fridge and freezer were packed with a weeks worth of groceries, but who could resist dinner with drinks for $8?

Brings me to Blue and Large... Walmart, of course.  I've never been a big promoter of Walmart (for well known reasons) however: Walmart is a RV'ers dream.  The size of the parking lots alone are impossible to pass on.  Open all kinds of hours, in every medium sized town in America and they offer overnight parking..free if you are in a pinch.  Not to mention they now offer some RV parts and supplies.  Only outshone by Cracker Barrel...where you can park over night and have Pecan Pancakes for breakfast before pulling out! Sometimes when you are in a strange town, Walmart and Cracker Barrel are comforting.

Today on the road we experienced 30MPH headwinds...tough on the driver and we were happy to pull into St. Andrews, a wonderful site on the water.  Can't wait to explore the beach tomorrow.  

Stopped in St. George Island and learned about Tupelo honey. A honey provided by bees that only pollinate Tupelo trees. This honey never forms crystals...and lives forever (if you don't eat it first).  A foodie couldn't pass on buying some of that!

I have not much experience writing. Did some wedding announcements, obits and anniversary announcements in our local paper a million years ago.  Now I have this little "blogging" bug in my ear. All day I find I'm thinking about what to add to my journal. Who knew...