Sunday, October 18, 2009

Boy - the weeks are flying by!

This week went really fast! John was busy painting around the park and I learned some more about my job here and my second (afternoon) job at another park. A few more people have arrived and there will be more coming this next week. We've been hearing some tales of nasty weather through Nebraska...

On Saturday, we had our regular breakfast with the gang at Beto's and then we, and our friends Bill and Sandy, headed for South Padre Island (SPI) to see "Sandcastle Days". SPI is the southernmost portion of Padre Island National Seashore which is the longest undeveloped stretch of barrier island in the world (about 70 miles). The sandcastles are created by experts from all over the world and were really neat, but unfortunately, it was quite windy and, after about 45 minutes of being sandblasted we headed for someplace calmer. You can click on the picture below to see the detail - quite amazing!

We drove a little ways north on the island to the South Padre Island Birding and Nature Center which overlooks the Laguna Madre. We wandered down one of the many boardwalks and look what we found! We looked in vain last year here for an alligator. This little guy was about 4 feet long and the first we've ever seen outside of a zoo or aquarium.

Not sure what this bird is - I suspect it's some kind of heron. Anyone out there recognize it?

This one is a Great Egret. Someday we should pick up a bird book for this area, since there are so many around here.

Quiet day today catching up on naps (John) and paperwork (me). We did get our two-mile walk in and washed the salt off the car. It's a tough life we have here...

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