Bird pictures

Birds in Saguaro National Park

Curved Billed Thrasher sitting on pick-nick table

At the beginning of our trip we had the opportunity to make some wonderful pictures of birds in Saguaro National Park. This small but very nice national park is a haven for all sorts of birds.

Thrasher sitting on Chola Cactus

I was sitting outside one afternoon with Wahids camera on my lap and I took some nice shots, even though it is difficult to take a good shot of those birds, they are so skiddish. Especially the Gambles Quiale, they never sit still. Somebody had left some grapes on the pick-nick table and a bowl of water and that sure helped getting those birds to the table.

Thrasher on dead Saguaro branch

& Gamble's Quail

Livingston

At the beginning of this year, we registered at Escapees in Livingston, TX. We never stayed at the campground; we only joined because they could provide us with an address, which we needed for the deed of the MH. So finally a year later, we have come back to our home base and are staying here for a number of nights. The rates are very reasonable. We pay only $ 10, 50 per night plus what ever you use in electricity. That is no more then $ 1, 50 per day or so. Last weekend we stayed for a couple of days at Lake Livingston State Park, but that was costing us $ 21, - per night. The weather was pretty bad, so we ended up staying most of the day inside.
We are probably the one of the youngest couples over here, but everybody is ever so friendly. I was sitting near the Laundromat doing some stuff on the computer and people just start talking to you. Of course, I do not want to be rude, but the whole afternoon I did not get to do the stuff that I wanted to do.

Wahid is doing all sort of work around the MH, yesterday he cleaned the roof, took off all the beading and today he resealed the lot. We are still waiting for our part to arrive, but it is taking longer then we anticipated. On Tuesday, somebody will do some of the last work on the MH and the cleaning will start for real. On the 26th, we give the MH the dealer and we move to a hotel for a number of days. We both are very sad about it, but all things must come to an end. We can hardly believe that the year has gone so quickly. We have done so much this year, but we feel that it is still not enough and we should have done more. Wahid has to go back to work on the 2nd of January and he is already assigned a new project. He was hoping to ease in, but as it seems he will have a hard start. As for me, I will give it a couple of weeks and put the house back into order and then I will have to go job hunting.
But for now I am still enjoying the beautiful weather we have over here and reminisce about the past year. This has been in one in a lifetime experience, but there are talks to do this again in the hopefully near future.

Close Up Impressions

Most of the photos that I have been putting on the blog were made by me, but of course I do not travel alone and my beloved partner has got a super camera, with a huge zoom lens, so I thought it would be nice to put some pictures of his on this blog.

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This male Elk was visiting the Moraine Campground in Rocky Mountain National Park, this was without any doubt the biggest bull around. Later he would be strutting around in the valley in search of his harem. Pretty big boy.

I saw a beautiful photo opportunity, but when I started climbing towards the edge of the rocks my fear of heights got the better of me and I chickened out. Wahid did climb the rock, and was posing quite happily. But when it came to going back from the rock even he hesitated a little. The drop you can not see that well on the picture, but it a sheer drop of 2.000 feet.

This Turkey Vulture was sitting on this rock for the longest time, he was quite far away, but the photo did not come out too badly. This photo was taken on the scenic drive through Black Canyon of the Gunnison in Colorado. A small but ever so beautiful park. The canyon is almost more impressive then the Grand Canyon, because the walls of the canyon are almost dropping down straight.

The photo of this bird was taken on our way to Mt. Rushmore, it looks like its beak is crooked and that he would have a hard time catching anything. Somehow he is getting by alright, because he looked fine. We have not a clue what kind of bird it is, we still have to look it up.

One of the many Prairie Dogs in Wind Cave National Park, they life in big flat areas preferably were the bison come a lot. They make a lot of noise when an intruder is spotted and they hide in their burrow.

This bird of prey we spotted when we were on one of our hikes in the Badlands, it spotted it sitting on a branch quite far away, we moved closer and the bird flew away, we thought that we had lost it, but then it started circling right above our heads and Wahid took this neat pictures.

Still have to look up what kind of bird it is, maybe a hawk or falcon?

This Pronghorn was walking along the trail that we were taken in Wind Cave NP, it was almost like he/she was posing for the picture. These animals are the fastest land animals in North America and the second fastest in the world, with a speed of 70 mph. They are not very good jumpers though.

This Mule Deer was grazing the grass when we spotted her, soon after she moved into the shrubs and she was hard to spot. But with a bit of patience this nice close up shot was taken. Later on in the afternoon we would see her again from the top of the cliffs.

This picture was taken again in Badlands National Park, the evening light is so gorgeous and to our surprise were there some deer grazing in the grass, so we took the opportunity to take a couple pictures of this Mule Deer doe with her fawn complete the picture.

Chipmunck was making a wooshing sound with its tail, we could not believe that we could get that close to him. Funny little critters, we call all small animals "buddies", because sometimes it is so difficult to see if it is a chipmunck or a squirrel. The difference is that chipmuncks have stripes on their heads and squirrels do not.

Photo of one of the wild horse in the South Unit of Theodore Roosevelt National Park. We were doing a hike and I got stuck in the mud near the river and this horse was standing at the other side of the bank and wanted to get to our side. I do not know who was more scared the horse or me. Wahid pulled me out of the mud and we tried to leave so the horse could come across. He started running across the river up the river bank, pretty cool sight.

Going to Graceland, Memphis, Tennessee

Finally we made it to Graceland, Wahid wanted to go for ages. We knew that it was a commercial event, but it was nice to have a peek inside the house where he lived. I was actually surprised that the house was not even that big. It is big enough, but for someone who had that kind of wealth I expected it to be much bigger. Some of the rooms are not attached to the mansion.

The living room

Elvis bought the mansion when he was only 22 years old and he kept on living there until he died in 1977. It thought that some of the house was pretty stylish, even for this time and age. I loved the dining room & the living room. We were not allowed to go upstairs, Elvis never just to allowed anyone going to the upstairs floor. He died upstairs, just above the entrance hall. The kitchen looked very dated, but for those days it must have been state of the art. In the basement he had several rooms. One of them was the TV room, all in yellow and blue. I thought it was rather nicely done.

The TV room in yellow & blue

The pool room is covered from top to bottom in fabric, even the ceiling was covered in material. I liked it a lot, all though it was not that big either. After the jungle room we went to an area were there were clothes from his wedding and other private artifacts. After that we went outside and had a look in one of the adjacent buildings. One of the corridors is filled with golden records & award, it is pretty amazing to see how many he received in his lifetime. But later we would even more.

There was an area that was dedicated to his movie career. There were lots of billboards & movie costumes. One of the last areas we went to was were Elvis played the piano in the morning with friends on the day of his death. The last room was dedicated to more of his golden records and costumes of his Hawaiian tour. The walls are so high and the records were hanging all the way to the top. I have to say it was pretty impressive.

The last stop was in the garden, Elvis had a meditation garden were he would sit and sometimes read. Now there is his grave and the graves of his mother & father. He and his mother were burried in another cemetery, but after threats that someone wanted to take the body, the bodies were moved back to Graceland. His grandmother outlived them all and her grave is also there, she died in 1980 at the respectable age of 86. There is also a marker for Elvis's twin brother who died at childbirth, his grave site is still in Tupelo, were they were was born.

For some reason I felt sad after the visit, it just feels to me that a lot of people are trying to make a buck after his death.

Memphis, Tennessee

Rock & Roll Country

After about 250 miles drive from Nashville we arrived in the afternoon near Memphis. We had looked if we could find a campground near Memphis, but we came up with zilch. Wahid had found a campground near Germantown, still a good few miles out. But it was not that expensive and further more there was a bus stop. For some reason not all the sites had water and it took us quite some time to find a site with water. But the sites were nothing more then some grass with a hook-up. It had been raining a lot the previous days, so while we attempted to park up we got stuck in the mud. We put some blocks under the back wheels, but it was all in vain. The wheels just duck in even more. Luckily someone came by and informed the owner of the campground and he brought in some heavy duty material to pull us out. I thought it was quite funny, because I fingered that someone would have been able to pull us out, but Wahid was a tat upset.

The next morning we found out that the bus would not stop in the area were we were parked up, so we had to cycle a couple of miles to the nearest bus stop that would take us to downtown. Wahid was hurry so our first stop was the Peabody Place were we had a bite to eat, after that we went to Beale Street, this was the street were once up a time all the big Blues & Soul artist came to perform. It is very touristy, but we did get into the B.B. King bar. There was a band playing and we decided to stop for a while. During the performance a couple of guys who called them self the Beale Street Flippers did a little performance. They did flips, one of them did 20 flips in one go. It was pretty amazing to see this. Unfortunately we could not stay that long since we had a bus to catch. So back to our campground near Germantown.

Nashville, Tennessee

On the way to our next destination we had to pass by Nashville. We both are not really Country fans, but it seemed fun it check the city out.

We found a supermarket were we could park up for a couple of days or so and we took the bus to downtown. At first we did not know what to see and visit, so we just wondered around for a while. We came to the Capitol building and had a look around there, after that we headed back still not finding anything really exiting to see. But then we saw a visitor center and got some info about the city. One of our stops was at the Tennessee State Museum, to our surprise they did not charge any fee for that one and it turned about to be much bigger then I originally thought it would be.

They show some of the influence the Indians had before the European settlers came into the area. And of course a huge section about the Europeans who came after the 1700's. There are some lovely portrait paintings from late 1800's. There was a section that was dedicate to the music as well and they showed some of the clothes of country stars like Dolly Parton. We spend about 3 hours in there and we still have not seen everything properly, we went into overload.

After that we walked around and came to the music street Broadway, the are quite a few bars in this street and some of them have live music. We ended up in Tootsies Orchid Lounge, a smallish bar with a tiny stage were a country band was playing. It was very busy in there and the atmosphere was wonderful. The drinks were a bit expensive though. We did not stay that long, because we had to catch the bus back to Madison were our MH was parked.

The next morning the weather was horrible, it just kept on raining. We decided not to take the bus, but to drive the MH to the Opry Mall. There are some 200 shops under one roof, some restaurants & a cinema. So enough to spend the entire day there. I bought some CD's in Tower Records, who are closing down in a couple of weeks, so I did a good deal. The DVD's were still expensive, even with the 40% discount.

I was a bit peckish, so we stopped at Johnny Rockets, a 50's style diner. The milkshake was really good, and Wahid's hamburger was very tasty as well. Neat place, it reminded us of the place where I took Wahid to for his 30th birthday in the Netherlands.

Late in the afternoon the rain had stopped, we walked to the Grand Ole Opry House, but we were not allowed in. But someone in the gift shop told us that there were tickets available for the opening show the next evening. A Christmas Show with the Rockettes, so off we went to the tickets office to see if we could get tickets. And to our surprise they still had some tickets.

The next morning we went to the Ole Opry Museum, there was some things on display about the time that the Grand Ole Opry was broadcasting radio shows. But most of the exhibitions were of the stars in the 50' & the 60's, like Jim Reeves and Marty Robbins. After that we went to the Ole Opry Hotel, I was surprised how big this place is. There is an atrium, which all most looks like a jungle. Very nicely done. We spend most of the afternoon there, because outside it was raining again, there are some nice shops & restaurants to check out. In the late afternoon we headed back to the MH to get ready for our night out in the Grand Ole Opry House. The show was neat, it is amazing to see who those Rockette girls can kick their legs at the same time. Nice combination of classical music and Chrismas songs. We both loved the Christmas Spectacular, well worth the $ 29,00 we paid.

Wild Caving Experience in Mammoth Cave, KY

When we arrived at Mammoth Cave we noticed that there was a wild cave tour scheduled for the Saturday & Sunday, at first they had said that the tours fully booked, but when we came back the next day the ranger at the ticket office told us that there were two tickets left. But after we purchased the tickets I started having doubts about a tour that involved crawling into tight spots, through dirt and wading belly down through water. But we had booked the tickets and Wahid was confidant that I would be able to do it.

Cave Crickets

So on Sunday the 12th of November at 9:30 in the morning we gathered at the visitor centre. I felt kind of nervous about the whole thing, but Wahid was thrilled and looking very much forward to the whole thing. The first part was dead easy, because we had to descend via a number of stairs into the cave. But soon enough we came to the first challenge, we had to crawl into a hole and crawl to on our hands and feet for a pretty long stretch. I was wondering what I had gotten myself into, was this really fun? We were provided with knee pads, but they came off almost immediately. But going over the rocks you really need some sort of protections. But in really tight spots they kept slipping off below the knee and were more of a nuisance then good protections. And they made it even harder not to get stuck.

Then we got to a part that was called The Bare Cave, accordingly someone had lost their clothes there, because the spot was so incredibly tight. And for a moment I thought I was going to get stuck there. But I made it and I was not the only one having trouble there. Then we came to a hole that was called the Birth Canal, this hole was going straight down and you had to go head down. It looked a lot more scary then it was in reality after that we ended up in the Fallopian Tube, which was kind of long and very narrow. Up till then I had been ok with it all, but in the afternoon I was getting tired and we had to do some tricky stuff still.

One of the last tricky things we did, called Lover's Leap, you could choose which route you wanted to take, the lower side was slightly wider, but rougher and wetter or the upper route, which was a lot tighter. It did not look that much tighter for what we had done before so I went for it, but once I got in the hole I could not move around that much and my feet had no grip behind me. The only thing I could do was to get a hold of a rock or something to pull my self forward. I finally managed to get my head and shoulders of the tight area were I discovered that I had no room to climb out. It was a sheer drop of a couple of meters. So I was hanging face down, still with my legs in the cave and had to lower myself down and at the same time grabbing a rock on my left side in order to block my self from falling face down. Some of the others tried to encourage me, but I was so focussed on getting out that I could not listen to them. I have to admit I was shit scared and I did not enjoy that one bit. Somehow I managed to wiggle my legs beside me on that tiny ledge and from there I could move further on the ledge and finally jump down. Luckily we did not have to do much of crawling after that. We walked along very narrow canyon walls for quite a while and had a look at some of the domes in side the cave. By that time I had developed a huge headache that I could not wait to get out of the cave. So when we finally we finally got out I was so relieved. It was a nice experience, but I think that I will think twice before I do that again though. The trouble is that Wahid enjoyed it immensely so he if already talking about another tour. Something neat happened though when we drove back on the bus to the visitor centre. A Red Tailed Hawk was sitting right on the road and when we came near he started flying right in front of the bus. The hawk was so close, it was awesome. A little bit further down the road we saw some deer standing near the road side. Hunting season had started the day before and for some reason they seem to know that they have to get their behinds in the national park in order not to get shot. A large number of bucks had been sighted in the park, when normally they are never seem, is not that weird?

While writing this piece for the Blog I do not feel so good: my muscles are sore and my knees bruised and I think that I never will do this again, but who knows when all the pain is gone……..!

Shenandoah National Park

A couple of weeks ago we were in Shenandoah National Park in Virginia, the fall colours were at their peak right that weekend. What a beautiful sight that was. When we arrived the sun was shining, but soon enough the fog would come in and in the evening the campground was shrouded in thick fog. It was quite eerie I have to say. We spend most of the afternoon playing our new National Park Monopoly game.
We had a couple of nice days there, and even to to point that we could walk around in t-shirts and shorts, it was almost like an Indian Summer.

Motorhome in fog at Mathews Arm Campground

On one of the hikes we had to cross a number of streams and it was hard to keep our feet dry, even though the water was not that high, the stones and boulders were ever so slippery. Although we were hiking in backcountry we did not see any bears, just our luck again! The deer are plentiful over there though, so that surprises me.

It is incredible who quickly the weather can change in the mountains though, one day you are walking in a t-shirt and shorts and the next you have to wrap your self in winter clothes, because the temperature that dropped about 30 degrees or so. One morning we went for a walk in the Big Meadow area and it started snowing. Overnight the temperature had dropped to about 26 degrees outside and in the motorhome it was about 32 degrees when we woke up. No, we do not have the heater on at night, because it would drain the batteries.

On the way to Loft Mountain we picked up a girl who was walking with her dog along the road, it was bitterly cold and the wind made it even more cold. We are very hesitant about picking up people in our motorhome, but I really felt sorry for her. Nobody else seemed to want to pick her up, so when she made it to one of the overlooks just after we had arrived I asked her if she wanted to get a lift from us. It saved her and her dog, Polly to walk another 10 miles to Loft Mountain.

We did one longish hike to Doyle River Cabin and then further on to the Doyle River Falls and then headed back along the Appalachian trail, it was a beautiful day again although it was cold. We would have loved to stay in one of the cabins, especially when it is snowing and we would have had lots of firewood to keep us warm. The only thing is that I did not like about the hikes (45 miles or so we did) that we did in the park, that there were hardly any vistas, the trees are everywhere. If you want to see the vistas you have to do the Skyline Drive.