Brief Trip to Camp

We drove to camp on Wednesday for a brief visit before heading for Costa Rica and Panama on Tuesday. We drove back to NJ today so we could pack. While we were in town in time to see one of the largest ice palaces built in Saranac Lake in recent years, we didn't make it into town. I got really sick from side effects of the malaria drug I took in preparation for our trip, so we didn't do much. But we did make it to a nice neighborhood get-together at Lewis's Saturday evening.

Busy, Busy, Busy

Just checking in since I haven't blogged for a month. I know I'll look back at this a year from now and wonder where January went. I've been busy

• reading - lots of neat books; one of these days I'll blog about the best ones I've read in the past year. Right now I'm reading a fascinating book on tropical ecology in preparation for our trip to Costa Rica later this month.
• working on genealogy - we were supposed to visit a cousin of W's father and I started up on my genealogy work again in preparation for the visit. She got sick so we haven't gone yet, but in the meantime I've made a lot of progress. I now have a spreadsheet of all the ancestors in this country and am anxious to compile a list of those who immigrated so I can start searching the ships' lists. And there is much more work to do to validate the data I got from ancestry.com.
• quilting - I went on a trip to the quilt shop in Pennington with a group from the guild, took a fabulous workshop with George and Virginia Siciliano and now have two of their kits, and am taking another workshop from a guild member next weekend. Plus I still have to finish the latest quilt I've been working on.
• exercising - Now that W has stopped working and traveling we've been very good about getting to the gym 3 times a week and walking the other days. I've even lost 5 pounds in the last few weeks :)

Frozen Lake, continued

Today we snow-shoed on the lake, in some places alongside our ski tracks. Tomorrow we drive back to NJ.

Dear Deer

I posted lots of deer photos last year, but couldn't resist just one more. This deer seems to be telling me to put out some birdseed for her.She came up to the deck and sniffed up at the feeder. So I went out and put some seed on the ground and she eventually came back and ate it.

Frozen Lake

Today we x-country skiied on the lake. There was quite a bit of snow so the skis disappeared as we were making a new trail. We knew there was not a pocket of air beneath the ice since the water level is so high. We didn't get very far since the ice was quite soft around the peninsula.

Hike to the Bog River

We finally managed to hike to the Bog River from the trailhead on Route 421, not far from its intersection with Route 30. We just wore our snow boots, but probably should have had snowshoes. There was a lot more snow that we have at home. Despite the cold temperatures (mid-twenties; it hasn't been above freezing for days) there were running streams crossing the path. It is definitely a path one walks only when the ground is frozen or it is a very dry summer. W took this photo with his cell phone.

Now That's More Like It

What's Wrong With This Picture?

We are in the Adirondacks - we drove up yesterday to do some snowshoeing and x-country skiing - that is what is wrong!! The temperature continued to rise overnight so by this morning the only snow left was in the big piles along the driveway. So we took a soggy, muddy walk along the road today and hope the forecast for colder temperatures is correct. We are not due to get significant snow any time soon, but colder temps should at least allow us to walk in the woods without sinking to our knees.

Sanibel Wildlife Refuge

One of our reasons for going to Sanibel Island is that we hoped to kayak among the mangroves in the wildlife refuge. But the winds were very high the first few days we were there, and in any case they wouldn't let the rental kayaks out of their sight. So you could just paddle around the open bay, which is not very exciting. We took the late afternoon boat tour out into the bay and saw birds heading for their roost trees and saw dolphins frolicking out in the open water and manatees poking their noses out of the water.

On another day we took the drive through the refuge and saw lots of birds and several raccoons.

• Roseate Spoonbill


• Ibis


• Great Egret


• Snowy Egret


• Reddish Egret


• Tricolored Heron


• Green Heron


• White Pelican


• Brown Pelican


• Double-crested Cormorant


• Red-Breasted Merganser

This snowy egret visited us on the beach so we got a good photo.

Sanibel Shore Birds

I've never seen as many shore birds as we saw on the Sanibel Beach, and I've certainly never had to worry before about stepping on them. I guess they've gotten used to all the shell hunters.
And there were LOTS of terns, possibly blown in on the storm we had the first day. There were royal terns with their large orange billsand sandwich terns. We learned how to identify these from the naturalist on the boat tour we took in the Ding Darling Wildlife Refuge. It's hard to tell from this photo, but the tip of their bill is pale yellow - from the mustard in the sandwich. That is one I'm going to remember.