San Joachin Marsh and Wildlife Sanctuary

After several days trying to recover from the drive back from Idaho and possibly fighting off sickness once again, we decided to get out for a bit to get some pictures, fresh air and sunshine. We headed out to the San Joachin Marsh and Wildlife Sanctuary in Orange County. It is actually a water treatment plant. 

There were a lot of different birds here. We spent a lot of time chasing some of the smaller birds in through trees and bushes with varying success. We only really took pictures into one of the ponds although we peeked into two others. They were mostly surrounded by a lot of reeds and there were not a ton of birds in them.

There were quite a few people going up and down the trails...which was pretty irritating since the birds are already skittish and the people were not quietly walking and enjoying what the preserve offers but using it as their local park to play or jog through...which scared the birds away.

The pond we spent a lot of time at was not quite quiet and serene either as big groups of people came through together. I don't know if it was like a tour bus or what but it took them some time to get through our area. Some seemed to be birders so they at least seemed to be quieter and more respectful of their surroundings that the riffraff at Whitewater. 

The shorebirds and the Red-tailed Hawk were not really disturbed by the people going through though. We didn't want to stay out there too long though and get caught up in the afternoon traffic of people returning home from work, so we cut the day somewhat short. We only managed to see a fraction of the place, so we will definitely be back.

We started our birding journey in the last quarter of this year, after getting my long telephoto lens for my birthday. We had collected a few bird pictures throughout the years here and there as part of the nature photography we enjoyed. After compiling and sorting through all our pictures, we have nearly a hundred and thirty birds on our life list!

Idamaho

Shortly before Christmas, we made the long and painful drive up to Idaho to see the girls. Since the gas is much more reasonably priced outside of the state, we did not drive below the speed limit at a crawl to save as much gas as possible as we have done in the past. We just don't have the stamina for it anymore. We don't bother stopping for fast food. It's all crap now and expensive to boot.

We made it up to Idaho in record time. The girls made us dinner while we got unpacked and settled in. Luckily, all the roommates went home for the holidays and we were able to be a little more comfortable hanging out at their apartment with them. 

They did get their Christmas presents early this year so there were no gifts to open except for their stockings.

They still got to open early. One, because we didn't want to wait...and two, because we thought they could use some of it while we were there.

On top of this, Caitlyn got a new upgrade to her camera once again because Christian moved up to a mirrorless camera for his Birthday/Christmas present. Emily got his old zoom lens.

And since the girls didn't have any other ideas or plans of what to do, we took them birding the next day! We got a later start than we had intended so we stayed close to home and checked out a neighborhood Nature Park first.

It wasn't really big and there wasn't a ton to do there but we still managed to get several more lifers none-the-less. Next, we headed out to Egin Lake. It's a seasonal lake. It is currently dry. It was kind of windy and cold, so there wasn't much to find. Plus there were a ton of people on the OHV trails making a racket nearby. We only found some American Robins and European Starlings in the trees. We left when it started raining a bit.

We decided to call it a day and head home to grab a late lunch. Afterwards, Christian took a quick nap while the girls and I headed to the market to prepare for Christmas and the next few days of our visit. We made some Winter Solstice Soup for dinner. 

On Christmas morning, we walked around the campus to see what kinds of birds we could find in the gardens there.

We also got a few other animals while we were out. Mostly some fox squirrels which are a lot cuter than the ones we see around here. My favorite birds were the Black-capped Chickadees. I was ecstatic to get another chance of photographing them. We originally got them at the Nature Park but was not completely happy with the results of my efforts.

The problem is that the cutest birds are the smallest and either shyest or just won't ever sit still for a moment. They flit around tirelessly and are so hard to capture. Not only are they always on the move, but they move in and out of the shadows and spend much of their time in the thickest trees/bushes that make it difficult to capture, much less focus on.

Afterwards, we went home to work on other things. The girls cut down and decorated their own personal Christmas trees :)

We had picked up a rib roast for dinner. We made some cinnamon rolls as well for dessert. Afterwards, we decided to get some fresh air and walk around a bit after our big heavy meal and decided to go look for some Christmas lights to practice using our cameras with. We started with just going down the main street in town.

There were too many people lurking around still and most of the interactions we've had with people in Idaho has not been very good. We've decided that Idaho drivers are even worse than those from Utah, if you can believe that. We decided to go back and finish up on campus where it is at least a bit quieter.

When we finally got back to the girls' apartment. We were ready for dessert.

There was still no snow to be had. It has been raining on and off during our visit so far. The next day was a bit darker and cloudier than it has been so we were much more likely to get more rain that day. We decided to risk it and go out anyway to see if we can get lucky and get a pocket of dry weather. We went to check out Mud Lake. It is supposed to be a decent place to go birding. We could not find ready access to the lake where we could definitely see birds. We drove around a bit but it was a bit wet out. We finally pulled over to a spot where we thought we could access the lake but the initial departure from the road was steep and slippery/muddy. Christian and I ran out to see what we could discover. Emily was driving and Caitlyn was really cold for some reason. 

The place had definite promise, but it started raining again before we could even get to the lake and the birds took off flying. Apparently, while we were gone, Emily decided to follow us but before she got too far, she already saw the gigantic flocks of Tundra Swan taking off and decided to just go back to the car since it started raining again. I think we would like to attempt it again if we go back up at a different time of year.

Emily didn't sleep very well the night before so she took a nap after lunch. I trimmed Caitlyn's hair as she had cut it on her own while she's been away and she wasn't entirely happy with the shape of it. After which, Christian and Caitlyn went to run some errands and I took the opportunity to shower after cleaning up and puttering around in the kitchen. I finally got Emily up after a while and we made some Chex Mix. Emily had also started a boule of sourdough bread. She's been making no-knead bread lately and we brought her some sourdough starter to see if she liked that. All her roommates have been ecstatic to help polish off all her fresh baked bread.

By the time we finished dinner, I was pretty wiped out and ended up going to bed early. Everyone else has been taking naps on and off during the visit except me and I think I just needed to crash at some point. Christian was helping Caitlyn back-up her computer files and Emily was working on Dark Table. She was waiting to put her bread in the oven as it was going a little slower since it was a little colder that night. I was a little upset to have had to cut the evening short as it was going to be our last evening there, but I was too tired to do anything.

The next morning, we got an early start as we were headed home and it would be a very long drive. We brought camping gear in case we wanted to stop along the way, but the weather was not going to cooperate. We got a few pieces of Emily's bread for the road. We would be lucky if we can get out of Idaho before the roads got icy. In fact, we hit snow by the time we got to Pocatello along with a horrible head wind. That was probably the worst of the weather. We hit patches of light snow and rain, along with cloudy patches with even a few patches of sun on and off through Idaho and Utah. We evidently just missed some heavier weather patterns in some areas. 

Traffic mostly flowed until we got outside of Las Vegas. At that point, it turned into a nightmare. The 15 freeway became a parking lot. The first obstacle was a semi-truck that evidently hit the middle divider and flipped itself over on the other side. We started moving a bit after that but not for long. After many miles of stop and go traffic mostly due to the moronic drivers in the passing lane going slower than the people on the slower lanes or going at the exact same speed as everyone else making it impossible to get by, we couldn't take it any more and decided to get off the freeway and take some of the smaller roads through the desert. It would take us down a longer route, but at least we would be moving and less aggravated. Needless to say, it took many hours more to get home than to drive to Idaho in the first place.

Whitewater and the San Jacinto Wildlife Preserve

The next weekend, we drove out to the Preserve at Whitewater. The place was amazingly beautiful this time of year.

We were so excited, but as we got out of the car to get our gear ready, tons of other people were arriving. I would say that they are not normally people you expect to run into early in the morning at a Preserve. You expect to see them at the Outlet stores or malls. They were loud and obnoxious. They were even doing stupid TikTok videos or something in the parking lot. We tried to disappear down one of the trails hoping to get away from them but they were everywhere and we ran into them or they followed behind wherever we went. 

We were there to get away from people and try to relax and it wasn't happening. We decided to cut our losses and leave. There was some little girl waiting on her own beside one of the buildings singing loudly like a strangled cat. One of the obnoxious city dwellers was in the parking lot complaining about the noise because, they too, went out there to get some "peace and quiet." That was rich.

We walked around at first outside of the Preserve at first. There were a few birds here and there but nothing unusual except for a little Rock Wren.

After a while, we were just frustrated and hot. The last straw came when what looked like a bus load of people got dropped off and were walking by into the Preserve. We left after that.

Instead of heading straight home, we decided to check out the San Jacinto Wildlife Preserve on our way back. We didn't have high hopes for it and had a tough time finding the opening to to area, but it was a lot nicer than we had imagined with lots of variety.

There was a series of different ponds as you go through. I think that in the end, we only just touched the surface of what was available there and we eventually ran out of both time and light.

Besides the obvious excitement of the various raptors we ran into, we were most excited to spot a Mountain Bluebird. I was not happy with the pictures that I ended up with. Most of them were grainy and blown out because they were horribly backlit by the setting sun. After that, we were super excited to run into a flock of Red-winged Blackbirds. Everybody mentions how common they are, but we'd never seen them. Plus, they make a neat and eerie song as they are perched in trees together and it was super cool hearing it all around us.

All in all, we'd definitely go back to the San Jacinto Wildlife Preserve. I am excited to see what we can find further in. If I go back to the Whitewater place, I think I will have to go back with Caitlyn on a weekday or something, when there might be a little less people hopefully.

A Walk in the Neighborhood

Over the weekend, Christian and I got up early to take a walk in the neighborhood. We wanted to try to catch the coyotes out in the meadow where we find them resting most mornings. On the way, we spotted a skunk and a rabbit. The coyotes were out there but they started moving off before we could get too close. I saw three of them scattered at the end of the meadow.

We walked over to the trailhead to see if we could find some birds. Amazingly, there were very few birds down the trail that we took. On our way back, we found a Red-tailed Hawk sitting on top of a tree, surveying the area below. We set up to take some pictures and video. 

By the time we finished, the sun was well up and we headed back for breakfast. The donkeys were out eating and walking up the middle of the street. I don't mind when they are out on the mountain in the areas they used to always roam, but I am sick to death of being woken up in the middle of the night because they are stomping around my driveway, destroying my plants and birdfeeders and people's mailboxes, because they use them as scratching post. I am sick of having to get up to then have to shovel pounds of donkey shit because the city won't control them. 

The city is building more and more houses and warehouses on the hillsides, shrinking their habitat while also letting the donkeys breed like rabbits and taking over our streets and neighborhoods.

Big Morongo Canyon Preserve

Christian has been really struggling with work this year. He started off teaching during what seemed to be the worst time possible. Covid hit just a year into him teaching but every year has brought more problems and struggles. The kids are very rough and don't want to do or learn anything, but it is the administrators and other teachers that seem to always cause the worst problems. Even he custodians and security employees seem to just refuse to do their job and no one holds them accountable. It is just chaos at school every day and Christian struggles to keep a calm, safe and inviting atmosphere for his kids and teach something to the small handful of students that actually care to learn anything. This year, he has been given the most amount of students of all the other teachers as well.

He had an especially hard time at the beginning of the month and took a day off in the middle of the week to try to regroup. He got a substitute to take his class and we drove out to the Big Morongo Canyon Preserve to take some pictures. We originally wanted to go during the Thanksgiving Break but he hadn't really felt up to it.

When we arrived, we were a little worried as it was kind of windy out and there were an unusual amount of cars already in the parking lot. There was also a small group of people gathered in the middle of the parking lot. I recalled that they do birding walks on Wednesdays and when we got out equipment out to start down the trail, one of the birders asked if we were joining them for their bird walk. We decided to try it out and join them. It was certainly an interesting experience as they immediately started spotting and recognizing the bird calls around us. One of the first birds they spotted was a small Sharp-shinned Hawk way off in the distance. I did not get a great photo of it but I was able to spot it and record it. They had hoped to find an owl for us but that was not meant to be. After the initial spotting of some small birds, everything slowed down. We had to really have to work hard to find anything.

They said that it was unusual to have to work so hard to find birds. We managed to see a few more but the birds were mostly hidden and hard to capture. We got to walk in the closed off areas as we just followed where they were leading. They didn't seem to care about the damaged areas so we didn't either. It was still a beautiful walk, although, it would have been a lot better without the gusts of wind...which is probably why a lot of birds were not out and about.

We did find a dead Long-eared Owl in the closed off section. They were trying to decide what it had died of and whether they should take it into the Ranger.

We walked a bit farther with the group but ended up separating from them as they headed back over to the nature center as we were taking some pictures and videos of the surrounding areas.

We eventually ended back up there and at the feeding stations to see what birds were around.

I was most excited to see the Oak Titmouse there. It was one of the birds we saw flitting in and out of the bushes but I could not even get close to capturing. It was still aggravatingly difficult to get a good picture of it, but I was determined to get it.

Christian spent more of his time getting some of the birds in flight in the neighboring trees and surrounding area but he managed to also get the best Oak Titmouse picture!

You never know what to expect when we are out birding...either in some preserve or in the neighborhood. On this trip, I also barely got a somewhat obscured shot of a Lark Sparrow which I had not gotten before. I was a glad to have at least gotten it, but a bit disappointed that the shot wasn't that great. A couple of weeks later, I was taking a few pictures in my driveway and lo and behold, the Lark Sparrow was just casually feeding along with some of the more common sparrows under our feeder in the driveway!

I have managed to get some birds at a distance, especially on the wire in the back of our house. I got my first Western Bluebird a couple of months there and then got a bit better pictures of them when we went out to Newport last month. Now the Bluebirds are common birds that flit around the house. They are still not as common as the birds that come to our feeders but it is no longer an unusual occurence. 

I got my first Phainopepla some months ago on the ash tree in our backyard. Now we see them flitting in and out of all the trees around us.We saw our first Thrasher and Towhee here at the Morongo Preserve and didn't even know that we had them in our neighborhood until afterwards. So sometimes you just never notice them and sometimes it must be a slight change in their migration patterns or we are just lucky to capture them in the neighborhood because they don't come that often. There have been many birds like that.

Thanksgiving

We spent Thanksgiving with my family this year. It's been a while since we have done that. We've spent the last several years on the road and camping. We usually take advantage of the time Christian has off and go out into areas where, hopefully, others will think it is too cold to go out to but not too cold for us to camp still, trying to find some peace and quiet. I think that it wasn't too successful last year. In fact, it hasn't been very successful in a while now. There is no getting away from people anymore. They are just saturated everywhere. With the TJ still out of commission, we haven't bothered to get out to more than a day trip to a local spot. 

Christian has been too burnt out to work on the Jeep, so it's just been sitting there. 

This year, both of our nephews on my sister's side was planning to bring their girlfriends. We haven't met any of them. I believe one came last year, but we didn't make it. So that something we wanted to make time for.

That was interesting. It was nice to catch up with everyone. Unfortunately, my sister's house doesn't have a lot of good lighting, so I struggled to get useable shots. 

My sister is taking my mom on a cruise next month. They are going to make their rounds to a number of asian countries along the way. Tommy is setting off to Asia on his own trip, meeting up occasionally friends and my mom and sister along the way. We won't be seeing any of them next month, especially since we have our own plans to visit the girls during the holidays anyway.

November

It's been a long month. Christian spent half of it either sick or fighting some sickness. He had to take several days off as well, so we haven't really done that much this month. We've continued our birding locally. 

We've taken walks to the base of the Box Springs Mtns. 

We saw a surprising amount of birds on our short walk (along with some non-birds). You may not even notice them if you aren't paying that much attention (or don't have a long lens/binoculars). Not all of them are that easy to find or see otherwise. 

There are quite a few hawks in the area. They are mostly Red-shouldered Hawks and Red-tailed Hawks. I've seen as many as three generally flying in the same area, usually being harassed or flanked by Ravens or Crows. I've even heard a Cooper's Hawk one morning but have not been able to see it around here yet.

During the week of Christian's Thanksgiving break, we took a walk over to the UCR Botanical Gardens. They are closed the last time we attempted it but since this was during the middle of the week, we figured we might as well take the opportunity to go.

We used to always love going to the Botanic Gardens. We have many memories of it from when Christian and I went to UCR and throughout when the kids were growing up but I can't say that it held any real nostalgia or sentimental value when we finally went back. It just doesn't have the same feeling anymore. The loud obnoxious people certainly didn't help. Plus, I didn't really find any new birds. We were on the track of a raptor of some sort when some loud idiot went through and scared it away. The only thing I found unusual there was this Leucistic Yellow-rumped Warbler.

That was an interesting find. I thought we found a new kind of bird initially, but it definitely had all the other markings of a normal Yellow-rumped Warbler.

It was a long walk to and from campus. Plus we were there for quite a long time. By the end, we were super hungry and tired and pretty disappointed with the whole day.

My favorite picture this month is still just in my own front yard...and is still a hummingbird.

Garden

We spent another month fighting the weeds, gophers and donkeys from destroying our yard. I have resorted to chemicals to kill some the bermuda grass trying to take back my planting area. I keep digging up bermuda grass and if there is even a small chunk of rooting material left behind, it sprouts and spreads all over again. I am losing the fight. The gophers continue to make tunnels disrupting my watering wells and helping the spread of weed grass and no matter what barricades we put up, the donkeys seem desperate to get into our yard to ravage and destroy everything in sight. We don't understand it as lots of neighbors have some of our same plants out in the open and the donkeys leave them mostly unmolested. Sometimes they will go in the neighbors yards to nibble on the grass, poop or roll around on their lawns but I don't see major damage to their areas. Maybe I am not looking close enough but somehow I don't think so.

This month, they got back into our yard and destroyed half my dwarf orange tree once again. It has been something like three years since I have been able to get any fruit from it. It is just hanging on to dear life and then recovering enough to start growing and fruiting again until the donkeys come in to destroy it once again. This time they even got into our back yard and destroyed my dwarf lemon tree. It doesn't want the fruit, it just eats the leaves and tears the branches off by the mouthful and everything that comes with it. Now my lemon tree looks like someone took a couple of swipes with a weed wacker to it. It nimbled on several other trees and plants, including my roses, but my lemon and orange tree took the biggest hit. Of course, it left big holes in the softened soil from the recent rains everywhere and piles of poop I now have to shovel, both in the yard and my driveway.

In addition, it pulled down and broke my bird seed feeder in my driveway! I think it attempted to pull down the suet feeder in my front lawn as well, but was unable to do anything more than stretch the line it is hung from. The bird seed feeder is a lot more delicate. Plus the birds had just found it and was flying around wondering where there seed was, scrounging around on the floor picking up the bits that were left scattered on my driveway.

The damned donkeys act like we are the only source of food in the area for miles and are determined to come in when in fact, we are surrounded by houses everywhere, most of which, are not gated and some idiots even invite them in by leaving out, or even hand feeding them, carrots, pumpkins and put out buckets of water for them. One even went out and got a watering trough for them!!! A few neighbors have had to put up gates around their property. Others have put up the flimsiest of barricades. I can't even believe that those work for them because it certainly wouldn't work for us! Others seem to just get left alone for whatever reason and other's couldn't care less about their yard anyway. They have destroyed many mail boxes as they use them as scratching posts.

Anyway, I digress...I mostly wanted to post about the birds and the success (and failures) of some of our feeding stations.

The suet feeder is the only one that doesn't seem to be working. I'm not sure why yet. Maybe I have to try some different suet or move it. I need to have it re-hung anyway since the donkey stretched out the line and it is now hanging too low.

We also put up a second hummingbird feeder, hoping that the Anna's Hummingbird that protects it will be less aggressive if there is more food available...it hasn't. Now we hope it will tire him out trying to protect both so that it will give the other hummingbirds a chance to sneak in and get drinks. There is a fairly aggressive Costa's Hummingbird that is always contending with him. Personally, the Allen's Hummingbirds are our favorites. They are just beautiful and seem less aggressive but are not around as much. I'm not sure if they hang out elsewhere most of the time or if they are repelled by the other two factions!

I really like the new spot for the second hummingbird feeder though. It lends itself to much better pictures. 

The background is much nicer than the side of the garage or my ugly kitchen window. Most of the birds are still pretty skittish around us though. They will fly away as soon as we walk out the door. It will take quite some time for them to come back to the feeders afterwards. We have to be out there for quite a while before they do and we still have to be somewhat stealthy to get pictures of them. The hummingbirds are actually the boldest. They will fly away if you are actively moving into their area but after they get used to you, they will fly down to take drinks even if you are standing somewhat close to the feeder still. 

I want to get a few more bird friendly plants but am a little reluctant to put any more into my garden when the donkey's can still get in and destroy everything if we aren't extra vigilant. You can go out and chase them off during the day if you notice them, but they sneak in in the dead of night sometimes so not much can be done in that case. They have woken me up many times as the stomp around on my driveway or garden. We need to come up with a better moveable barricade. Right now, we are parking our cars across our driveway and putting up our trash cans in order to deter them. We have the fence that Christian put up a few months ago still to block off our garden from the driveway, but they have still been able to find the weaknesses to get in here and there.

Newport Coast

My family hasn't gotten together all at the same time for a while, they were trying to get us all to go on a vacation together but it's hard to coordinate with everyone's schedule. Then, earlier this year, my brother had his stroke and wasn't able to do much. After months of physical therapy and everything, nothing much has helped. My sister decided to get a timeshare nearby so we could "get away" a bit and spend some time together. She was going to get her usual Palm Springs resort over the summer while the girls were still in town but no one seemed that interested or had the time to drive out there to be stuck in some condo like place in that kind of heat. She tried to find a place near the beach but they were all booked up until now.

She got the place for a week but no one was really able to go for that long. Everyone is back to work and only had the weekend. She headed over early with my mom and they hung out there themselves, taking walks on the beach and seeing the tide pools. Tommy was in and out and had to fly back briefly to work. When he came back, he picked up my brother and niece who took Friday off to enjoy a little more time there. Christian and I headed over late that evening after Christian got off work. He was too exhausted to go earlier, so he took a nap after work and we had dinner before heading over as well. 

The place sits above Crystal Cove. They have trams that take guests down to the beach there or Laguna Beach on and off all day. My mom took Norman and Lauren down to the beach I guess briefly on Friday. Then, Tommy and Wendy taught Lauren how to play pickle ball.

Christian and I got up early and walked down to Crystal Cove by ourselves to go birding. There was a surprising amount of people already at the beach and really, all over the streets. It was not exactly quiet or relaxing. We didn't make it very far down the beach. We took our time taking pictures and videos of whatever birds we could find.

The little sanderlings are always the neatest but they dart around so much it is difficult to get a good picture of them. There were a ton of brown pelicans and they were the easiest to take pictures of because they are big, abundant and move a lot slower compared to the smaller birds. The most interesting bird we got was actually just a Heerman's Gull. It came down and was flailing around in the waves and totally got bodied by the waves several times before making it out. He was very unsteady afterwards. We didn't know if he was old and dying or hurt from the crashing around in the waves or just drunk. It eventually recovered at least somewhat but it was very dramatic watching him. 

Eventually, we decided to head back to see what everyone else was planning to do for the day but on our way back, we ran into a hawk flying around and we chased down several smaller birds in the chaparral. 

By the time we got back, Tommy had left again to see his mother and meet up with his sister. Everyone else was up and had gotten breakfast. We made a few plans and headed out again after lunch. We took the tram back down to the other side of Crystal cove. Christian wasn't feeling that well and stayed behind.

It was just as well that he didn't not come with us because the tram takes you to the most crowded part of the beach, where all the shops and restaurants are. It was crowded and there were not a lot of birds. We only spent an hour or so there before heading back to meet with Christian and to take the tram to Laguna Beach. Our niece wanted to go to some of the museums there. My mom was tired and stayed at the resort. My brother went with Lauren and the rest of us went down to the beach. It was even more crowded here. Not sure if it was just because it was later in the day or if the beach is always more crowded. There were as many people milling around as when I went to the beach over the summer with the girls.

We took some pictures of all the Brown Pelican's and Brandt's Cormorants on Pelican or Bird Rock and the tide pools. 

Afterwards, we headed back to the resort. We were pretty tired and hungry. We planned to celebrate Christian's birthday that evening even though his birthday is technically not until the next day. Christopher drove out to join us just for the evening. Christopher, Tommy and his sister took the opportunity to play pickle ball at the facilities while we worked on dinner. I had baked a simple portable cake on Friday before we came. I brought some extra caramel to drizzle over it and some candles but no matches. No one had a lighter so we did without. Christopher decided to decorate the cake a bit but I think the caramel was a little too thick to flow well. He ended up writing "HBD" and drew some stick birds flying in the air. It was hilarious because you can barely tell what anything was. Since the caramel was somewhat thick, he tried to make a caramel candle but it fell and turned into something more akin to a caramel turd. The important thing was that the cake tasted good!

After dinner, some of us went for a walk. Wendy took us for a tour of the facilities there. We went to the gym and attempted to play ping pong! Christopher left to go back home. Wendy's place really isn't that far and he opted to drive back to get a better night's sleep in his own bed. Which was a wise choice as the place was packed and kept way too hot.

The next morning, Christian and I got up early once again and headed back out to the beach but we never made it. We got distracted chasing little birds on the grounds. We also kind of bush wacked our way onto the golf course. Luckily, no one was really out playing. We did run into one of the grounds keepers but he was friendly and didn't seem to mind us being there.

All-in-all, we got 10 "lifers" over this weekend. We are racking up quite a list since we started a couple of months ago when I got my big zoom lens. We did count a few of the birds we've taken pictures of and can identify in our picture catalogue. Some birders will even count birds they can hear and not see, as long as they can identify them. We've decided to count only the ones that we are able to capture on camera and catalogue. They don't have to be great pictures, but they do need to be recognizable! Afterwards, we still hope to get better pictures of them all when we find them as we are photographers first and foremost.

Since it was getting late, we decided we had better hurry back to help pack up and clean up as we were supposed to check out soon. Even though Christopher took some things home for them, they still had more stuff than they could fit in their one car because Tommy picked up Norman and Lauren up separately with their luggage. We were really only allowed two cars in total at the resort and since it was all booked up, we had to both park on the other end of the resort in the parking garage. Tommy had offered to take everyone out to lunch for Christian's birthday to a Hong Kong style cafe that we had talked about the evening before. So we put most of the luggage in our vehicle and met them back at Wendy's house. Luckily, Christopher was still there and able to then join us for lunch. Collin also joined us at the restaurant. The restaurant was super crowded but the food was pretty good.

Afterwards, we went back to Wendy's to hangout for a little bit more. Christopher gifted Christian a wireless microphone for his birthday. He had seen some of Christian's neat videos and thought that it might be useful. You can connect it to your camera or phone. Christian got to play with it a little as Christopher gave us a little example of his matcha tasting thing he does. Christian recorded him doing it.

We ended up polishing off the rest of the cake before heading back home.

I had a few token presents for Christian but we are mostly saving and waiting for what he really wants, which is a new mirrorless camera. The one he wants was just announced last week and will ship later this month!