Another Walk... More Photos....

Before I even start writing, I've got to show you my favorite photo of the day...

That's my daughter, Donna, with Evie, her granddaughter, my great-granddaughter.  I knit the sweater and hat for Evie's Christmas present and she's showing me that it fits.  Heather, her mom, says that she's worn it since she unwrapped it... that it's already due for a washing.  Evie's 4 years old and I'd loved to have been with them for the holidays.  So...  photos are especially nice!

We woke up to rain this morning, and the temperature was several degrees cooler.  I wore my raincoat when I walked up the street for church services, but really didn't need it then.  However, off and on, during the day, it rained...  actually sounded kind of nice on our tile roof.

We didn't go for our long walk until around 2 pm

While the main street and several side streets are cobblestone, once you leave the "city proper" (2 blocks over) there are dirt roads...  heavily potholed in places.  Look at the size of this mudhole!  I walked around it very carefully because I never did learn how to swim.

Of course we headed for the river...

These look like Weeping Willow trees....  I don't know what species they are, but they are so lovely hanging over the banks of the river.

And just across the road...

Thee horses were grazing...  with Cattle Egrets at their feet.  I haven't seen the first cow here...  maybe I'll call these Horse Egrets.

And before we'd gone any further, we saw this big guy...

The Crested Caracara

This is the national bird of Mexico (sometimes called the Mexican Eagle)...  it's much like the vultures we have back in the States...  loves carrion and the such.  We'll see him again later.

At first I thought these kids had stalled their jeep while crossing the river...

Nope...  they're just having a good time washing it.  This is a popular river crossing...   you can see that it's not very deep here.

This was our first sighting of the...

Yellow-breasted Chat

Usually, we'd hear this guy's noisy talk before seeing him, but today he was pretty quiet...  just flitting around up among the treetop.

And also our first sighting of this Northern Beardless Tyrannulet

I knew he was a flycatcher, but had to look up his long, fancy name.

It remained overcast all day...  the mountains across the way are shrouded in fog.  Even the beach had a haze over it.

We could tell something had happened since we'd been here yesterday....

This creek was several feet deeper yesterday...  you can see how much water is gone when you look at the muddy banks.  

What happened?

Well, the river water gained enough force to wash out the inlet to the sea.  The sand had filled in to where it was holding the water back.  Now that the sand is washed away, the cut is deep and wide...  and water is rushing through fast and furious.

And the sea was wild today...

A closer view of where the water pours into the sea.  Look at those waves!  I don't think there were many swimmers out there today, but there were sure a lot of folks looking at that angry sea!

We turned to walk back home, and instead of walking through town this time, we decided to walk back the way we came...  the road along the river...

I counted over a dozen Yellow-crowned Night Herons here....  probably all lulled to sleep by the sound of the waves.

And when we got back to where we'd leave the river road, we saw the Caracara again...

He had a fish on the sand (gravel?) bar and was making a meal of it.  Actually, he and a turkey vulture were both working on it.  But I think this guy had first dibs...

We saw a couple other "new" birds today...  one I'm still working on the ID... and the other, one of my old friends from the USA....

A Yellow Warbler...  can barely see the red stitching on his side.

The End

That's All For Today