PORT ARANSAS, TX TO NORTH PADRE ISLAND—January 27th and 28th, 2013

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Sunday, January 27^th— HolidayInn Express, Port Aransas, TX

We left about 10:30 after eating the hotel-provided breakfast and checking our e-mails. Back to making waffles shaped like the state of Texas.

At the Texas Welcome Center, we were able to pick up a series of glossy, slick, beautifully-made and illustrated maps of the "Great Texas Birding Trails." We were particularly interested in the coastal areas and along the Rio Grande Valley. These maps give the locations in sets of loops you can take of various sanctuaries, wetlands, parks, trails, ponds, etc. where specific birds may be found. We used these maps with various success on this trip. Birds being birds, they don't cooperate and show up at these places like Disney's trained mechanical animals. They also hang out at different locations depending upon the time of year.

Using the map as a guide, we drove a mile or so to ParadisePark and Port Aransas Birding Center to bird watch. Saw several couch's kingbirds for the first time--cousin to the kingbird we saw in Nebraska--and lots of yellow-rump warblers. A good number of birders were out and helped us find and ID the birds in the willows around this fresh water pond.

This area of Port Aransas and Mustang Island is very much like many developed barrierIslands along the AtlanticCoast---beach homes up on stilts and restaurants, beach stores, and other businesses catering to tourists. Headed toward Padre Island on route 361, which is the main drag down all these particular islands. This island is less developed and is basically sand dunes and more sand dunes with occasional live oak mottes.

Pulled into National Seashore and showed our SeniorPass and got in free. Reading the literature given out by the park ranger we learned that: "Padre Island National Seashore , separates the Gulf of Mexico from the Laguna Madre, one of a few hypersaline lagoons in the world. The park protects 70 miles of coastline, dunes, prairies, and wind tidal flats teeming with life. It is the longest stretch of undeveloped barrier island in the world.”

Drove a short distance to Bird Island Basin and found a camp spot with Rosie's nose right on the water edge on the leeward side of the narrow island. Dry Camping here for $5 per night. Spent the afternoon watching about 12 windsurfers in the Laguna Madre, the barges going up and down, and the shorebirds, mostly pelicans.

The water is very shallow here so windsurfers had to walk a good ways in the water before they climbed aboard their boards. This made it fairly safe when they wiped-out as they just had to stand up. The shallow water is being constantly dredged in the ship channel and the resulting "dirt" has been formed into small islands with several being large enough that squatters have built homes on them.

Monday, January 28^th--Bird Island Basin Campground, Padre Island National Seashore

Hazy sky this morning. Drove a couple miles to the Park's VisitorCenter. On the way saw a large flock of snow geese that was a big surprise to us. Also drove by a pond absolutely covered with redheaded ducks. Watched them take off and land and couldn't see how they didn't run into each other as there were so many in the pond--200+. On the banks of the pond were large turtles sunning themselves.

At the visitor’s center, they listed a free guided birding tour at 3:00 that afternoon. Drove a couple blocks to the Malaquite Campground, which is located on the ocean side. There were 50 sites on a paved area on a first come first served basis for dry camping at $4 per night. Most of the sites were taken by RV units from New Hampshire, Illinois, Wisconsin, Colorado, and Montana--which was no surprise. Picked a spot and parked diagonally to have a clear view of the ocean, registered, had lunch, and chilled until 3:00.

The 3:00 bird tour was somewhat uncomfortable as 6 adults squeezed into the guide's small personal SUV. He drove us to an area that is closed to the public but all that was there were more redheaded ducks on some water treatment ponds. He then drove over to the BirdIslandBasin we just came from and on the way we saw a white tailed hawk sitting near his/her nest. Saw some sandhill cranes, our first caracara sitting on a sand hill eating his prey, the same flock of snow geese, and nearby, deer. He did point out that within this flock of snow geese were both some juveniles and some blue geese that are a color morph of the white snow goose.

We got back to the visitor’s center at 5:00 and drove back 5 minutes to our campsite for dinner. Watched a big blue heron in the grass toward the ocean.

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