The trip down on Saturday was uneventful and traversing Houston on a Saturday morning was relatively easy – although the Houston drivers must have trained in Boston. We did go by hundreds of school kids working along one of the Interstate exits and Mary remarked, “They are planting stuff.” Sure enough, sort of a Green Up day in January in Texas.

Once we got south of Victoria, the traffic was very light and the road Texas straight. The trip by Aransas refuge to Goose Island was familiar and it was good to have an easy 270 mile trip done.

Goose Island is very busy so we were smart to have reservations. Texas parks don’t reserve specific sites — just a slot — so it is take what you find when you get there. We were bummed that our favorite site from last year was taken but we found a spot nestled under some trees on Bayberry that will do fine. We have other campers a little too close with too many dogs but it is quiet — I can hear Cardinals singing loudly as I type — and we’ve already seen some nice birds.
Yesterday was laundry morning so Mary logged some time feeding quarters and I went looking for birds and coffee. We have a couple of little repairs to the Airstream for which I got some bolts and parts. We are settling in for some good birding — there’s a raptor expert here this week. Penny has had some good runs with the bike setup and yesterday we saw three Whooping Cranes a few miles from here. Since we’ll be here for a week or so, I’ll likely be mostly blogging about birds I see. I’m including a Brown Pelican shot that I took yesterday as a teaser. Visit vtbirder.