Today is my second to last day on the island and one I had been looking forward to since signing up for the Hawai’i Island Festival of Birds. It was the day that I went to Kaloko-Honokohau for the guided bird walk. All told, we saw 18 species of birds, though except for the Wandering Tattler, I had seen most of them on the island before.

I took a little tumble (onto the sand, not lava, thank goodness) so when the walk was over I went home to sort things out. Also, it was high tide, so I had managed to get my shoes wet.

After getting sorted out, I headed to the Sheraton for the “festival” part of this event. There was a lot of beautiful art, clothing, and other items, but I managed to resist it all.

Finally, I decided I hadn’t done enough snorkeling, so I decided to go up to Wai’alea (69) which is my second favorite snorkeling spot on the island.

Rather menacing clouds were everywhere, both coming and going. While I was in the water the wind blowing over my snorkel was a whistle, but the visibility was good and it was still easy to maneuver through the water.

Here are some pictures from the last time I went to Wai’alea.

And now I’m back. I’m tired. I’m a little sore from my tumble. It’s a good day to wallow in vacation and read a book while it rains!

You hear, “Go big or go home” all the time, but I think the lesson I need to learn is to go small AND go home.

Last night, not knowing what kind of weather the day would bring, I searched local birding areas trying to get an idea about where I could go. I was particularly interested in “forest birds” (they look pretty) and I discovered a place called Kona Cloud Forest Guided Walking Tours. I decided to sign up for a 10am tour and went to bed.

I woke up this morning and it was gorgeous and calm, so I decided to head to Two Step, among my favorite places on earth (arguably, this is my favorite spot, but it’s hard to tell sometimes.)

As always, it was amazing, though I was sad to see how much the coral has degraded since I was last there. Lots and lots of fish of all sorts, obviously. Two turtles (honu) who seemed to be going somewhere, but swam along with me for a while. And as I was heading back in from my first expedition, a spotted eagle ray came up and swam beside me before floating off again.

THIS IS NOT MY PHOTO! This is just so you can get an idea how cool it was.

I had seen an eagle ray one other time, but this was by FAR a better view. I never realized they had a stumpy little nose!

I was only there a couple of hours, but it was great. I headed back to get ready for the tour.

When I had made the reservation, I asked how long and how hard the tour was. The gentleman assured me that it was about a mile (no problem) and about an hour (no problem.) I asked him about birds. He admitted that other guests had commented that the birds didn’t come down to be seen. That didn’t worry me too much (birds are rarely cooperative) so I made the reservation.

Before I go on with the story, I want to make sure you understand that the place is BEAUTIFUL and the tour guide (I’m terrible with names) was very nice and really took his time and let his enthusiasm shine through.

However, his enthusiasm came at a price… a lot of talking. And thus, a lot of standing around. And the tour started to go on… and on… and on… I only saw two species of common birds. Pretty soon, my knees hurt and I was hungry and my blood sugar started to drop. When it had been two hours with a pace of about 20 feet every 5 minutes because of the talking (almost all of it uphill), I HAD to tell the group that I couldn’t continue. If I had gone further I was concerned I wouldn’t be able to get back down again.

It was humiliating.

But I got down, I got home, and now I’m at my computer. And FINALLY this silly hurricane has arrived!

This is good, because tomorrow is the start of the bird festival and I’m really looking forward to that!

So this silly hurricane is taking its sweet time. It’s having some effects, but so far it hasn’t “arrived” yet. I got up this morning and checked all the reports and determined that if I went snorkeling it would probably be pretty rough and murky. I’m not sure about that decision, but it’s the one I made.

Instead, I decided to try some birding. I looked at some e-bird hot spots and decided to go to the glamorous local waste water treatment plant!

It turned out I had to hike into the site because of a gate, but they assured me that birders were allowed. It was hot and muggy, but very dramatic because of the clouds.

However, the hike in was all but birdless. I was starting to get a little nervous, but then I got to the plant and the black-crowned night herons (‘auku’u), black-necked stilts (ae’o), and Hawaiin coots (‘alae ke’oke’o)started to appear. Pacific golden plover (kolea) and ruddy turnstone (‘akekeke). Least tern and white-faced ibis. SO worth it.

And if you read yesterday’s post, you know why these photos are so bad.

After about an hour I came back and was so wet from the humidity I might as well have snorkeled. I got sorted out with water and other supplies back at the time share and headed South to do some more birding.

This part of the day was not nearly as productive, but just as beautiful.

Finally I stopped into a local farmers’ / artisians’ market. A photographer I had purchased prints from was there and I purchased another photo from her. Then there was a display of bees (to entice the purchase of honey, obviously.)

As my friend Lea said… a possible painting the making!

For the last week I have been a blissful combination of artist and tour guide as I gathered Ruth Buchanan up at the airport and showed off Oregon (in between making her teach a class at the fabulous Oregon Society of Artists (OSA) in Portland.) More about the class tomorrow.

Thursday – Airport pickup, Blicks, and Portland City Grill

I collected Ruth much more smoothly than last year (inside joke there) and took her to downtown Portland to see OSA and then swing by Blicks for workshop supplies, before taking her to a restaurant I have wanted to try for a long time, Portland City Grill.

Portland City Grill is on the 30th floor of the US Bancorp building. The food was good (pricey, not terribly generous, but good), but the views are what people come for.

Even though the fire smoke obscured the best views, you can see what it was like!

Friday – Timberline Lodge and Multnomah Falls

Since reading “Timberline Lodge: The History, Art, and Craft of an American Icon” I have been wanting to go up Mt. Hood to see Timberline, a place I have visited many times as a child, but never as an artist.

I think Ruth liked Timberline, but she had told me from the beginning she wanted to see Multnomah Falls.

Her wish is my command.

Saturday – Monday (workshop)

To pay for all my tour guide services, I forced Ruth to teach a workshop on drawing from Saturday to Monday.

It was AWESOME (I swear, more tomorrow). But after, we were off again.

Tuesday – Basket Slough, Lincoln City, and Yaquina Head

Tuesday was not a day that we moved quickly. I started out with an elaborate plan about going up to Astoria and then driving down to Lincoln City (where we had a place to stay), but common sense prevailed. Instead, we took it slow, got off late, and sort of eased our way west.

We hit Basket Slough where I tried to pique her interest in birding.

As punishment, I am assigned to paint this.

When we hit Lincoln City, though, Ruth started to get into the groove.

We stopped at one of my favorite places, Alder House Glass, and watched a vase being made.

Then we headed to Yaquina Head Lighthouse and Outstanding Natural Area via Cape Foulweather and Devil’s Punchbowl.

We capped off the day with dinner at Tidal Waves before soaking in the best hot tub in town at Hotel Maggie.

Wednesday – No to the whales, but yes to elk

My plan was to take Ruth out to see the whales via Whale Research Eco Excursions, but the picturesque marine layer just turned into dense fog overnight and the boats didn’t go out. We stopped a little in Depoe Bay because Ruth’s partner is a film camera operator and I had shown her the nearby Oregon State Hospital which is featured in the film One Flew Over a Cuckoo’s Nest. Anyone who has seen the movie will know that Depoe Bay is also featured.

From there we travel south through the fog, our goal Cape Perpetua. We stopped at Earthworks Gallery in Yachats to admire the work of Bev Jozwiak, Harold Walkup, and Sarah Bowsama.

Because of the fog, Cape Perpetua was atmospheric but not necessarily farsighted.

Still, the wildlife ended up making up for it. As if to make up for the lack of views, I was able to show off a bald eagle, a pair of barred owl youngsters, and a fairly large herd of cow elk.

We returned to Salem to pack up, make the final arrangements, and do the rest. Ruth boarded the plane this morning to head back to England (via Reno). But we’ve already started to plot what we’re going to do the next time she comes back.

I CAN’T WAIT!

This weekend I drove over to La Grande to enjoy the Friends of Ladd Marsh Bird Festival. I had seen this even on my Facebook feed last year and had kept an eye on it all year long. They have some great programs over there. I hadn’t made up my mind whether or not to go, when two things happened.

First, they posted they were inviting plein air painters out for Saturday through Art Center East. So now, there was birds and painting! I’ll tell you about the painting in tomorrow’s post, but for now, I’ll concentrate on telling you about the birds.

My mind was made up to attend when the second event occurred: one of the trips was a tour to GROWISER, a place I had read about in the book “The Hidden Lives of Owls” and had aspired to visit ever since! I signed up the day registration opened and I was still #7 (out of 10) for the tour.

Friday

Friday morning I got up and did a few chores before taking off. I had decided to “car camp” and Google assured me there were several nearby state parks, but none of them accepted reservations, so I wanted to get over there as early as possible. It still ended up being a six hour drive, but I got a camping spot (not really a problem, it turned out) and worked on exploring where I needed to be the next day.

Camp site

After stopping in for directions at Art Center East, I drove out to Ladd Marsh to scope out potential painting spots.

Birds were everywhere. It was awesome! I was just concluding my initial tour when I came across the following bird.

In the Willamette Valley, if you see a bird like this, you say “Red tail” and you’re right about 95% of the time. But this didn’t look like a red tail. The color was just a little wrong, and the face a little different.

Thus, I met the Swainson’s Hawk.

Saturday

Saturday was a day dominated by painting, so a lot of my photos are landscape related. I made big starts on two paintings and traveled around the entire refuge, painting at stations 5 and then 2.

Along the way, I saw…

It was a wonderful day, though in the end, thunderstorms came through and I decided to give up my plan of car camping a second night and use my credit card to score a hotel (yes, I’m getting older and things aren’t as comfortable as they used to be, but now I have credit!)

Sunday

The big day, the GROWISER tour, started as early as the day before because I got out to the meeting spot on the refuge with enough time to do a little more birding. I scored a Wilson’s snipe on the way in, but the photo is too poor to post.

GROWISER stands for Grande Ronde Overlook Wildflower Institute Serving Ecological Restoration. So, essentially, it’s a wildflower preserve. The story is amazing. Take a minute and check out their website!

But the real selling point for birders is this. A long-term, nesting, human-habituated Great Grey Owl…

… and her three chicks…

… in their wicker basket.

LIFE BIRD!

Last week I went south and west to visit the coast. This week I headed south and east to visit Klamath Falls, Burns, and Ontario.

Part of my job is doing training around the state; a couple of times a year I go on a bit of a “tour” to areas where new employees have come on and need a bit of guidance around billing out their grants (which I then pay after review.)

I enjoy this, but I almost always come back with this same reaction: Oregon is a HECK of a big state.

Tuesday, I drove from Salem down to Klamath Falls. I didn’t grab any pictures, but I did see an American Dipper, Mountain Chickadee, and a White-headed woodpecker at a rest stop.

Wednesday, after the training, I turned east, driving first through the Klamath Marsh and then through the high desert / sagebrush steppes of Christmas Valley to arrive in Burns where spring was just a theory.

Thursday morning I wok up to an inch of snow over ice. Thankfully, the hotel was only a short distance from the training site.

By the afternoon, it has warmed up enough the snow and ice had melted. My trainees suggested a slight detour just outside of town and I was able to drive by part of the Malheur River and a wastewater treatment area. The Burns area is one of the best birding areas in the world, and I was able to add Ross’s geese, American Avocet, Long-billed Curlew, Willet, and Franklin’s Gull to my life list, as well as admire several sandhill cranes.

Once out of Burns, it was “just” a 2.5 hour drive to Ontario, Oregon’s gateway to Idaho. This leg of the journey was, again, all about the sky.

And a few pronghorn antelope.

And the occasional juniper, raptor, or interesting canyon.

Today I did a brief, individualized training, then headed back west to home. 420 miles and just over 7 hours of driving, today alone. In real world terms,  this week I went through three books on tape.

It’s a very big state.