Spring Trip 2010 – Day 34 – Writing on Stone – Part 3

After lunch we decided to leave the dogs and walk up the hill to the visitor’s center.  They have a wonderful gift shop and I’d hoped to do some really early Christmas shopping ~ alas, their system was down and the gift shop was closed….

On the way up the trail, we spotted a pair of these Lark Sparrows….

This picture gives an idea of how easy it is to not see birds in this habitat…..the sparrow is in the middle at the bottom…

Because this is one spectacular looking bird ~ at least in the sparrow family ~ and because I don’t get to see them too often, I’m throwing in a few pictures….

Now we are back up on top, over looking the campground….

This shelter is located adjacent to the large parking area up here…

the path leading to the visitor center…

that’s Ernie sitting on one of the benches, enjoying the view…

This is a replica of one of the ‘writings’ on stone, located in the park…..this replica is on the outside of the visitor’s center.  I’m sorry I don’t have any pictures of the interior of the center….you’ll just have to go there and see it for yourselves!

heading back along the trail, to go back down to the campground….this is looking off to the west, the sani-dump is up there on the horizon (always an important piece of information for RV’rs!)

Took this, just to give an indication of the terrain…..

Back in the campground, we had a visitor…

This, what appears to be a yearling Mule deer was very curious about Shantz….

we were actually worried she was going to walk right up to her.  I’m not sure what would have happened.  Shantz has been trained to ‘watch’ and not ‘react’ but there are limitations!  Fortunately, discretion reigned and the deer decided that perhaps she’d been close enough and left.

back in the campsite itself, the bird activity continued.  The silly Yellow Warbler was still warring with it’s reflection in our truck mirror….

Brown Thrasher continued to tantalize but never actually coming quite close enough for a really good picture…

Robin’s were around….this one having a bit of a dust bath….

I took this from the adjacent campsite, to show one of those Swainson’s Thrush, it’s proximity to the camp and to Shantz, who is lounging in ‘her’ chair.  So much for shy, secretive….

this was taken out in front of our campsite, looking in the direction of the river….

this just shows one of the campsites….the one, if I remember correctly, the snake lady found the aforementioned specimen in….Note, too, the cloud…..we’d been listening to weather forecasts, and there was a reason why today would be the only full day we’d spend here….that ‘S’ word was creeping into the forecast again!

Here is another campground view….those blue containers are all recycle containers and they are that close together throughout the campsite ~ no excuse not to recycle here!

did another wander, back around behind the campsite, along the river trail….

and back into the campground….the white are all dandelions that have gone to seed….

These are Cliff Swallow nests on the rocks beside the river….they would be last years as there was no sign of any Cliff Swallows yet….

Sand dunes beside the river…

and another look along the river….that isn’t mud, it’s damp sand.

Here is a Brown Thrasher who came right into the campsite, only because I’d actually gone in the camper…..took this out the door.

a Magpie arrived as well….

Here are some more birds enjoying those dandelion seeds….

American Goldfinch had now joined the sparrows….

 

a final, after supper wander, and I spotted, first, this female Grosbeak up in one of the large trees in the campground….I thought at first it was a female Black Headed Grosbeak, like we have back home, but after spotting…..

this….realized they were Rose-breasted Grosbeak ~ you can really see where the name comes from!

another look at the male.  Despite taking probably 30 or 40 pictures, I never really got anything good – after all they were up in a large tree, I was looking straight up trying to find them and get pictures….

By now, light was fading….a perfect day was drawing to a close…..

and tomorrow, we’d be heading on…..moving closer to home.

Spring Trip 2010 – Day 34 – Writing on Stone – Part 2

Still up along the trail….

and Shantz spot’s something!

a rabbit (or more correctly, a Nuttall’s Cottontail).   These rabbits are usually seen all over this park, but like I said shortly after we arrived, it had been a bit of a zoo over the long weekend and I think every thing was just starting to venture out of hiding.

a bit further along, it was our turn to spot these Mule Deer…..this is pretty much at the ‘turn around’ point of the trail.

Here is one of those deer giving us a good looking over ~ I guess, if I’d heard at this stage, about all those ‘attack’ deer in Cranbrook….I might have been more concerned that this one might have had a fawn hidden away and had been doing more than just watching….as it was, it was just a deer ~ I was more concerned about watching for Rattlesnakes since the day was warming up and they were liable to be crawling out into warm spots to warm up.

so now we are headed back….the deer would have been just off to the right of this spot….

We’ll toss in another wildflower now, This is ‘Butte Marigold’ ~ a bit more sensible name than the last few.

We’ve climbed back up on top…

Time for a breather, and a drink of water for everybody.  You’ll note Shantz is on a short lead, that is partly due to the cactus and the already mentioned possibility of Rattlesnakes ~ which, fortunately, we never saw.  I actually prefer it when there has been somebody ahead of us on the trail, figuring that they would have scared any away.  As you who know me, know, I don’t like snakes of any sort.  We have actually seen Rattlesnakes here.  On our first trip there was a baby one right on the road leading into the campground, and the second trip, the park ‘snake lady’ had one in a cage….she had found it in one of the campsites…not too far down from the one we were presently camped in.

Back to more pleasant subjects, here is a Blue Flax flower…

and another view…..

There are a few tight spots on the trail where you wend your way between sandstone hoo doo’s…

Remember I mentioned Cactus?  Well here is one of the Prickly Pear Cactus found all along the route….this one has flower buds just forming…..

There were more of these Yellow Prairie Violets, tucked in spots all along the trail….

Prairie Onion as well….

 and of course, this showiest of the wildflowers….Smooth Blue Beardtongue

As we’re almost back to the campground, we’ll take a final look at the surroundings…..this view would be looking back the way we’d just come, which is pretty much looking westward.

and here we are looking ahead towards the campground (those green trees the other side of the rocks)

and this is looking across the top of the rocks, over towards the visitor’s center….just barely visible up there on the horizon….

this part of the trail actually has steps carved into the sandstone…..this is probably the steepest part

and here we are, back at the entrance of the campground.  Those buildings are a shower room and a store.

So I think I’ll post this, and then get on with the last, and longest entry for this particular day.