This Little Blue Heron looked cold while waiting for the sun to warm him up.
This Blue Heron looks like he’s waiting also.
During our ride we spotted this bird. I’m not sure what it is…it may be a juvenile Little Blue Heron. The beak looks similar and there are similar colors on the head .
After this post...one of my followers, Robert Currie, emailed me with this "I believe it is a tricolored heron (used to be called a Louisiana heron). Thanks, Robert....I'll make sure I put my bird guide aboard next trip.
These two Buzzards looked pretty against the blue sky.
Look at the size of this Osprey nest.
One of the Osprey flew off as we cruised past…..circled around and came back to this small limb.
What looks like a big rope draped over this fallen tree is actually a thick vine.
After our ride we tied the dingy to it’s towing bridle and headed S. We’re going to stop at Drigger Island and see if the Sand Hill Cranes are nesting there. I took pictures of them a few years ago and was surprised when I downloaded them to the computer….there were little downy chicks with them.
It’s very windy and we don’t expect to see many gators today.
At Pier 44 we saw this cute little boat for sale.
Lots of windows….same on the other side.
We got to Drigger Island and dropped anchor. This is one of our favorite spots and normally you can go completely around the island.
We decided to see if we could do it in the dingy. When we came by going North it looked weed filled at the Southern end.
This gator gave us the eye as we went by in the dingy.
These White Herons are beautiful.
When we got to the entrance to the river…it was indeed weed choked….but we decided to see if we could get thru….this is looking back after we made it. Took a lot of paddling and pushing weeds out of the way but we made it. The arrow was our starting point. Two fishing boats turned around and went back the easy way. You would think that at our age we’d have done the same thing….nawwww…no challenge.
Once back underway Jim spotted this beautiful Tom Turkey along the shoreline.
Such beautiful feather patterns.
The forecast is for rain all day tomorrow so we are going to cut our trip short and pull out today.
We didn’t have any trouble getting the boat on the trailer even though it was windy. Gear all stowed for travel and we headed home.
The new to us Honda 50 4 stroke is a joy. Runs good and is soooooo quiet. I had forgotten how much difference there is between a 2 stroke and a 4 stroke….much easier on fuel too.
The Yahama 2000 is just what we needed. Lots of hot water for showers.
The trolling motor on the dingy makes everything so much easier, and the whisper quiet as we cruise around the islands is perfect for bird and critter watching early in the morning. Perfect way to start the day. We found we used the dingy a lot more.
Our trip out this time was more for testing those items than for a cruise. Next time we will do some exploring in places we hadn’t been able to go with the 3’ draft Albin …”Slow Motion”…. although there are places we could go with Slow Motion that we’d never take Meander. Slow Motion is a much more seaworthy boat.
