Valley Life

Life in the Rio Grande Valley tends to be laid back and relaxed. Despite the misinformation and politically advantageous lies that come across the conservative news channels, there are no signs of “IMMIGRANT CRISIS” or “Murderous Gang Wars” filling the streets. This is a subtropical area that enjoys a subtropical temperament. Traffic is slow. People ease their way forward when the lights turn green. They walk with an easy gait, many in groups, and carry on conversations with their companions and complete strangers. In fact, I have seen fewer police here than I did on our trip through Montana, Utah, and Idaho. Yep, I am settling in very nicely, thank you!

This is especially true on the weekends. Over the last few years, we have learned that planning only a few things for weekends is best. Families fill the parks and attractions during the school year on Saturdays and Sundays. Even when the schools are not in session, working people claim the weekends to be "party hearty."  Weekends tend toward noisy, crowded streets and venues, so we take it easy. Last weekend was no exception. We had a chill couple of days with reading, playing games, watching movies, and smoking a pork butt on the pellet grill. It was a relaxing break from our nice, comfortable pace of life. I suppose that is why we retired!

On Monday, we had planned to get out and about to some of our favorite birding spots. But the weather had a different idea. The forecast called for sustained winds of 30 mph with 50+ mph gusts. The skies were cloudy but dry. But birds do not like that much wind. So, we took our lead from our avian compadres and hunkered down until the winds died down. We stowed away our outside furniture and gear and settled in for a breezy day in Koko. I continued working on our routing for 2025 and decided that the trip had had started outlining did not excite my joy. So, I began cogitating on the elements of travel planning. I knew I needed to come up with a better way to develop our trips. So, I put it away and let it bubble on the back burner for the week.  

Tropical Parula

By Tuesday, the winds had died down a bit, and we loaded up our hiking, birding, and photo gear for an afternoon at Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge. After arriving, we discovered it was a Bow and Arrow Hunt Day, and most of the trails were closed to birders. We did walk a few trails and made a short drive to see Laguna Madre, but the freshwater Laguna Atascosa was surrounded by people armed with Bows and Arrows, so we had to leave the waterfowl to them. We also discovered that the staff no longer supplied birdseed and water for the birding blinds, so the birds were scattered throughout the brush. We found one mud hole, and I was able to photograph a few birds that came by for a drink. It was a lovely day to be out in the sunshine but a flat day on the trails. Here are a few of the shots from our day. The highlight was picking up a "lifer" species, the Tropical Parula.

Curious Yellow-Rumped Warbler

Black-Crested Titmouse

Orange-Crowned Warbler

Yep! That's a Yellow Rump!

Red Wing Blackbirds and a Green Jay

Narcissist Green Jay

Greater Roadrunner

The winds started picking up a little on Wednesday, and we decided it would be a good day to see the Gladys Porter Zoo in Brownsville. This fella welcomed us to the Zoo in his usual, relaxed manner. This small, world-class zoo never fails to delight the animal lover. It is in the heart of Brownsville and is well-curated with the comfort of the animals and the guests in mind. The zoo was built in 1971 and quickly established itself as a world leader in providing care for hundreds of species while offering a unique experience to visitors. We have been coming to the Zoo since the 1990s and have watched them continue to delight new generations of future naturalists.

I have been taking pictures at Zoos since I was 10 years old and visited the San Antonio Zoo on school trips. While the photography is relatively easy, I still get much satisfaction from capturing images of these exotic creatures. Here are a few of the shots from our day.

Surveying his kingdom

Letting it all hang out!

Just Showing Off!

Mom!   MOM! Are you sure about this?

A Tortoise Tete-a-tete

A Majestic Bald Eagle

Look at this little cutie. Especially those teeth!

Pondering Primate Possibilities

I know that look!

Watching the antelope next door.

Crested Crane

Giraffe Gossip

Scary Eyes

Jabba the Hutt's Little Cousin

A little too close!

The Warthog

Look closely at the eye lashes!

 

We drove to South Padre Island to bird along Laguna Madre on Thursday. Two boardwalks wind through the Mangroves on the Island's bay side. South Padre Island Bird and Alligator Center and the South Padre Island Nature Center at the Convention Center allowed us to get up close with many of the shore birds that winter in the warm, hyper-salty waters of Laguna Madre. (The world-renowned Sea Turtle, Inc. sits next door, but that will have to wait for another day on the Island.) Here are a few photos of these other winter Texans enjoying the sun and warmth of SPI.

 

 

Red Eared Turtle catching a few rays!

Mottled Duck Feather

Egret Ballet

Skimmers looking for food!

White Egret Posing

A Brown Pelican in the middle of a dive. They actually flip over when diving at too slight an angle.

More Egret Ballet

Spotted Sandpiper

Hannibal Lecter the Tortoise

Two little cuties

"Let us pray!"

Tri-Color Heron snags a snack!

One Handsome Tri-Color

Pair of Redhead Ducks

White Morph of Reddish Egret doing some modern dance.

And you thought you had bad hair days!

Two Piping Plovers. The one in the rear used a bit too much beach!

Under the watchful eye of the Redhead.

American Oystercatcher

Tricolor Heron

Pintail Ducks

Roseate Spoonbill: "I know I'm cute!"

An egret grabbing a little brunch.

The Narcissist Spoonbill

Somedays I just do not want to deal with it!

Black-Necked Stilt on reflection

Spotted Sandpiper

A Ponytail on a Great Blue Heron

Great Blue Heron in Profile

Green Heron

Unfortunately, the high winds returned on Friday. When the rest of the country gets winter storms, we get the winds that sweep up Gulf and Caribbean moisture and deposit it into those deep lows that pummel the Midwest with heavy rain and blizzards. Once again, we hunkered down in Koko. It became a good day to return to the questions that bubbled up last Monday. It began with a simple question that soon transformed into a BHM, Big Hairy Monster of a question. What is the best way to choose a destination when you have a whole year and country ahead of you? Here are a few of my preliminary ideas.

When exploring options for traveling, I have several choices: weekly, monthly, or seasonal stays. There are also the options of combining two of these into a particular year of travel. We have been doing the weekly for several years. Since going full-time, we have booked mostly weekly stays with a monthly stay for the winter. We enjoy the rhythm of weekly travel, but it can be very expensive and only sometimes leaves little time to explore an area thoroughly. Weekly visits limit our exploration radius to an hour or two. We have used monthly stops primarily for Wintering in Texas and saving a lot of money on gas and site rental. It also expands our exploring radius and allows us to stay overnight away from Koko as we do when we go into Houston for our medical appointments. This is the first year we are doing a genuinely seasonal stay here in Brownsville. It expands the options and benefits of the monthly stays. It offers an even greater opportunity for a wider radius of exploring to include cruises or extended excursions. These are just the surface of the options and ideas I want to explore as we prepare for our 2025 trip. Fortunately, next month, we will begin taming this BHM and start seriously planning our 2025 adventure.

 

A Fan-tailed Warbler

Before closing out this week's blog, take a sneak peek at an extraordinary bird and another lifer for us, a Fantail Warbler. This bird is so rare in Texas that it is not even listed in Sibley's Guide as being rare to Texas. It is listed as a native of Mexico, Central, and South America. He has put on quite a show here in the Valley. It is recorded as a vagrant to Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas. I would love to say that we camped out in the howling wind for three days to wait for this bird to appear. But frankly, when we saw its location posted on Facebook, we went to the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley site. We saw people standing around with cameras and binoculars as soon as we left the parking lot. This little creature was holding court under a bush beside the Resaca. Several people stood around, talking and looking at him. At the same time, the bird flitted from branch to branch, giving us his repertoire of poses. It was as simple as that! Thanks, little bird. You made a lot of people very happy today!

We will continue exploring the Rio Grande Valley for the next 6 weeks. There are so many winter birds from Mexico, Central, and South America in the area that we will have our work cut out to see and photograph them all. Please hang with us as we while away the winter here on the tip of Texas.

If you want to see the complete set of pictures from our travels, please go to my Flickr page. You can find it at https://www.flickr.com/photos/bobdees/.

Enjoy!

Bob

 

Well Begun Is Half Done!

Our week began at CM Nature’s Own RV Park in Kingsville, TX. We spent the last two nights of 2023 here in the home of Texas A&M University – Kingsville, formerly known as Texas A&I. Generally,  we drive through Kingsville on the way to the Valley. But this year we stopped for a couple of nights to see my niece, Christy, and her family. It is always good to catch up with family. Thanks for the afternoon, Christy, Ralph, and Luke.

Here are a few more shots from our walk around the Park before we headed for Brownsville on Monday.

A Northern Shrike

This bird is a carnivore with a special liking for lizards.

A pair of domestic white ducks.

An Old Bridge at the edge of the lake.

Rocks and Mesquite, Welcome to South Texas!

 

On New Year's Day, we headed out of Kingsville and made the two-hour drive to Brownville, where we stayed at Jetstream Tropical Trail RV Resort. Like most in the Valley, this resort caters to Snowbirds or Winter Texans. The sites are spacious, and all kinds of activities are scheduled throughout the week. The services are designed for long-term stays. For example, a propane truck comes through the Park twice a week and will fill up your propane if you put an orange card on your rig. The gathering places for social events are large and designed for more than just covered dish potlucks. They have live music, food trucks, weekly market days, opportunities for tours, etc. This is definitely a resort. I don't know how many of these amenities we will use, but it is good to know they are here if we choose. 

I have had more than one person question my sanity for staying this far South. We are staying 8 miles from the border. Many people cannot imagine anyone choosing to be this close to the Mexican border. They ignore that Brownville is among the safest city in Texas and has had a falling crime rate for several years. But I am not here for the low crime rate.

 

Why are we here? Look at the weather chart for January! That should explain most of what you need to know. In addition to that, we are within 50 miles of some of the finest birding sites in the world! (Note: I did not say the USA, but the world!) And all I can ask is, why would we stay anywhere else? We are glad to be here for a couple of months while enjoying the amenities, the birding, and, most importantly, the warmth!

 

We have spent a couple of days settling into our winter home. We have the last of our projects to complete and scoping out the grocery stores, gas stations, etc. One of the facts of life on the road is that we do not have the luxury of going to the same stores. We must find new places for recycling, etc. Usually, during a short stay, we look for these things as needed. But for this more extended stay, we spent the first couple of days getting acclimated.

 

The last major project for the winter is to replace Nakai's shoes. Our previous tires were bought in Las Cruces, NM, after I ruined the original set with a braking accident when leaving Lajitas, TX. I bought some very aggressive off-road tires at the time because that was all the dealer had for a Jeep. Unfortunately, I spent too much, and they did not last as I would have liked. This time, I did a little shopping and found some All-Terrain tires that would be better for highway and off-road driving. They should also last longer. Thanks, Goodyear of Brownsville. Y'all done good! Doesn't Nakai look stylish with her new "tenny-runners?" 

One of my fears about setting up for a longer term is that we will get out of our well-practiced routines for the road. This is particularly crucial when getting Koko ready for a move. Quite a few things must be done, and several must happen in a particular order. I don't know if it is my ADD or if I am getting older, but the memory isn't what it used to be. Many of the items are self-evident, but the rest have been learned the hard way, and I would rather not forget those lessons. Some were quite expensive! Therefore, we have developed a checklist for arrivals and departures. This checklist has been adapted over the last 5 years in Koko. The list helps us remember to secure the outside storage doors and many other details. It gives us peace of mind when we set off for our next stop. It also allows us to recover our routines relatively quickly after an extended stay. Therefore, we use a new checklist every time we move Koko, just in case! It is more than safety. It allows us to relax and enjoy the road, which is why we are out here in the first place. As I have said before, checklists are my friend. (Plus, I enjoy checking things off a list. It is so satisfying!!!)

 

After settling in, we made our first birding excursion to Resaca de la Palma State Park in Brownsville. According to Google Maps, we were last here in 2018. When I looked back at my pictures from that trip, I saw a lot of shots from everywhere but Resaca de la Palma. Unfortunately, this first excursion proved just as unsuccessful. The photos below are the sum total of the shots I considered worth sharing.

 

A resaca is an elbow lake formed when a river or creek meanders and is cut off from the flow. Unfortunately, the resaca's at this State Park were all dry. There were no waterfowl. There were several migrant birds from Mexico in the Park. The Gray-Collared Becard, the Rose-Throated Becard, and the Roadside Hawk had been spotted and were still present. Unfortunately, we did not see them on this trip. We will likely make another trip out there and try again, but for now, enjoy these few shots of what we did see.

A Cicada Shell

Green Jay

Ruby Crowned Kinglet

 

On Friday, we drove to Boca Chica Beach on the tip of Texas. This beach sits at the end of Brazos Island and at the mouth of the Rio Grande (also known as the Rio Bravo in Mexico.) In 1994, the State of Texas created Boca Chica State Park. But it has now been turned over to the National Wildlife Service as the Boca Chica Wildlife Refuge. Unfortunately, this is a paper-only refuge since SpaceX has taken over most of the property and appears to be expanding its operations to create Musk's Spaceport. We have watched his buildings encroach on and pollute more and more of this old prairie. Undoubtedly, the State of Texas and the US Government will allow him to use the entire area for his rocket development business. Enjoy these shots of some of the last wildlife left on this beautiful slice of Texas.  

Ruddy Turnstone

A Grumpy Ring-billed Gull

A Sanderling

Taking Flight

The Portrait of a Gull

Great Blue Heron

 

After Boca Chica, we traveled to the Palo Alto National Battlefield Park, just north of our RV Park off CR 511. With the defeat of the Mexican Army in 1836, Santa Anna went into exile. But he saw a path back to power when Texas was annexed by the United States with a contested southern border with Mexico. President Polk was elected with the mandate to expand the US across the continent. To do so, he had to double the size of the country and claim the West from Texas to California. These two giant egos clashed in the brush country along the Rio Bravo in 1847-8. Polk established Fort Texas on the Rio Grande (in present-day Brownsville.) Santa Anna claimed this as a provocation and sent troops to lay siege to the fort. Polk then dispatched troops from the Gulf Coast to break the siege and re-supply the fort. These two armies met on the Palo Alto prairie, where the US forces defeated the Mexican troops with larger and more powerful artillery. (Check out the pictures below.) With this victory and the subsequent victory at Resaca de la Palma, the Mexican Army was galvanized to defend their homeland. However, the war was lost when Winfield Scott's army captured Mexico City the following year. Santa Anna was sent back into exile. Mexico lost over half of its territory, and the US doubled in size. This tiny battlefield began the annexation of New Mexico, Arizona, California, Nevada, and Utah. It was part of a global power play that continues to echo nearly 200 years later along the Southern Border. Here are a few photos from the battlefield.

The US Lines at the battlefield

The US Battle Cannon

The US "Flying Cannons"

Compare the Mexican Cannon

 

Our 2024 adventure is well begun! This echoes the old saw, "Well begun is half done!" traditionally attributed to Aristotle in his work Politics. With one notable exception, we have completed the preparation for our year on the road in 2024. (we will still have the slide replacement coming up in March.) But the adventure does not begin when we leave Brownsville. It started on January 1^st when we arrived. And there is much to see and do while we are here.

 

Here is a small sampling of our hopes for the next 7 weeks in the Rio Grande Valley.

·      Sabal Palm Sanctuary

·      Stillman House Museum

·      Sea Turtle, Inc. rescue center

·      South Padre Island Birding Center

·      Laguna Madre Nature Trail

·      Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge

·      Bentsen-Rio Grande State Park

·      Edinburg Scenic Wetlands

·      Old Hidalgo Pumphouse

·      Estero Llano Grande State Park

·      Frontera Audubon

·      World Butterfly Center

 

This does not include many farmers' markets and a few restaurants. There are also things that we have not discovered yet. If you have any suggestions, feel free to pass them along.

 

I am glad you are here with us and hope you find our Rio Grande Valley wandering worthwhile reading.

 

Good travels,

Bob