It Was a Happy Birthday
24 December 2014 | Texarkana, Arkansas
Jill
Thanks to everyone who sent me birthday wishes on Facebook. I did have a nice day. Bud and Jamie asked me if there was anything I’d like to do on that day. I checked out the activities on the Arkansas State Park web site and found out that DeGray Lake State Park had an Eagle Tour. I called and signed us up.
I need to insert a word of praise about the Arkansas State Parks. I’ve never been in better. During Clinton’s time as governor they established a dedicated 1/8-cent conservation tax, which funds the parks (it may fund other things, too, I don’t know). But admission to all the parks is free and the buildings and grounds are always extremely well kept up. They also have a lot of innovative programs, some free, some not. The RV we rented at Cane Creek State Park is one of their innovations.
The Eagle Tour is held in the winter because that’s when the bald eagles come to Degray Lake. There were twenty of us and the Park Ranger on a big pontoon boat. As you can see from the photo it was chilly, especially on the lake. The temperature was about 50 and it was overcast. The park ranger tried to warm us all with his Jim Carey type humor, and for the most part, succeeded. The park furnished life jackets, some binoculars and some blankets. Bud and I had recently bought a pair of decent marine binoculars (just 7 x 50 waterproof, nothing fancy) and we brought those and Adler had our old ones.
We saw a deer swimming across the lake. The ranger pointed it out. It was swimming across the width of the lake, which had to have been about three-quarters of a mile at that point. You could just see its ears sticking up above the water, although I’m sure its nose was out, too. All I could think of was that poor deer would get out of the water on the other side with no warm towel or warm house to go to. We humans sure aren’t very weatherproof compared to the other animals.
We saw a few birds and we did get a very good look at a juvenile Bald Eagle. Bud was the one who first spotted it. It landed in a tree at the end of a cove and we glided fairly close in the boat before it took off. I put a picture of it in the gallery. It’s not very sharp because of the lighting and the magnification.
Before closing I’d like to tell you why I haven’t written sooner, and apologize for not acknowledging the birthday wishes sent my way until now. Through a piece of singularly bad luck, Jamie is on night float for this half of the month. She works about 16 hours, starting at 5 PM. Adler started his school vacation the day after Jamie started night float, so during the day, I need to keep Adler occupied and either quiet or out of the house. The only time I have to myself is in the early morning. I usually get up at 4:30 or 5, and Adler isn’t up until 6:30 or 7. Our laptop is generally in the bedroom, and I can’t process pictures or easily type the blog on the i-Pad. So I have wanted to write this for several days, but only remembered to take the laptop with me this morning.