A Little Fishing

 I think this may turn into our summer of fishing. We've already gone three times, and one time Desert Boy even caught fish, learned to clean them, and ate them for dinner (I was out of town so missed getting photos of that momentous occasion). He loves to fish. I'm good with that. I'm thinking of lots of fishing trips this summer where I bring my lawn chair, a good book, and let the kids fish to their hearts' content.

Do you like to fish? What's your favorite fish?

Spring is Here!

I am loving that we are seeing more and more signs of spring. The temperatures are all over the place, but the reappearance of plants and animals, the rebirth of things vital and beautiful, make it a wonderful season. My husband told me that the sandhill cranes were back over two weeks ago, but it took me awhile to spot them. I heard them first, their prehistoric squawks making me think again what a good nickname my husband has for them: flying pterodactyls. With dinosaurs as ancestors of birds, he's not that far off.


Watching the birds take flight and seeing their huge wingspans is impressive.

Spring is all about sudden snow storms that melt off quickly. And lots of wind. The wind isn't such a great part, but it's part of the game.


Another bird that's back is the killdeer. I like these spunky little birds that run around, calling "kill-deer, kill-deer."

I've had robins singing me awake the last two morning. Such a sweet song!

The crocuses are starting to come up in our flower garden, little bursts of color. Out in the desert (meaning the valley floor), we can find little bits of green here and there emerging. It won't be long till the brown of the winter is transformed into an amazing green. The green doesn't last long, making us appreciate it even more.

What are your favorite signs of spring?

Comparison of Ungulate Pellets

I took a hike last week in a place used by three different species of ungulates. I didn't see any of them. So how did I know three species had been there? By their pellets, or scat, that they left behind.
I'm going to show you the photos and give you some clues. You see if you can figure out which three species left the following scat.

The first scat I examined closely looked just slightly larger than rabbit scat, but instead of being brown and totally round, it was black and slightly pointed at one end. The pellets were in a group, but rather scattered within the group.

What's your guess? If you said bighorn sheep, you are correct!

Scat Number Two:
I came across a place where the gravel had been cleared away. Adjacent it to it were two big piles of scat, along with a smaller pile and a wet area from urine in the cleared area. I surmised that this was a favorite ungulate hangout.

A close-up look at one of the piles of scat:

A close-up of the pellets, brownish-black, slightly dimpled, one end (or sometimes two) narrowed.

And your guess? If you said deer, you are correct! We have mule deer out here, a LOT of them. Deer scat is about the size of a raisin, although not quite as wrinkly. I'm not sure if I should admit this, but I have a fun prank that deals with deer scat. (If you're a long-time reader of this blog, you read about it here.) I've given talks about scat to school kids. I like to have samples of various scat with me (in Ziploc bags--in reality, handling scat with your bare hands is not the best idea and can lead to nasty diseases, so don't do what I'm doing.) Anyway, I show the kids the deer scat and ask them how they can figure out how old it is. After I hear their more reasonable guesses, I tell them that the best way to do it is to do a taste test. I pretend to take a pellet out of the bag, while palming a Raisinet instead. I pop the Raisinet in my mouth, bite down on it slowly, and make an appropriately theatrical expression. While the kids look on, faces frozen in horror, I declare the age of the deer scat.

It's an awesome prank.

I may have scarred some kids for life. Probably not. But they may never look at scat the same way again.

Okay, last ungulate scat of the day:

This scat is also black and in pellet form like the other two, but is noticeably larger. Here's a close-up:

Your guess? Elk is the correct answer. They are bigger animals, so it only makes sense that they leave behind bigger poo.

Although all these three ungulate scats look similar, it doesn't take too much detective work to tell them apart. And the more practice, the easier it gets.

Thanks for joining me in this little soiree into the leftover matters of life.

Key West

 On our four-night cruise from Miami we had two port stops: Key West and Cozumel. I had previously visited Key West and hadn't found that much that excited me. Knowing the kids would be happiest to dig in the sand, I decided that the best place for us to go would be Fort Zachary Taylor State Park. The cruise ship docked at the Navy pier, and from there we could catch free shuttles to downtown. Our helpful shuttle driver let us off right by the entrance to the state park.

 The state park included the remnants of a fort that was built on a key, but over time fill materials had annexed it to the mainland. The fort was originally three-stories tall, but the upper two stories had been removed, leaving it not quite as imposing. Nevertheless, the large structure still had a lot of bricks.

 And a lot of cannons. This was an important defensive position during the 1800s.

 Desert Boy thoroughly inspected one cannon.

 Our cruise ship wasn't far away, but because we had to go through the almost-retired Navy restricted area, we had to go a roundabout way to tour the fort.

It was hot and muggy, and what we really wanted to see was the beach, so we didn't stay long.

 We saw a couple huge iguanas on the fort as we continued on our short walk to the beach.

 The beach has both sand and some rocky areas. The first rocky area I snorkeled by I didn't see any fish. Fortunately another rocky area did have some fish.

 Desert Boy couldn't wait to go clamber on the rocks. I followed, wincing as my sore feet came in contact with the sharp rocks. It turned out that the rocks were quite interesting.

 They had tons of fossils! Way cool!

 The water was a nice respite from the heat. I wasn't used to being able to go swimming and not come out cold.

 We watched another cruise ship heading to the pier. We were the only one there that morning, so the beach wasn't very busy.

 On the way back, we crossed the road by the state park entrance and went to the Florida Keys Eco-discovery Center, a facility sponsored by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The shuttle driver had told us it was free--and air-conditioned. Sounded good to me. (It's hard to believe that I'm writing about air conditioning when it's barely above freezing outside my house right now!) I didn't know anything about this center, as my Internet searches about what to do in Key West hadn't turned up information about it.

 The center has a number of displays about different habitats, such as the mangrove coastlines and the coral reef. The kids loved looking at the fish.

 They also had a mock up Aquarius, the only under-ocean laboratory. Desert Boy was thrilled to go in and press buttons.

 We met up with other family members, who had taken the shuttle to Mallory Square, walked along Duval Street, went to the southernmost point in the U.S., and then met us at the state park. It was a very pleasant day, and if anyone is wondering what to do in Key West that is good for kids and not expensive, I would definitely recommend these sites. I have to admit the parasailing looked like a lot of fun--but that will have to wait for another trip!

I think living in the desert makes me appreciate the abundance of water in Florida even more. The ecosystems there are so different and amazing.

Maya Lands: A Trip to Cozumel

 I figured it might be apropos to do a post that had a Mayan connection on this 21st day of December in 2012. It so happened that about ten days ago I was in Cozumel, Mexico, the main destination of our cruise. I was so excited to get there. The water was an amazing blue color that I've never seen before.

 In the distance we could see buildings and monuments of Cozumel island, which is the largest island in Mexico. It is a bit south of Cancun, located offshore of the Yucatan Peninsula.

 It was a stormy day, but that didn't deter us from our plans: to go snorkeling.

 We waited in line to get off the cruise ship, then hurriedly walked down the pier, through the little fake village of shops, and to the taxi stand. They didn't have a sign as to where you could get out of the village, and I think the cruise companies kind of hope that people will stay there.

When we got to the taxis, we were the only cruisers there. We had one guy try and talk us into going to a beach to the north, but we had decided we really wanted to go to Parque Nacional Chankanaab, located a few kilometers south of the pier. Our taxi driver also tried to get us to change our minds, but we decided no. Chankanaab charges $21 a person to enter, which includes several attractions, as you will see if you keep reading this rather long post.

 Desert Girl was wearing her princess crown, and she was a sleeping beauty, lulled to sleep by the short taxi ride.

 The entrance to the park was quite nice.

 We quickly got to see some of the local fauna.

 We really wanted to get to the beach. We found a nice chair and parked our worn-out princess. Then it was time for most of our group to go snorkeling.

 Desert Boy really wanted to climb a tree and get a coconut, but he never quite achieved that.
I had read that much of the sand at Chankanaab had been imported. Beaches in Cozumel tend to be either rocky with good snorkeling or sandy with poor snorkeling. Chankanaab had solved that problem by bringing in sand to its rocky shores and appealing to everyone.

 It was very easy to get to the water, and the visibility was very good, at least by our standards (and much better than Key West, where we had snorkeled the day before).

 Fish were everywhere! It was so cool to watch them swimming, feeding, and sometimes hiding.

 I don't know what the fish were, even though I had a tropical fish book. I still need to look them up!

 The snorkeling area was quite large. Further down the beach they had scuba diving, but none of us came prepared for that.

 When Desert Girl woke up, she was ready to play on one of the hammocks. It was mid-afternoon and not very busy, possibly because of the storms.

 Our admission fee included a sea lion show.

 The sea lions were very well trained.

 Desert Boy and Desert Girl each got a special kiss at the end of the show.

We also saw dolphins. One of the main attractions at the park is to swim with the dolphins. We didn't feel the need to do that. Supposedly they also have manatees, but we never could find them.

 It started raining hard, and the waves got kind of big, so most of our group went in search of the crocodiles. They looked a little scary. Then we ended up on a trail to see some archeological finds.

 Desert Girl was not too sure of being in such a downpour. It was a little chilly, but as long as we kept walking, we were fine.

 Along the trail they had replicas from many cultures from all over Mexico. We didn't really read much as we were trying to stay warm and find our way through. They had lights by some of the statues, and it would be really cool to go through there are night.

 We were surprised to come to a little temple. As we looked at it, we noticed a pair of glowing eyes inside it. We had been talking about monkeys, so at first we thought it might be one. It also sort of looked like an owl. We decided the best way to find out what it was would be to take a photo.

 The flash revealed a cat taking refuge from the rain inside. Well, not too exciting, so we kept going.

 The kids found a small turtle in a puddle and were enthralled by it.

 When we got back to the beach (skipping the tequila tasting section of the park), the rain had slowed, so we snorkeled some more. The kids played in a really nice freshwater pool. Then it was dark, and we were the last tourists out of the park.

We debated whether we should go back to the ship or not and decided to make the most of our time in Mexico and go see the downtown area. We had no problem getting a taxi, and our taxi driver enjoyed a conversation in Spanish with Desert Boy. He let us off at the central plaza.

 Desert Girl was ready to party it up.

 They had some nice Christmas lights up. It also appeared that they have a small carousel and a trampoline that parents can pay for during the day. We didn't mention those to the kids. Instead, we plied them with an all-time favorite: churros.

 Yum. Who can resist some sugary fried dough?

 We wandered down the pedestrian streets (so nice not to worry about traffic!). One English-speaking lady told my sister-in-law that Cozumel had changed a lot in the last decade. More and more cruise ships come, so the area has developed a much larger shopping district. One cab driver said about 25 ships come each week. Only one other ship was in port the day we arrived, and it left at 5:30 pm, so we found very few tourists wandering with us.

 We found a simple church. It was the feast of the Virgin of Guadalupe, a huge religious holiday in Mexico. However, the big celebration was the night before, as they had a procession around the island that culminated with a midnight mass. One senora that left the church told me that the six o'clock mass was just ending and that there would be another at eight o'clock.

 We found a little cafe and ordered some tamales. They were huge!

 As we wandered, we passed this mural, which I found extremely touching. It shows the native flora and fauna and is entitled: Los veradaderos islenos/Our real islanders. It is so great to see that the people who live there realize that they are not the only inhabitants, that many other species share the island with them. This mural really grabbed me, and I wish I had taken more photos of it so I could see it even better.

 We wandered by many shops, most selling trinkets. When we went by the boot store, the bored shopkeeepers let us take a photo of Desert Boy in the big boot.

 Desert Girl tried on a hat.

 At Mr. Chile's, we found a bar with swings as seats. The owner encouraged us to take a few photos.

 If we had more time, I would have loved to have had a drink or two there. It looked like so much fun!

 Eventually we got tired of wandering and got a taxi back to the cruise village. We ambled through and back to the ship. It had been a good day in Mexico, and I didn't really want to leave. I could easily spend more time in Cozumel.

And in case you're wondering, I didn't get any strange vibes that the world was going to end or that Mayans were going to rise up and reconquer the island. But maybe I just wasn't paying enough attention. We'll see what happens...