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Home Miami Photos 2010 Crane Creek & Michigan 2010 Alaska Photos 2010 Antarctica Summary 2010

As we entered into 2010 we already had plans for a trip to Alaska in June. So we started to think about a few places that we hadn't been to in a while or just hadn't been able to get to yet.

So first up for us was a trip to the Miami Area of Florida in March where we stayed in our timeshare on South Beach. So this would be a nice relaxing stay at the beach vacation - right - wrong. We started off on the wrong foot, a delayed flight out of Boston, multiple problems at the rental car - thanks Alamo, and then misplacing our backpack with our binoculars, spotting scope, ipod, and just about everything else electronic. Luckily by 2:00 AM we had it all sorted out and rested comfortably in bed before leaving at 5:00 AM. While staying at South Beach in a condo seemed like a good idea, using it as a central point while we visited: STA-5 about 2.5 hours from Miami, Bill Baggs State Park on Key Biscayne, the Dry Tortugas, Everglades NP, Three Lakes WMA and Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary puts a whole lot a miles on the rental car. All in all we had some great wildlife sightings and added rarities such as the Black-bellied Whistling Duck, La Sagra's Flycatcher, Red Footed Booby, White-crowned Pigeon, Sooty Terns, Masked Booby, Brown Booby, Smooth-billed Ani, and Shiny Cowbird to our ABA list.

Toss in a trip out to Naples to visit our friends Karen & Hal (now officially snow birds) and having the opportunity to catch the run of Wicked in Miami; things turned out pretty well after such a rough start.

In May our friend Christopher hit one of those milestone birthdays and really wanted to make the trip out to Michigan to see the Kirtland's Warbler which primarily nests in a very specific region of Michigan and winters in the Bahamas. So it was time for a road trip: Leave at 5:00 PM on a Wednesday night, arrive at Crane's Creek on late Thursday afternoon, watching the birds in Crane Creek on Thursday afternoon and Friday morning, off to Grayling, MI on Friday afternoon ~ 4 more hours, attend the Kirtland's Warbler Festival on Saturday morning, jump back in the car to get back to Crane's Creek on Saturday late afternoon, search the fields around Crane's Creek, grab some dinner Saturday night and after a bit of bird watching on Sunday morning make the 12 hour ride back to Boston. So what makes this worth it ~ well it was Christopher's birthday and that's what he wanted to do, but Friday morning at Crane's Creek was a warbler fall out at least in terms of species - 26 warbler species including Cape May, Mourning Warbler, Hooded Warbler, Prothonotary Warbler, Golden-winged Warbler and low and behold a beach side Kirtland's Warbler found by Ken Kaufman. It was a bit tiring but one of those trips you look back upon and say: "Remember the time we..."

As for our traditional long weekend trips throughout May, June and July – we made it to Twin Lakes Village in NH, but it seems like Paul's annual trip to Oceanedge on Cape Cod isn't so annual anymore and we again had to pass on our Rangely Lakes trip in ME scheduled for the 4^th of July weekend.

With June approaching we were off to join Bill Drummond on a trip to Alaska. Back in '95 we did the Alaska Inside Passage Cruise as well as a quick trip out to Denali NP. We've always said you need to see Alaska three different ways - the Inside Passage is not to be missed, the outer islands and coast of Alaska and ultimately renting an RV and touring the interior.

For this trip our focus would be on rarities in Nome, the glaciers along the Kenai Fjord Peninsula, the hope of Asian rarities and specialty breeding birds of St. Paul on the Pribilof Islands and finally a return to Denali NP in hopes of catching views of Grizzly Bear, Wolf, Gyrfalcon, other wildlife.

Alaska boasts some of the most spectacular scenery and wildlife viewing opportunities found anywhere. It is host to impressively large moose; to whales & other sea life; to the elusive predators of the forest; to an abundance of bird life; to massive glaciers down to the tiniest of lichen.

When planning any trip the expectations are always set extraordinarily high, why else we would we choose it over all the other possibilities that exist. Our trip to Alaska provided us with spectacular wildlife views of those we expected: Grizzly; those we hoped for: Wolf; and that which we dared not imagine: Lynx. For birding opportunities we had unsurpassed views of nesting Kittiwakes, Auklets, Puffins, Gyrfalcon as well as a few rarities such as Emperor Geese and Lesser Sand Plover (Mongolian Plover). Bring that all together with the abundant scenic views and allow us to introduce you to ALASKA 2010.

We transitioned from 2010 into 2011 in the midst of an unrivaled experience – the discovery associated with exploring some of the most interesting areas in the Southern Ocean - the Falkland Islands, South Georgia and Antarctica aboard the Hurtigruten MS Fram.

An amazing journey filled with hundreds of thousands of penguin, nesting albatross, soaring petrels, beaches lined with seals, rugged ice-capped mountains and enormous icebergs of inconceivable shapes and intense shades of cerulean blue.

‘There’s a peculiar fascination about going – I don’t think I can quite explain it in words, but there’s an excitement, a thrill, a sort of magnetic attraction about polar exploration.’ ~Sir Ernest Shackleton

Home Miami Photos 2010 Crane Creek & Michigan 2010 Alaska Photos 2010 Antarctica Summary 2010

Diana's Tale Alaska 2010