When we lived in Western Kansas out near the Colorado border we use to joke we could count the days that the wind did not blow as opposed to Southeastern Kansas where you count the days in a row it does blow. This weekend we had two days in a row of 30 -40 mile an hour gusts out of the south. Yesterday I spent the day repairing and rearranging things around our place. This morning I awoke to wind and grey clouds but I could see hints of blue sky here and there, I decided to go for a ride and hike out at Bone Creek.
I drove out to the south side of the lake hoping to be out of the wind, still gusts blew in swirls on this side of the lake as I hiked down from the car along the shore.
I could see white caps on the north side. The sun began to play hide and seek as the cloud flew by overhead like the cars of a slow moving train.
I spotted a lone mature Bald Eagle out in the middle of the lake maybe a quarter of a mile away. I watched through my binoculars for a good fifteen minutes. The eagle sat perched in a dead tree head down into the wind, its tail feathers moving up and down as it teetered on the limb. As each gust of wind made me adjust my stance I though how in the hell does it stay on that limb? I was having a hard time standing on the slightly uneven ground here on the shore . Possibly looking for a meal, I thought, there were few waterfowl on the water here today. Its just a few weeks from the great snow goose migration through here. Fish? maybe but slim
pickins, a few fish made hard to see by the white caps below the tree. I turned for a moment and missed
seeing the eagle fly across the lake to the point in the above photo, its perched in the tall dead tree closest to the shore, out of the wind for a while. Some day Ill get a scope and learn how to
digiscope. For now though Im content with watching the eagle.
I left the eagle and headed off the trail up a hill. I love to hike here in the winter, you see all kinds of things that in summer are hidden ,
camouflaged by leaves and shrubs and vines. At the top of the hill in some oaks I found several trees that had fallen maybe five years ago and had become overgrown with thorny vines and
buckbrush.
In this place just twenty yard from the trail there was a series of den like openings under the trees, fox maybe but not recent as I
didn't detect that odor foxes have. Skunk? That thought made me walk a little lighter but there were no signs of them as well. It remained a mystery.
Nests appear in winter as well, protected here in a thorny shrub and shaded by leaves in summer, now a vacant reminder of warmer days. I hiked across the hill top and down the other side and soon I found the trail again and began hiking back to the car. I will try and remember this spot next summer and try to veer off the trail as I hike by to investigate a bit more.
This week I would feature the Will Rogers Memorial Museum in Claremore Oklahoma. My wife and I drove down yesterday to take a look. Its located on a beautiful 20 acres campus.
It features nine galleries of memorabilia and artifacts, a children's museum, two cool theaters, and some very interesting interactive displays.
He and members of his family are interred on the grounds.
Will Rogers was one of Americas favorite and multi-talented individuals of the twentieth century; cowboy, trick roper, humorist, stage actor, film star and Zigfield follies star to name a few of the things he did well. He hung out with presidents, pilots, actors and plain folks. He died in a plane crash in Alaska in 1938. For more on Rogers click here.
