Today we went to an Eagle Festival in a local county. We weren't sure what to expect, so we just planned to go on some of the walks and explore some nesting areas of bald eagles.
We arrived just in time for the Bald Eagle Trail walk. It was a little cold, sometimes snowing lightly, but not much, and cloudy and muddy.
Rudy had to explore areas "off the beaten track".
Paul brought an old camera, and I had our newest camera, which was recently broken and there is no display, so to take a picture, you just have to guess that you are pointing and focusing correctly. I have actually been taking pretty decent pictures with it. Here is a picture of Paul taking a picture of Rudy...
... and here is the picture Paul took.
Once you have a walking stick there are endless possibilities!
Across the small man-made pond, you can see an owl box.
This was one entrance to a fox hole.
This was another entrance. Rudy, naturally, wanted to poke his stick down it, which we wouldn't allow.
Rudy and I checking out the fox hole. I kind of like the two camera procedure. This way Paul and I don't constantly pass the camera back and forth and we can get two perspectives of certain things!
Across the water, high in the tree, was an eagle nest. Through the guide's scope, we could see the eagle sitting right near the nest.
Here is Rudy standing under the owl box with one of the guides. The owls regurgitate animal bones and other waste, so the kids were assigned the job of digging under the box and finding bones - which they very happily did.
Here Rudy is showing people the bones he found.
After circling around on the trail, we saw a bald eagle over the water flying around and then perched in the trees. Amazing sight!
Crazy kid.
Crazy kid and dad. No wonder I rarely have any nice pictures since this is what happens when I try to take pictures. Rudy says, "Let's do a silly one."
Then he says, "Take one just of Daddy," and this is what Paul does. Like father, like son!
After we finished that walk, we drove to the end of the road to check out where another walk was later. We decided to forgo the later walk, but explored the area ourselves. We took a path down through the marshes that ended at a broken bridge.
On this bridge and look out, we saw more bald eagles. There were lots of volunteers with scopes and binoculars all focused on the current location of the eagles. We will definitely be heading back to this area to watch for the eagles again. Our state apparently has more than 100 bald eagle nests with 70 of them in two counties near us.
As we drove back to the main rode, we stopped to see the swans in the lake.
Although cold and wet, this was a great day!
