On the Road: Holland to southern Tennessee

I left Holland about two hours after the sky turned soft blue with white clouds, the sun was all over everything and birds were very vocal. Why was I leaving?

I drove to Indianapolis and what began in sunshine ended in a really really ucky drizzle. Arrived about 5-ish and had a glass of wine with Deborah before we drove see to the short-eared owl venue which is an airport out in the country. I had no faith and was certain we were not going to really see anything. It was slightly mushy and wet underfoot, dreary-grey with a chilly damp breeze and it was getting dark. We HEARD horned larks which twitter away on the ground and usually aren't too hard to see in good light, but they are often in fields and camouflage well, especially in the dusk.

And then Deborah FOUND a short-eared! My heroine! I would never have seen it if she hadn't. It was flying low at a fair distance, would land briefly and then fly on down the edge of a runway, land, pop up and fly again. The impression was of large, very floppy wings and a smallish body. The wing motion was almost like there wasn't much muscle where they attached to the small body...kind of like laundry flapping, and very different from the flight of most birds, which is usually rather steady and coordinated. They predictably show up in the time of last light flying low over the ground. They roost in burrows in the daytimes. I didn't even expect we would go, what with the inclement weather, but Deborah thought we had a good chance.

She then made dinner (shrimp and those delicious Costco roasted vegies) and we ate chocolate and talked and went to bed by 10:00. Emily had painted her bedroom last summer. It turned out very nice: soothing and classy in two shades of what I think of as sage green with creamy white trim. Nice prints on the walls...I piled on quilts and slept well...

When I stepped out of their house this morning, it was noticeably balmier than it has been in Michigan...pleasant, although still overcast. About 100 crows were flying over as they do every morning.

We went to Starbucks where we had an Indiana map out. I was figuring a route when a lady overheard us and cautioned me against trying to get across the Ohio River at Louisville. There is a major rebuilding / repair on the bridge there and the wait could be "several hours...Some of my friends have even changed their obstetricians because they're afraid they'll get stuck when they are ready to deliver..."

I headed south and just meandered on lesser roads until late afternoon when I knew I needed to make some time and got on the interstate east of Nashville. I drove a couple of hours and am now in a motel not too far from Alabama.

Deborah told me I could "drive through" Brown County State Park so I tried, but actually went in a circle coming out where I started. There was no one around and I couldn't find any park maps. One enters through a covered bridge. It is a beautiful park, so unlike flat northern Indiana. It is very hilly and the road continually curves (as did the roads all day long). There are hardwoods, all leafless, except for many beech trees which retain their dry, light-brown leaves all winter. The effect is artistic: beech trees everywhere but singly, not in groups, interspersed on the hills with the tall maples or oaks or whatever hardwoods there are in Indiana. They brighten the woods considerably this time of year. It must be absolutely stunning in the spring and in sunshine. Also, there were a lot of birds. I saw a pileated, RB woodpecker, four turkeys, WB nuthatch, cardinals and many blue jays and juncos. And this was just casually driving through, not specifically looking for birds.

The best sighting of the day though was farther down the road after I left the park. I saw a buteo (hawk) on a fence post near a small house in the country. I was on a road where I could pull onto a shoulder (that was my mission all day: find roads with shoulders I could get on). As I was slowing down, the hawk flew but only to the other side of the house. I had very good eye-level views. It was a red-shouldered hawk (new bird for me) AND, while I was watching it, a male flew in and they mated in a very brief flurry of feathers. He gently landed on her back with wings outspread for balance. And off he flew. The female stayed another minute or so. This was such a cool sighting!

A bit farther on was flock of robins...at least 20 in a tree. I would sometimes go down a side road to get better views, like a mini-chasing deal, which was where I saw the robins. Well into the afternoon, I drove up on some road-kill with a couple of birds pecking away, and as I got closer, I realized one was a vulture and its head WAS NOT RED; it was greyish white, and as it flew off, I saw white wings patches. Yes! a black vulture and another new bird for me.

The rain did stop by mid morning and the temperature kept rising all day. I could tell because I would feel warm and look at the car thermometer and it would be a degree higher than last time I looked. When I stopped for the night, it was 55 degrees! Listened to NPR all day.