Partners in Crime

I picked up Eva at 11:15pm from ABQ on Tuesday night. A short drive away, we got to Rupp's high school bud Megan's house. Her and her husband Uly were very welcoming, and pretty soon after getting there near midnight, we went to bed.


The next morning, Eva and I trekked up the 45 minutes to the over 10,000 foot high Sandia Crest in the Cibola National Forest outside of Albuquerque. The snow was deep up there, but the results of our visit could not have been better. Immediately upon entering the visitor's center up there, all three species of rosy-finches were present at the feeders. Within just a couple of minutes, we discerned BLACK ROSY-FINCH, BROWN-CAPPED ROSY-FINCH, as well as the many STELLAR'S JAY, MOUNTAIN CHICKADEE, and one RED-BREASTED NUTHATCH. It took us a few minutes to figure out the GRAY-CROWNED ROSY-FINCH, as neither of the obvious gray-cheeked subspecies were present.


On our ride down the mountain, we stopped a few times observing no outstanding birds, and stopped at a supermarket for lunch. We then headed to the Rio Grande Nature Center and hiked around, and in the afternoon to foothills of the mountains. Eva got some good looks at several new species, so we headed home and got cleaned up and rested.


We went out with Megan and Uly to Frontier, which is a pretty famous New Mexican style restaurant, which was very good. Then we watched Vicky Cristina Barcelona at there house, and went to bed fairly early.


Thursday morning Eva and I drove to one of the many waterfowl management areas along the Rio Grande, south of Albuquerque. We were treated to thousands of SANDHILL CRANES, which flushed when we walked by, as well as looks at GREATER ROADRUNNER, HORNED LARK, and MOUNTAIN BLUEBIRD, as the windy cold was making us uncomfortable. We got down to our destination of Socorro pretty early in the day, so we stopped at the Bosque Del Apache NWR, which we had planned to visit the following day. Despite the wind, we had a diverse number of species present, but we were tired of the cold by about 3. So we headed to the local Owl Bar and Grille and had a drink. Warmed up a bit, we went back to the refuge and scanned the SNOW GOOSE for the smaller ROSS'S GOOSE, and ended up finding quite a few. With success declared on the day, we settled into our couchsurfing hosts Rebecca and Christina's house in Socorro, then got a beer and dinner at the Socorro Springs Brewpub, and went to bed by 10:30.


Eva and I woke up at about 5:30am on Friday to head back to Bosque Del Apache NWR to see their famed morning flight. This is traditionally when thousands of SANDHILL CRANE, SNOW, and ROSS'S GEESE leave for the morning, observable from a platform in the wetlands. Unfortunately, this year the bids moved to a less extravagantly observable location, and the numbers were really low. It was a decent show regardless.


An even better show was getting to see an APLOMADO FALCON take off from its perch accross the road, given the two of us impecable looks. After this, we went for a hike thrugh one of the canyons, which offered excellent views of the park, and of SAGE SPARROW and SAY'S PHOEBE. We ate lunch by the railroad tracks there, and then left the park for the south.


We stopped at Cabello Lake State Park, and got a few looks at some interesting birds, but just south of there, at Percha Dam was the real show. Our list of species seen on the week greatly increased here, as we saw VERMILLION FLYCATCHER, SPOTTED SANDPIPER, BLACK PHOEBE, RED-NAPED SAPSUCKER, and PHAINOPEPLA, to name a few.

After this success, Eva and I had a beer at a genuine wild west bar called El Patio, in the town of La Mesilla, which is where Billy the Kid was tried in court. That night we stayed in Las Cruces with my couchsurfing host from the week before, Richard.


The next morning, Eva and I drove through the beautiful Organ Mountains, and went to the White Sands National Monument. Although unbirdy, this place was really odd and interesting. We had a good time playing in the gypsum sand.


After White Sands, we went to the Three Rivers Petroglyph Site, and took a look at some of the thousands of old drawings on the rocks. Needless to say, we were both pretty enamored by the bird pictures.


In the evening of Saturday, Eva and I stayed at the Classic Inn at Alamogordo, NM. We had some good Mexican food and some Bud Lights watching live Bill Maher stand-up in the room, on HBO, not in person.


Sunday morning we drove down to Texas, being stopped at the entrance of the Hueco Tanks State Historic Park outside of El Paso. We were not allowed in as they had reached their 70 person capacity, mostly of rock climbers. After hiking around outside for awhile, eventually we were able to get in, and it was very beautiful. There were rock paintings, a coyote chasing a man on a bike, and huecos which are small bodies of fresh water held by the rocks attracting some good birds.


After a couple hours of hiking, Eva and I headed to the airport for her afternoon departure. All told, she had quite a few new species, and hopefully a good time exploring New Mexico with me... but I'll let her tell that story.


From the El Paso airport, I drove nearly 650 miles yesterday to reach my destination of Maggie and Stephanie's house in Austin. We had a couple of local beers (Independence and Real Ale) and chatted last night until about 1. This morning I've just been getting my act together with laundry, and planning my Lower Rio Grande portion of the trip here at the Epoch coffee shop.