Silverton

And, of course, the train...

Red mountain pass

Silverton

Over Red Mountain Pass, between Silverton and Ouray, the water is high.

Can you hear it?

Silverton

Ooh. And this cornice on the ridge.

Wouldn't want to get too close to that.

Silverton

Silverton

We have to send a couple pictures of the view from silverton.

Silverton

The silverton job. Working conditions.

Silverton

Optical zoom. I meant optical zoom. I said digital zoom, but I meant
optical zoom.

-----Original Message-----
From: Steve Taylor [mailto:spt@thetaylorcompany.net]
Sent: Wednesday, May 25, 2005 10:48 PM
To: Bill Taylor (E-mail); David Taylor (E-mail); Tom Taylor (E-mail)
Subject: FW: silverton

Time delay binoculars.

Here we are, taking a morning walk on the rails of the durango silverton
narrow gauge, when we see little warblers flitting about and singing in the
willows. This is not a birding walk. We don't have binoculars. Ah ha!
The camera. 12x digital zoom. ...

Colorado

The american avocet.

Ridgway

Our new friend Edie and her dog Tally Ho.

87 years old. Been solo motorhoming for 30 years.

Silverton

[Steve Taylor] Time delay binoculars.

Here we are, taking a morning walk on the rails of the durango silverton
narrow gauge, when we see little warblers flitting about and singing in the
willows. This is not a birding walk. We don't have binoculars. Ah ha!
The camera. 12x digital zoom. That's more magnification than our 8 power
binoculars. Great magnification, but hard to see details through the
viewfinder. You could never identify a difficult bird through the
viewfinder, but you can freeze the image. So we point our camera in the
direction of the little yellow bird in the willows near the ground. Click.
We point at the little gray bird singing in the fir tree. Click.

That's it. What did we see? We have no idea. But later.... Later we
download the camera memory chip to the computer. We look at the computer
screen, we even blow it up a little, and there they are:

Virginia's Warbler. Wilson's Warbler.

Time delay binoculars (monocular).

Villa grove

The black headed grosbeak.

Villa grove

Hobbs the campground cat comes to visit. Annied tried to scare him and
chase him, but he just kept rubbing his head against her. Annie needs to
work on her "cat intimidation" skills.

Villa grove

We're not at Valley View any more either, but here come some pictures.

The view from Valley View.

Silverton

Virginia's Warbler.

Wilson's Warbler.

Villa grove

A room with a view. This is the desk and window where they made me work.

Colorado

I'm still sending pictures of other places but we're not at those places any
more. We've moved from Ridgway to Silverton.

Sand dunes

These two pictures were taken from exactly the same spot. 180 degrees out
of phase. How's that for a contrast?

Sand dunes

The trail of two backpackers headed out into the dunes for the night.

Sand dunes

The backside of the dunes.

Texas

Our campsite at South Llano River State Park.

Sand dunes

A view of the dunes from a distance.

Texas

_____________________________________________
From: Steve Taylor [mailto:spt@thetaylorcompany.net]
Sent: Sunday, May 22, 2005 12:15 PM
To: Bill Taylor (E-mail); David Taylor (E-mail); Tom Taylor (E-mail)
Subject: texas

We didn't get many warbler pictures. They tend to move too fast, and we
were too busy trying to figure out which ones they were, anyway. In spite
of that, this nashville warbler posed for a picture.

Texas

The black bellied plover.

Texas

The creepy sneaky green heron.

Texas

A south texas specialty, the vermilion flycatcher. Here, with a baby, and
with a bug.

Texas

Some hawks have red shoulders.

Carlsbad

The bat show. Quite a show.

Texas

Cattle egrets follow after bovine in the fields, picking off the bugs they
scatter.

This one opted for a day at the beach.

Texas

The painted buntings at the bird bath.

Ridgway

We've left the land trust. That was a nice week. The job came together
really well. We got to hang out with people we really liked. The couple
that established the land trust, first came here in the seventies. They
have worked all these years to protect the special characteristics of their
land.

Two nights ago, we took a walk in the moonlight on the trail that follows
the warm stream carrying the hot springs water through the forest from pool
to pool. It was alive with fireflies. Fireflies at 9,000 feet in the dry
Colorado high country. What a surprise! What a magic moment.

It was difficult to leave. It was remote and rustic there, dusty at times,
limited hookups, not the best conditions for our motorhome living. But we
sure got attached to this place in a short amount of time.

Now it's north and west to another place we like. North over Poncha Pass to
Salida. West over Monarch Pass to Gunnison and on to Montrose. At Montrose
we disconnected and started our errands. Judy left for the post office and
grocery. I made stops for fuel and propane in the motorhome. While Judy
got Annie's dog food at the specialty pet store, and some chocolate for
medicinal purposes from the Russell Stover factory, I got all the dust
washed off the outside of the motorhome at a truck wash. South from
Montrose to Ridgway State Park. We like it here too.

The weather is warm. The snowmelt has begun in earnest. All the crystal
clear mountain streams have turned brown in their annual effort to move the
Rocky Mountains to the sea.

Ridgway

Tonight's view.

Texas

The rose breasted grosbeak.

Birds

The western kingbird.

Texas

The boardwalk to the beach.

Texas

Judy's favorite, the scissortail flycatcher.