Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge

On Monday hubby and I decided to check out a New to us, wildlife refuge.  

It was fabulous.  Part of the refuge borders on Lake Erie. 

 We went for a 4 mile hike and saw so many cool things. 

 Some I was able to get pictures of and some not so much, LOL.  

We saw a bald eagle but it didn't land where I could get a good picture of it.  

So that was kind of sad.

I did get a photo of one of the eagle's nests though.  

It was HUGE!  

This photo of hubby was at the beginning of the hike.

 Walking along the road we came across a Painter turtle in the road.  

Hubby rescued him and moved him to the grass near the water so he would not become road kill.

There were a lot of wild flowers (some would say weeds) but they sure were beautiful colors!

This sun dappled field of Queen Anne's Lace was so pretty!

We saw this tree with the most beautiful cones on it.  

The mint green color was just striking in contrast to the vibrant green of the tree.  

Come to find out it is a Cypress tree.

As I walked off the trail to investigate the cones I happened to notice this beautiful moth.  

I think it is a White Lined Sphinx Moth.  

Also known as a Hummingbird moth. 

 I had one of these in my garden once but didn't really see the wing pattern. 

 I was excited as I thought it was a  hummingbird, until I got close enough to see that it was a moth!  He let me get pretty close for the photo too.

We saw this blue heron and it had caught a snake and was eating it.  

I didn't dare try to get closer for a better picture as I wanted to watch him.  

Right after I took this he swallowed that snake whole!

There were large areas covered in these water lillies.  

When the flowers are finished there were these weird "pods" left over.  

I know you have seen them as dried flowers.  

They are circular shaped with holes and turn brown.  Now I know where they come from!

You can see them in this picture.  The leaves on these are gigantic too.

Herons were everywhere!

While we were eating our lunch a Great Blue Heron landed on the breaker.

This was our view of Lake Erie from our lunch spot from a beach log.

We walked along the beach and picked up a few cool shells too.

After lunch it was time to head back to our car.  

Hubby spotted this water snake when he looked over a bridge we were walking on.  

There were several places that had swans. 

 They were never close enough to get really good photos though. 

 This is the closest I was able to get and my poor phone camera did the best it could.

There is a great birding area in this refuge, Magee Marsh.  

Next time we will head to the birding area and see what we can see.  

We were pretty happy with all the things we were able to see though.

It was nice to have a day away with hubby to just hang out and relax.

I am so looking forward to being able to do this more in retirement.

Only 9 more months!

(but who's counting?)

~XOP~

OBX Continued

The next trip was to Jockey's Ridge.  

It is a state park and there are multiple sand dunes there.  

 This was the lead up to the ridge.

These were the dunes.  

Thank goodness the day was overcast or the sand would have burnt our feet!

Such a great view once we were up on top of the ridges

The people walking on top of one of the ridges reminded me of what 

I think it would look like in Egypt.  

You can see father and daughter sitting on the ridge, in the distance.

We took a photo of the three of us on ridge too.

I thought this pinecone was amazing with all of the colors.

Next up was Kitty Hawk and the Wright Borther's Memorial. 

 This rock was the starting point for their flights and many famous aviators 

have touched this exact rock 

(Including my husband). 

 Both of the Wright brothers, Charles Lindbergh, Amelia Earhart and Chuck Yeager to name a few.

These stones represent the first 4 flights of the Wright brothers.  

The first of which lasted only 12 seconds!

This is looking the other direction to Kill Devil Hill. 

This is the hill the Wright brothers took their glider up to work on it's flight.  

That hill is NO JOKE, I thought I would die before I got to the top!

I can NOT imagine walking up that hill carrying a gigantic glider like the brothers had to. 

 Makes me sweat just thinking about it, LOL.  

This is the road leading up to the hill and the monument.

This was the back side of the monument.  It was super impressive!

You can see this is the path we walked to get up to the monument.

While standing taking the photo of the path, 

I turned around toward the monument and this is what it looks like on this side.

We headed back to the camper after that and let the boys outside to play in their tent.

I thought you might like seeing them play in the tent too.

 Then when we came inside they were lounging about on the table and the bench.  

It was difficult to see Cole in the photo above as he is so dark and blends into the shadows.

Lazy boy Finn.  He thinks he owns the camper!

This is our daughter and her boyfriend and their dog, Max on the beach.

She took this of me when I was not paying attention.  

Beach finds.  Hubby found the one on the right and I found the one on the left.  

My daughter and I found the Mermaid Purses.

Hubby and I walked over to the other side of the road to watch the sunset one night.

The next day we got up to watch the sunrise together.

Last day on the beach before heading home.  It was a wonderful time!

So now you will have to endure some more traveling kitten photos.

Funny story.  We stopped for gas and I got out to use the bathroom while hubby pumped the gas.  

A few minutes later he was in the store at the gas station and was asking me if I had the keys.  

Well, no, why would I have the keys?  

We walked back to the truck only to find a 

certain 2 somebodies standing on the arm of the door, and we were locked out!!! 

 Luckily, the gas station let us use their phone and we have On-Star so they were able to unlock the truck and we were on our way in a matter of minutes.  

Thanks On-Star!

Finn thought his shoulder would be a good vantage point

I hope you have enjoyed our trip to the OBX.  You may consider going there sometime.  

Off season was great, just listen for hurricanes prior to traveling in the fall!

~XOP~