Our Nest on Wheels

There are very few places in the world where you can swim with penguins. Most penguins they are found in really cold places, like Antarctica. The Galapagos Islands are one of the few places where you can swim with penguins in temperate water, like 80 degrees. Another is the Tanganyika Wild Animal Park in Kansas. (I think those animals wake up every day wondering just how the heck they ended up in Kansas!)

We encountered penguins at several of the islands that we visited and sometimes found them in the waters where we were snorkeling.

I saw this guy while we were snorkeling.  I surfaced next to him and took this picture with my underwater camera. These penguins don't seem to mind if you get close to them. In fact, they don't seem to be bothered at all by the presence of other large creatures like sharks and sea lions.

Here's what a penguin looks like from underneath the water. It's said that penguins look like "deflated ducks" when swimming on the surface of the water, and that's true; pretty much all you see above water is their head. The rest of the body is under water, like this one.

Penguins are amazingly fast when swimming under water. Their flippers (or wings?) enable them to move really quickly and dodge and turn on a dime. Here's one "fishing" by swimming through a school of little fish at high speed. The little fish are pretty good at avoiding becoming lunch, but every now and then the penguin gets his meal. One penguin even tested my little finger to see if it was tasty when I snorkeled nearby.

 In November 2021, we wrote "Where Did the Water Go" after our October visit to Lake Powell on the Arizona/Utah border. At the time we were shocked by how far the water level had fallen in the 3 years since our previous visit. In November, it looked certain that the lake level would drop below 3525 feet (above sea level). 3525 feet is considered a critical level, as the ability to generate power decreases dramatically below that level. 

Well, on March 15 of this year, Lake Powell did drop below 3525 ft, forcing the Bureau of Reclamation, who runs the dam, to act. They decided to buy a little time by increasing releases from some upstream dams, like Flaming Gorge, while reducing releases from Lake Powell. This plan has achieved a bit of the intended result, and Lake Powell levels have risen again.

The Brown Pelican

Boobies.  These are Blue-footed Boobies.

This is the only nocturnal gull in the world, found mainly in the Galapagos. We did not see them hunting at night, and they seemed to be out during the daytime hours as well. So perhaps they work a double shift. As it was breeding season when we were there, we did see some tending to eggs in their nests on the ground. We even saw a couple of parents do the "changing of the guard" where one parent takes over for the other in tending the nest. More details on these gulls here:  28 Swallow-tailed Gull Facts: World's Only Fully Nocturnal Gull and Seabird • Storyteller Travel

Frigatebirds

This is a male Frigatebird, showing off for any of the females in the area who might be impressed by the size of his red sac. We saw frigatebirds throughout the islands, including many who soared along just a few feet above our ship as we traveled overnight from island to island. It was mating season, and we saw many males trying to attract a female, many couples, and many new-born chicks.

Yellow-Crowned Night Heron

We didn't see too many of these birds, but I think it's a Yellow Crowned Night heron, possibly a juvenile as this one doesn't have the yellow crown yet. This guy was standing right alongside the trail we were hiking on and seemed to be using his wing to point out the direction that we should go. Again, no fear of humans; this photo was taken from a distance of about 6 or 8 feet.

We saw many other birds, including penguins. The Galapagos is one of the rare places on earth where you can swim in temperate waters with penguins, which we did. Pictures of them coming soon.

Kanab, Utah.

We had never been to Kanab, or at least have never stayed there. We may have driven through it on the way to Zion National Park many years ago. But this year, while working our way south to Tucson, we decided to stay in Kanab for a few days and see what there is in the area. And it turns out that there is quite a lot to see and do.

Here's Jane navigating her way up a rather steep rock slope. [Jane's note: It was way scarier than it looks.]

Once you get up this slope, the caves are easily accessed.

From the road, you cannot tell just how far these caves extend into the hillside. It turns out that they go in pretty far. Far enough that you really need a flashlight to find your way around.

We took a great hike that was in the Dixie National Forest, on the way to Bryce Canyon NP. This hike was every bit as good as the hikes that we've done in Bryce Canyon, but far less crowded. Most of the time there were no other people on the trail with us. 

Yes, that's snow that you see in these pictures, as it was October and had snowed recently. But the day was sunny and reasonably warm, which made for great hiking.

West of Kanab you will find the Coral Pink Sand Dunes State Park. The geographic features of this park causes it to capture sand, in the same way that a snow fence works. The result is these huge sand dunes which can take on a pink hue at sunset. We were there during the middle of the day and it looked more like typical sand. Still impressive.

You may have heard of the Wave, the spectacular sandstone formation that's located east of Kanab in Arizona. Access to this trail is limited to 64 people a day, selected via a lottery. Forty-eight spots per day are allocated via an online lottery 4 months in advance. People typically try for many years to get one of these coveted permits. But if you happen to be in Kanab, you can attend a daily lottery for the remaining 16 daily permits. If you win this lottery, you hike in the next day. We went to the daily lottery in Kanab 2 days hoping to score a permit but were unsuccessful. But your odds are much better in person than online. Some of the people at the daily lottery had been there for 7 mornings in a row and finally got a permit. We weren't so lucky. We did, however, hike to a rock formation on a trail in the Best Friends Animal Sanctuary, just north of Kanab, that has a similar look to the Wave.

West of Kanab you can find Pipe Spring National Monument. For thousands of years, First Nations peoples lived at this oasis in the desert, where the water from this spring created a vast grassland and the abundance of game animals. Then white settlers arrived and built a fort around the spring.

The Mormon settlers then used the water from the spring to support a cattle ranch. The vast grassland disappeared under the hoofs of cattle, and in a few years a way of life that had existed for thousands of years was gone.

We only stayed four nights in Kanab and could have stayed quite a bit longer. Next time we're in that area, we will stay longer, and maybe get a permit to hike the Wave.