Ten Years of Retirement - Part 3 of 4

We’ve been retired for 10 years.  This s a look back at our second year of retirement.

2011
January - March

We volunteered at Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge in Alamo, Texas.  Our jobs were to lead bird walks, keep the birds fed, clean ponds and keep up with weeding and gardening.  Mark gave several presentations that were very well attended.

Mark leading a bird walk.

Feeding the birds.  They love the oranges!

Cleaning the pond.

All kinds of things live in the pond.

Planting tiny little plants.

Mark gave several different presentations.

While in this wonderful birding hotspot of Texas we took advantage of other birding sites.

S. Padre Island World Birding Center

April

In April we started making our way to Maine where we spent the summer.

States traveled through to Maine: Texas, Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine.

We enjoyed Caddo Lake in Texas.

Hiking in Arkansas.

Visited Mammoth Cave in Kentucky and found a few trails to hike.

May - June

We were still in Kentucky at the beginning of May.  Diamond Cave was our last stop before heading to Pennsylvania.

We made a detour to visit Hershey in Pennsylvania.  It was worth the trip.

Fellow Santa Ana volunteers Carolyn and Wally asked us to come to Magee Marsh in Ohio for the birding festival.

We had some cold, rainy weather in New York before getting into Maine in mid-May.

Letchworth Falls, NY

A tour of Morris Dam was fun.

Morris Dam, NY

In Maine we quickly discovered black flies, moose flies, and many other critters ready to take a bite out!

Each little black dot is a biting critter.

Our volunteer position was in Aroostook State Park in Presque Isle, Maine.  It was our first (and probably last) “host” position. 

The lead ranger really wanted to make Aroostook a birding destination so Mark was asked to give several birding presentations and bird walks.

Mark giving his wonderful Birds and Their Bills presentation.

The presentations were not well-attended.  The campers were not interested in birds.

We had a few other jobs such as cleaning the shower/rest rooms, and painting the flag pole.

Fresh paint on the flag pole.

We saw a few moose, discovered whoopie pies and went to the local festivals.

  

Draft horse demonstration at the local festival.

Moose poop is big!

Whoopie pies were a big hit.

Next time:  The last half of 2011.

Ten Years of Retirement - Part 2 of 4

We’ve been retired for 10 years.  This is a look back at our first couple of years.

2010 Continued

July - After spending the first part of July in Yellowstone we moved to the west side of Glacier National Park in Montana.

Avalanche Gorge

After several days on the West side of Glacier, we moved to the East side.

Bighorn Sheep

For my birthday we drove into Canada for the day.

Mid-July we headed back to Montana.  We tried our hand at gold panning and found a little gold and many garnets.

We found gold!

We went from panning for gold in Montana to caves in Idaho.

Minnetonka Cave

From Idaho we started heading home quickly.  After about a month in the Central Texas heat, we decided we were crazy and packed up the RV for Ruidoso, New Mexico.  We were retired after all, no need to be in Texas during the summer!

On our way out of Texas we stopped at Caverns of Sonora.  It’s a beautiful cave that we have been through a couple of times.  It’s always nice and cool too!

Caverns of Sonora, Texas

We spent a couple of nights at Balmorhea State Park and spent a lot of time in the pool.

Balmorhea State Park.

Spring-fed pool.

We finally got to Ruidoso, New Mexico where it was much cooler and did a lot of hiking and even a little geocaching.

We had to get back to Texas to start our first volunteer assignment on October 1 at LBJ State Park in Stonewall.

We spent three months here.  I worked in the gift shop while Mark worked at the Sauer-Beckmann Living History Farm.

Mark being a farmer.

Mark milking a cow.  It's not as easy as it looks!

We had plenty of time to visit the towns in the area.

Octoberfest in Fredericksburg

November - In November we started decorating LBJ State Park for Christmas.  It was a lot of fun putting up the Christmas tree and all the decorations.

LBJ State Park Visitor Center

December - We bought our park model house in the Texas Hill Country.  This is a beautiful area of Texas.

LBJ state park celebrated it’s 41st year of lighting the Christmas Tree and we helped with the festivities.

41st Annual Tree Lighting - LBJ State Park

Our route from Rockport, Texas (Goose Island State Park) to

Glacier National Park, Montana

Next time:   More from our beginning retirement years.

Ten Years of Retirement - Part 1 of 4

We’ve been retired for 10 years!  This is a look back at our first couple of years.

April 1, 2010, was our first day of retirement.  It was a Thursday.  We had a pretty good idea where we were going the next few months but after that . . . ????

Our first year: TX, NM, AZ, UT, CO, WY, MT, Canada, ID, WY, TX, NM, TX

April:  We headed out on our first trip as retirees on Monday, April 5, 2010.  We spent our first month in Texas visiting Goose Island State Park, all the birding hot spots in the Rio Grande Valley, Davis Mountains State Park and a couple of one-night stops in a few other state parks.

It is quite a drive to get out of Texas, especially if you’re all the way down in Mission!

May:  The month of May was very busy. 

We were in Silver City, New Mexico where we saw the Gila Cliff Dwellings, and walked The Catwalk. 

Gila Cliff Dwellings

 

 The Catwalk

We moved to Rodeo and visited Cave Creek, Rustler Park, Walker House, S.W. Research station - all places we have visited many times.

A week at Kartchner Cavern State Park was plenty of time to see Chiricahua National Monument, Miller Canyon, San Pedro House, Fort Huachuca, Joe French Canyon, and drive the Kartchner Loop trail.

Chiricahua National Monument

Having a snack on a hoodoo

By the middle of the month we were in Overgaard, Arizona.  We only had five days here but we made the most of our time going to the ice cave in Show Low, hiking the Chevelon Creek Trail to Woods Canyon Lake, and even playing bocce ball for the first time at the Elk Pine RV Resort.

We celebrated Mark’s birthday at Willow Springs Lake.

Mark’s birthday hike.

We spent the rest of the month in Utah.  We stayed at Ruby’s RV Park, right outside Bryce Canyon.  Our friends Rick and Sharon came to visit and we had a wonderful time in Red Canyon, Willis Creek Slot Canyon, Bryce Canyon, Escalante Grande Staircase, and hiking many trails.

Red Canyon

Douglas Fir trees smell like butterscotch.

Slot Canyon

We even had a little snow!

Golden Wall Trail

With a few more days left in the month we moved to Green River, Utah.  We had never been to Arches National Park.  We spent two early mornings in the park (early to avoid the crowds) and had fun seeing Delicate Arch and Balanced Rock and climbing all over Devils Garden.

Delicate Rock

Balanced Rock

Landscape Arch

We did beat the crowds.

This is why we got to the park early!

June - We spent the month of June hiking around Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado and Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming. 

Rifle Falls - Rifle Gap, Colorado

Fairyslipper - Rocky Mountain National Park

Grand Tetons

Grand Tetons

Green Mountains Falls - Wyoming

  

Sinks Canyon - Wyoming

July - In July we moved over to Yellowstone National Park.  We saw Old Faithful, the Artist Paint Pots, Lovers Falls, Wraith Falls, Slough Creek, Cascade Lake.  

Yellowstone Bison

Lost Lake Trail

Old Faithful

Lovers Falls

We spent a week in this beautiful area before moving to the west side of Glacier National Park in Montana.

Next time: More from our first year of retirement (2010).