I had my normal breakfast and made the coffee to go. We left at 7:10 in the Jeep.

We went to the San Jacinto Wildlife Area for the first time. Our photographer friend S from San Pedro told us about it, and we were really excited to check it out. On the way to the auto tour loop, we saw American kestrel and meadowlark — not a bad introduction. The managed wetlands were loaded with coots — they were everywhere. Neither of us had ever seen so many coots in one area before. We also saw mallard, northern shoveler, cinnamon teal, eared grebe, greater yellowlegs, lots of red-winged blackbird, great egret, snowy egret, American harrier, redtail hawk, an osprey with prey, and possibly a juvenile bald eagle.

My best images were of egrets. We spent some time watching a great egret and two snowy egrets hunting in a small pool near the road. We were both amazed that the great egret, who was patiently waiting for just the right moment to strike, would put up with the two snowies that were busy walking all over the place scaring up prey. I was able to capture the great egret flipping a tiny prey item in its bill (below left). The most exciting image was of a snowy egret hunting in a huge patch of goldfields (below right).


We returned to the RV at 11:35 and I downloaded the images I took.

I had lunch at 11:45 and downselected the images in iView. Then I started to work up a blog entry. We packed up our computers and laundry and left in the Jeep at 12:55.

We went to the US Laundry (laundromat) in Moreno Valley at 1:15. After starting the laundry, we enjoyed the really fast Verizon Wireless Broadband internet connection. I finished the blog entry. It started raining lightly. There were no snafus with the laundry this time, and we left at 2:55.

We returned to the RV around 3:25. After I put away my laundry, I downselected the images from this morning in Capture One (C1).

We had dinner around 6:40 of DiGiorno rising crust Supreme Pizza. It's been a while since we've had one, and J thought they had improved the sauce.

After dinner, I processed two images for the blog and it started raining heavily around 7:30. I coordinated with my friends from my days in Long Beach, and used J's iPhone to locate a restaurant where we could meet. It was nice to be able to go online using her AT&T coverage right there in the RV because the Verizon Wireless signal is too sporadic in our campsite. We watched an episode of Desperate Housewives on DVD.