A Nice Day in the Rio Grande Valley

I spent last night in South Padre Island, the closest motel to Laguna Atascosa NWR.  The Motel 6 was a notch above the rest.  This morning I got going after sunrise since the outside temperature was only 39F and I needed it to warm up a bit.  Although I was heading to a Denny's for breakfast, I discovered that it no longer existed, the space being converted into a retail store.  Instead I found a small breakfast spot near the causeway bridge that offered an inexpensive breakfast and lots of people watching.  I was intrigued by how few tourists there were during this holiday time.  I would have thought that South Padre Island would be a location where families might go for a holiday fest, although it was cold as hell today.  Still a walk on the beach and eating out are favorites most any time of year.  After breakfast, I drove to Laguna Atascosa and ran into Jeff Lemons whom Joyce and I had met at Pea Island NWR in NC when we went to see the White-cheeked Pintail.  He and his family were visiting the valley and they were having a ball.  He was picking up lifebirds at a rapid rate since this was his first trip to the valley.  I wandered around the area and finally encountered the Rufous-backed Thrush at one of the water sources.  It didn't hang around long enough for anybody else to get there.  I told Jeff about the sighting and then left to drive all the way to Bentsen State Park to spend the last hours of the day there.  I spent a lovely three hours walking around in an area that was just re-opened yesterday.  I didn't see anything rare, but it was nice to get great views of many of the valley specialties.  I left after sunset and got a motel in McAllen.  I walked to a nearby restaurant and then retired and watched TV from the bed.  Since I don't watch much TV, it was a bit entertaining, although I'm depressed with how small the content/advertising ratio has become.  I didn't measure it, but I would guess that there's no more than 35 minutes of real content per hour of TV time.  Tomorrow I'll try to fly home.  I hope my planes are flying and reasonably on-time.  Even if they are on time, I won't get home until midnight.  Then, only four days left in the year.