Great week-end, not as planned, but great. We birded our way into
Spokane and on up to Usk. Our plan to fly to Portland Saturday morning
did not work due to overbooking which left no stand-by space
available.So, we decided to drive. Thanks to Tweeters postings and my
husbands memory we saw several new birds and meet some nice people.

Our son works at the Portland airport and was able to take us to the
MONK PARAKEETS "address". Neat birds. Not your usual city dwellers. We
had a nice visit with our son and started home Sunday morning.

We found the AMERICAN BLACK DUCK in Hood River as reported on tweeters.
It took us awhile; he was in the sheltered area of "The Hook".

Saturday, on our way to Portland, we had stopped at Bingen to look for
the TUFTED DUCK. No duck, but we meet two nice ladies from Tacoma and a
few other people looking also. Sunday we stopped again and there he was.

As I was looking in the field guide to see what the SCRUB JAY looked
like, we heard a
squak; looked out the window and there were three of them in a tree not
more then 20 feet away. It was as if they were saying--here we are, have
a good look at the real thing. In the same area there were TREE SWALLOWS
and five GREAT BLUE HERONS in the marsh.

We stopped at Mary Hill Museum, walked the grounds and saw several
species. A new one for us was the YELLOW-RUMPED WARBLER. We also saw
SAY'S PHOEBE and GOLDEN-CROWNED
SPARROWS. It is a nice place to stretch your legs.

On down the road we stopped at a small treed area, set up the scope and
looked around.
A van pulled up, and Lee and Karen from Olympia got out to see what we
were looking for. The short stop produced a DOWNY WOODPECKER AND SPOTTED
TOWHEE.

The weather was beautiful all week-end. We had a great trip and tweeters
helped make it possible.

Thanks, Sandy and Jerry Converse
Grand Coulee, WA