Yellow-Crowned Night-Heron

The yellow-crowned night-heron has a glossy black head with white cheeks, a name-sake pale yellow crown going from the bill back between the eyes and to the back of its head, a black bill, dark orange or red eyes, long yellow legs, and a gray/blue body and back with a black scaled pattern on the wings. 

Yellow-crowned night-heron

The yellow crown and orange/red eye stand out. 

It is found only in the Americas. 

Range map from All About Birds.

I saw this bird, my first, on South Padre Island in southern Texas in September 2019. 

Los Tortugos - Port Isabel, Texas

During our foray into northeastern Mexico we diverted into extreme south Texas for a look-see. We spent the night in Port Isabel. Early on Monday we took a bridge over to South Padre Island and walked the grounds of the Bird and Nature Center. 

Roseate spoonbills on South Padre Island.

From there we back-tracked through Port Isabel, then northwest into Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge, perhaps the only place in the U.S. where they actually still have ocelots (of course with no hope of seeing that nocturnal animal). 

Then it was back to Port Isabel for a ride in a small boat out into Laguna Madre to look for bottlenose dolphins. 

Swimming bottlenose dolphins

Brown pelicans and skimmers. 

After that active morning, I was looking forward to lunch at Los Tortugos Seafood Market in Port Isabel. Being right off the water, I figured they would have great seafood. 

Los Tortugos in Port Isabel. 

I saw "crab fingers" on the menu and had never heard of such a thing. So I ordered them and was surprised to see crab claws mimicking tomahawk steak. The shell remained as a handle and the bulbous fleshy end was battered, fried and smothered in butter, then complemented by a bowl of  richly seasoned melted butter. I have to say, they were pretty good. Meatier than I could have imagined and who can't love all of that melted butter. 

Crab fingers.

Rich melted butter.

The shrimp cocktail was not what I expected or hoped for. It was shrimp tossed in a little bit of sauce and with some avocado slices on top. I was hoping for a goblet with some shrimp swimming in a spicy tomato cocktail. The shrimp were fresh and good, just not what I wanted. 

Shrimp cocktail

Finally, I got an oyster po boy sandwich. The first oyster po boy I ever got was in Newport, Oregon and it was amazing. Every one since then, and I've had four or five, has been a little downhill from there. I may quit trying. Too much breading on the oysters, just an okay sauce and the bun was not as soft and buttery as I would have liked. 

Oyster po boy

But still, it was seafood next to the ocean and was still enjoyable despite some complaints above. 

Restaurante Los Primos and Garcia Caves

The small town of Garcia is located 18 miles northwest of Monterrey in Nuevo Leon, Mexico in the shadow of some beautiful mountains, the Sierra Madre Oriental. This mountain range runs from the Rio Grande at the U.S. border in Coahuila, down to Puebla, southeast of Mexico City. This section of the Sierra Madre Oriental is known as the Sierra del Fraile, or Friar's Range. 

Sierra del Fraille or Friar's Range

Before going on to our main destination, Grutas de Garcia, or Garcia Cave, located 5.5 miles northeast of Garcia in the mountains, we stopped at a small restaurant called Restaurante Los Primos, for breakfast. 

My nephew, John, in front of the restaurant.

It was small and unassuming and one of my favorite meals of our trip. We had a number of bowls of different kinds of salsa, one of the things I love about Mexico, and I got a plate with eggs, chorizo, tortilla, and refried beans. It was simple, cheap and amazingly good. 

After breakfast we drove northeast through a canyon which divides the range to the eastern side and found a cable car near the road leading high up into the mountains where the cave is located. It is about a five minute ride on the cable car to the platform where we were dropped off. 

Garcia Cave

The route of the cable car can be discerned by the line (a path near the cable) going up the mountain.

The entrance to the cave is about half way up in the picture, on the left. 

Cable car at the platform.

Looking down to where we came up from. 

The cave is quite spectacular, discovered in 1843 by Father Juan Antonio Sobrevilla. I assume the name of the range may have come from this priestly explorer. 

Cave entrance

Although the formations inside are spectacular, they looked quite dry. We followed a route up, around and down on a metal pathway much of the way. As good as the cave was, my fondest memory of the area is of Los Primos, simple but deliciously good food. 

La Cancilleria - Matamoros, Tamaulipas, Mexico

In September 2019 while my nephew, John Pedroza, and I traveled through the state of Tamaulipas, Mexico into deep southern Texas, we stopped in Matamoros to take a look at Our Lady of Refuge Cathedral (Catedral de Nuestra Senora del Refugio) and then to eat at La Cancilleria, just a few blocks away and very close to the U.S. border and the Texas city of Brownsville. 

Matamoros Cathedral

There is a park across the street from the cathedral and some kind of outdoor fair was going on, with vendors lined up along the street and into the park, taking up any good views to photograph the cathedral. The cathedral was built in 1833 and has been through several hurricanes that knocked down the towers, one in 1844 and another in 1933. It was last restored between 1982 and 1987. We went inside and a mass was going on. We sat for a few minutes and I did not want to take photos and detract from the worship service. It was very light and bright inside. 

Entrance to the cathedral from the park across the street. 

Then we drove to La Cancilleria, the chancery in English, a very nice restaurant which was rated the number 2 restaurant in Matamoros on Trip Advisor (out of 48). It is a place I would love to go back to. The atmosphere was very nice, the food looks amazing (go to Yelp and look at the photos) and what we had was very good. The only thing that detracted was a party going on that hired a traditional Mexican singing group to come in and entertain that had a particularly loud trumpet. A little bit was nice, but it went on and on. 

Restaurants in Mexico are so good with added sauces. The closest one was an Argentine-like chimichurri sauce. 

John mentioned before our trip that Matamoros was known for jaibas rellenas, stuffed octopus. He ordered it, wanting to focus on the regional specialty. I'd gone in wanting it, but got distracted by other items on the menu. 

John and his dish of jaibas rellenas.

I got a tortilla mounded up with smoked octopus and avocado. It looked great and tasted pretty good - the octopus was a little mushy and had a vinegar on it that was not my favorite. 

Octopus

We got a baked cheese dish full of mushrooms and it was divine. We'd had baked cheese at El Rey del Cabrito in Monterrey earlier on our trip and it was so good that I wanted to try some more. It did not disappoint. In line with Dr. Seuss's "Sam I am," I would eat it on a boat, riding a goat, taking a hike or on a bike. I would eat it anywhere, and what else was going on, I would not care. 

Baked cheese in a very hot pan.

Some of the cheese on a tortilla, revealing some of the mushrooms. 

Finally, for my main course I got a leg of roasted meat - I believe it was lamb, covered with a sauce which I think consisted of roasted chiles. The meat was very tender and there was lots of it. 

Aside from the baked cheese, which was about as good as it gets, what we had presented extremely well and tasted very good.  From some of the pictures I've seen, there are lots of other good dishes at the restaurant that look like they rival the cheese. 

Red-Winged Blackbird - Antelope Island

There are about 22 subspecies of red-winged blackbird. The one prior post I've done on them featured a bird in Florida. One of the subspecies is A. p. floridanus which I'm assuming must be a subspecies located in Florida. 

There are other subspecies with hints to their location, such as A. p. nevadensis, A. p. californicus, A. p. sonoriensis and most are quite similar to each other. 

Red-winged blackbirds in Utah.

I saw a tree full of them in November on Antelope Island in the Great Salt Lake and know they must be a separate subspecies from the lone bird I photographed in Florida. The pictures are not great, but they are what I have. 

A male, bottom left and female, to right.

Bison - North Dakota

Two days ago I did a post on bison at Antelope Island in the Great Salt Lake. Earlier in 2019, in September, we visited North Dakota and Theodore Roosevelt National Park - both the South Unit near Madora and the North Unit which is about 70 miles north. We saw bison in both places and I share some of my favorite photos from that experience.

The leaves were just changing colors providing a beautiful back-drop.

This bison was down a steep hill amidst arroyos, hills and lots of trees, not typical bison country in my mind. 

The foregoing photos, as well as this one, were in the North Unit. This bison is in the typical grassland I think of when I think of bison. 

This bison stood out because of the heavy fur going all the way down the front leg. 

This bison reminds me of the bison on the buffalo nickle. 

This bison and those below, were in the South Unit. Close-up of the head of a bison near a large clay mound. He had quite a bit of clay streaked in his fur. 

This bison was walking down the center of the road and would not move over. We were afraid to try and pass him for fear of his ramming our car. We must have followed him for ten minutes. 

The muscles and power in that body are amazing.