<FontFamily><param>Courier</param><bigger>Dear 'spreyers, <FontFamily><param>Courier New</param>Fran and I just returned from our big summer trip to Washington and British Columbia. It was our first trip to this part of North America and Fran took great pains to research possible routes for us for months prior to the trip. Here are the major statistics, followed by a short run-down on our itinerary. Greg Miller's 1998 odyssey notwithstanding, our totals for 1998 now stand at 400 for Fran and 405 for myself, so we both managed to hit this seemingly elusive goal this year! Stats: 14 days birding 1800 miles driven 100 miles by ferry 100 miles pelagicing 6 miles death marching Primary target species for the trip (all seen): <paraindent><param>left</param>Black-footed Albatross</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Fork-tailed Storm-Petrel</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Blue Grouse</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Glaucous-winged Gull</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Marbled Murrelet</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Tufted Puffin</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Black Swift</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Vaux's Swift</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Red-beasted Sapsucker</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Pacific-slope Flycatcher</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Eurasian Skylark</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Northwestern Crow</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>American Dipper (Yea! Bird of the trip!)</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Varied Thrush</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Crested Myna</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Cassin's Vireo</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Townsend's Warbler</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>MacGillivray's Warbler</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Gray Jay</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Black-billed Magpie</paraindent> Second Tier Possibles (seen): <paraindent><param>left</param>Williamson's Sapsucker</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Three-toed Woodpecker</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Townsend's Solitaire</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Pine Grosbeak</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Barrow's Goldeneye</paraindent> Unanticipated lifebirds (seen): <paraindent><param>left</param>Tufted Duck</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Mew Gull</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Thayer's Gull</paraindent> Disappointing Misses (species actively sought): <paraindent><param>left</param>Black-backed Woodpecker (more difficult here, easier on the East Coast?)</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Sage Sparrow</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Gray-crowned Rosy-Finch</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Xantus's Murrelet</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>White-tailed Ptarmigan</paraindent> <paraindent><param>left</param>Spruce Grouse (for Fran)</paraindent> 12-13 July 1998--The first day was mostly travel. Starting from Sea-Tac Airport, just south of Seattle, we drove north of the city, through Bill Gates country, then East, into the Cascades, stopping at Leavenworth for our first night. Here we birded Wenatchee State Park, the Entiat River Valley, the Leavenworth area itself, and finished up our second day by driving into the rain shadow of the Cascades, the Okanagan Valley area. 14-15 July 1998--Second and third nights we spent in the town of Okanagan and from this locale explored Pateros, the Loup-Loup Campground, Alta Lake, fields surrounding the Okanagan Airport, Fort Okanagan at the confluence of the Okanagan and Columbia Rivers, and other back roads in the area. The Okanagan Valley is a remarkable contrast to the lush vegetation of the Western side of the Cascades--we found it to be quite reminiscent of our time in Arizona and, indeed, we found many of the dry country species in this part of our trip. As we left Okanagan we birded the Concanully Road and Lake areas then drove north up the lonely Sinlahekin Valley Road, finally crossing the border into Canada and finishing the day at the little town of Oliver, in British Columbia. 16 July 1998--Leaving Oliver for a long day of driving, we began by birding Vaseux Lake Provincial Park near Oliver then we took a little known dirt road back into the Cascades, from Oliver to Cawston. Along this little-traveled road we found flocks of feeding Pine Siskins and Purple Finches. Finally we just settled down for a 2-hour drive to our stopping point for the next few days, the lodge at Manning Provincial Park in South-Central British Columbia. 17-18 July 1998--This was the scenic high point of our entire trip. Manning Park is a wonderful place to visit and to bird, offering many habitats, trails, and mountain roads to explore. The high alpine meadows were in full bloom when we were there and birds were nearing the end of their nesting season. Two of our most difficult target birds were located in the park, both in the early morning hours of the day we left the park--Pine Grosbeak and American Dipper. We also tallied Gray Jay and Clark's Nutcracker's here, in abundance. After leaving Manning Park we continued westward to Tsawwassen, a suburb of Vancouver, and finished the day by birding the Reifel Bird Sanctuary, a private sanctuary that seemingly catered primarily to Rock Dove, European Starling, Canada Goose, and Mallard. 19-20 July 1998--Our most-wanted target in Vancouver was the slowly declining Crested Myna, introduced to the city a few decades ago. Thanks to Fran's diligent Internet research ahead of our trip, we drove immediately to a specific street corner, looked up at the third rooftop from the end, and were immediately rewarded with great views of about 5 individuals of this sometimes hard-to-find species. From here we attempted to bird the big city park but were frustrated by some sort of Asian Festival that had filled the park to bursting by 7:30 in the morning! Rather than fight the crowds we drove to Iona Island, bordering the Vancouver International Airport, where we tallied a real surprise for us, a Tufted Duck. In a rash moment we decided to walk out the jetty at Iona Island. Somehow or other, in my general confusion, I had gotten the impression that the jetty was 1 kilometer from start to end. After walking for 2 hours and FINALLY reaching the end of the jetty (at a certain point visions of the Bataan Death March danced in my head). It was worthwhile--at the end we tallied all three scoters, Surfbird in breeding plumage, and the only Black Turnstones of the entire trip. But then, of course, we had to turn around and walk back. When we finally got back to our car we realized the roundtrip out the Iona Island Jetty was a tad over 6 miles. We finished the day by birding along the shore of Boundary Bay, looking with little success for migrant shorebirds. The next day, the 20th, began early with a 7 am ferry ride from Tsawwassen to Swartz Bay, the latter on the Saanich Peninsula of Vancouver Island. Our target bird here was the Eurasian Skylark, which turned out to be a lot more elusive than the mynas in Vancouver. 21-22 July 1998--Since our first attempt to find the skylarks had been so singularly unsuccessful (Fran thought she saw one for a flash as it disappeared into high grass, I missed it totally) we made a few phone calls (once again, thanks to Fran's diligent Internet research ahead of time) and hooked up with Barbara Begg of North Saanich. This friendly, outgoing woman is apparently the area expert on the skylarks and their current status (she led Gene Scarpulla to his Skylark back in 1986 and some other nameless Maryland couple to a sighting in 1987). We met her and her granddaughter about mid- morning, walked across a short-grass field near the Victoria Airport, and almost immediately turned up three of the birds feeding on the short grass here and also in the short grass surrounding the runways of the airport. Thanks, Barbara! Also we birded Clover Point and picked out a Mew Gull from the hoards of Glaucous-winged, Ring-billed, and Heermann's, and Western Gulls. The remainder of our time on the Saanich Peninsula was spent being unabashed tourists in Victoria, the capital city of British Columbia, a wonderful place to ease legs aching from the Iona Death March! On the 22nd we caught the ferry from Victoria to Port Angeles, for our return to US soil, this time at the extreme northern tip of the Olympic Peninsula. The boat trip was pretty much uneventful with the exception of a Marbled Murrelet as we began our approach to the jetty protecting the Port Angeles harbor. We finished the day with quick trips to Dungeness NWR and Ediz Hook (where we saw our first Thayer's Gull). 23-24 July 1998--Our stay in Port Angeles began this day with a drive up into the Olympic Mountains to Hurricane Ridge, another gorgeous Alpine Meadow area in full bloom. We followed this up by more extensive birding in the Sequim area, near Dungeness NWR. The following day we checked out of Port Angeles and began the long trek to Westport, on the Pacific Coast. Along the way we stopped at the Hoh Rain Forest and at Ocean Shores. We must have been getting tired by this time because neither location yielded anything terribly excited and we were having trouble maintaining our enthusiasm. 25 July 1998--This day we spent the entire day at sea with Terry Wahl, the doyen of Northwest Coast pelagic trips. As with most of our other pelagic trips, we spent the morning ALMOST getting sick and the afternoon enjoying the thousands of birds around us. At one point we had easily 200 Northern Fulmar feeding on the chum at the stern of our boat as Tufted Puffins looked on from a safer distance. Target birds here were Black- footed Albatross and Fork-tailed Storm- Petrel, both of which we saw in large numbers. 26 July 1998--We finished our birding for the trip with a visit to coastal Tokeland, a site noted in Michael O'Brien's book, for possibilities of Bar- tailed Godwit. We didn't find any Bar- taileds, but we did add our only Marbled Godwits of the trip here. From Tokeland we drove leisurely back to Seattle where we re-packed and generally got our heads straight for our flight home on the 27th. A more detailed write-up, with references and a detailed sightings list will be forthcoming when we get to it.<FontFamily><param>Arial</param><smaller> <nofill> =============== Norm Saunders Colesville, MD osprey@ari.net