Tim Arrives

I spent the morning walking the streets of Havre, and trying to access a "wildlife observation area." I could not finish the drive to that area because of a rather heavy rain shower that made the road conditions deteriorate to the point that I was uncomfortable taking the Rialta farther in. In fact the drive back out concerned me a bit.

Tim arrived on Amtrak at 2:00, about 20 minutes behind schedule. No fault of his, he told me. We hugged, had lunch, looked at a steam locomotive and statue of James J. Hill, then headed North on MT233, to within a few miles of the Canadian border. We were looking for two wildlife refuges that showed clearly on the map, but found that they are undeveloped, without signage or entry roads. This was about a 30 mile drive along a very nice, but very infrequently used, road. We did a lot of birding from the car, and stepped out a few times to scope some ponds. One highpoint of this drive was when we found a Red Fox family. An adult ran away from the spot we first saw them, but 4 kits stayed behind, just on the other side of the ditch, and played with one poppong in and out of its den hole, which was clearly visible.

We then headed East on US2 to Malta and found a RV camp for the night. Tim is currently re-arranging his stuff, and finishing the moving in process.

We had some nice conversations during the day, catching up on each other's lives and kids and plans. I'm looking forward to much more of that in the days to come.

Birds: Upland Sandpiper, Red-Tailed Hawk, Swainson's Hawk, Western Meadowlark, Osprey, Song Sparrow, Mourning Dove, American Avocet, Horned Lark, Eastern Kingbird, Gadwall, Marbled Godwit, Western Kingbird, Northern Harrier, Mallard, American Wigeon, Vesper Sparrow, Brewer's Blackbird, Killdeer, House Sparrow, Rock Dove, Long-billed Curlew, California Gull.