Pajareo sin fronteras

  As I've complained about many , many times July and August are essentially the nadir of birding in DC. The migrants are gone, the breeding birds are few and far between (and and even those have fallen silent by late July). More importantly the temperature and humidity both get dangerously close to the triple digits, so it's the time of year that I reluctantly turn on the air conditioning and remember that I have other hobbies that can be done inside.  One major non-weather-related event of this July, however, was that after a seemingly interminable wait (more than 2 years!) Nikki finally got her spousal visa and moved to the US! It was touch and go for a while whether or not I would be able to make it back from Vermont in time to greet her at the airport but make it back I did, in a new car at that. Much of July was spent moving her in and doing the fun things I'd been putting off until her arrival like buying furniture and rearranging the apartment. Life here suddenly f

  Summer in DC is a pretty bleak time birding-wise, and this year that's where I've been almost all summer with the exception of a few quick getaways. Obviously I leap at any opportunity I can to get out of the city, so when I had a long weekend for the 4th of July this year there was no question I was going to try to get out of town. As usual I went with my go-to long weekend destination: Vermont. Nikki was (finally!) arriving to DC on July 10, but I figured that as long as I was back with a couple days to get ready it was no problem. Of course, I should have known that not all would go as planned.  I drove from DC up to Burlington on July 4, arriving late in the evening. The first day was spent seeing family and friends around Burlington, but on the evening of July 5 I headed east to the little town of Waterbury where I was staying for a couple of days in an AirBnb and planned to get out in nature a little bit. I had just a little bit of time before sunset to the Little River