Stromboli's Rolling Log: Day 28. Last Day in Colorado. Cattle, cemetery, and a DQ!

This is the last full day in Lamar and Colorado as we hope to be over the"line"into Nebraska by tomorrow evening. The destination will be Ogalalla NE. But today was another good one, a bit cool in the AM but warmed up to the 80's by mid afternoon, as when the sun gets low in the sky the temps drop quickly, That 80F at 6:00 PM turns to 66 F at 7:00 PM. The winds were not strong today and even were nil this AM. During the night however, a huge wind that lasted about 6 hours and then stopped. It was Deep LOW pressure that was moving through. The winds gusted to 47 mph and were steady at 35 mph. No damage except my "Twirly " flag that i have on a tall pole, is placed over the handle of golf club in the soil, and it broke.

We went to the early service of the First UMC here in Lamar which was an Methodist Episcopal church in its early history. They meet for the traditial service in the chapel . Only 17 people in attendance, a great contrast to the Easter Sundy service in Mcallen with 500 people. But it was a good service and I thnk Ruth and I (we were a tad late as we thought it started 15 miutes later than it did) were able to get the congregation signing as the first song was ver quiet. John Wesley would have been proud of their singing after a few hymns. We were met warmly and stayed a while to converse with a number of the people. The sanctuary is used at the 11:00 service which is a "Praise Service".

Next was a breakfast at the same "Hickory House" restaurant that we ate at before. Ruth had eggs, biscuits and gravy and I had the Mexicn Omelet , heavy on the green chilis. With some medium salsa it was very tasty. I finished the other half of it tonight at the trailer.

We returend to thje trailer after the breakfaast and headed toward Las Animas and the Martin Reservoir. Las animas is named after the Purgatories River nearby. The real name for it is, El Río de las Ánimas Perdidas en Purgatorio, which means "River of the Lost Souls in Purgatory". Don't ask!

On the way we traversed the Martin Reservoir and dam . A drive over the dam to a site that had Plovers and Grebes nesting we could not get near as they had all the gates locked. (Good idea to not disturb them). A drive through the State Park helped us to get a Red Necked Sapsucker, and Ruth saw an Oriole but we could not identify it before it flew away. A stop at a DQ helped us get energy for the rst of the day. We are now both getting "minis" as it is plenty. A total of 25 birds today and 170 overall.

The Martin Reservoir Dam

The Martin Reservoir. It is 1/3 covered with
water and 2/3rds dry.
We we didn't get to 30 birds today, did see a Great Horned Owl, and that Sapsucker, so t at moves the total count past 170 species. Up on th Platte River where we wi be tis next week, the word is tatthe Cranes are moving north, so we may see them. There will be me birds that are new mst certainly.her are a few pictures from the day. See ya tomorrow.