By Rochester falcon watcher MAK

What can I say? It was an adventure I’ll never forget from start to finish. Joyce picked me up at around 7:ooam Friday morning. We stopped in Buffalo on the way to Canada and saw BB and her 3 eyases at UB. Next we went to Central Terminal and saw one adult and could barely see the white of an eyas in the nestbox. From there it was to the grain elevators with no sightings. We had better luck at the Statler building in downtown Buffalo. Joyce got the idea to go up in a building across from the nest site. We told the guy at the front desk we wanted to go up to the 26th floor to take pics of the falcons and he gave the ok! What a great idea that was tho it was through windows and not too clear we did get some pics of the eyases. No adults were visible to us.

Next up was across the border to Canada with the first stop at the Burlington bridge. We saw the female adult(not sure of name) and the 3 eyases. We also met up with Sue McCready and her husband who were there for a fledge watch. We stayed briefly for we didn’t want to be late for the banding. After a nerve wrecking ride down the QEW with backed up traffic in more than one spot we finally arrived with about 15 minutes to spare! PHEW!!! Carol,Dana,Kathy and Lisa were there and the CPF were already at the nest site getting the eyases with Linn and Reuben flying back and forth overhead. After observing and taking pics we went in for the banding ceremony. My very first and hopefully not my last! It was wonderful to be so close to the little cuties. Afterward the 6 of us from Rochester went to have a bite to eat with CPFers Mark and Marion Nash,Big Frank and Tracy. When we were done we got our hotel rooms and then went to see Quest,Kendal and Harlequin. What a falcon and fun filled day as we saw a total of 19 adults and eyases!

Saturday morning the 6 of us enjoyed a continental breakfast together at the hotel before going to find Stormin. We parked at the top of a parking garage to view this nestsite and the female(not sure of name) was there watching over her babies. A short time after Stormin came flying in and we all marveled at how much he looked like Kaver with his dark head. When we left this site Carol,Dana,Kathy and Lisa were headed to the Sheraton and Rhea Mae and Tiagos’ site for a fledge watch. Joyce and I had planned on going there eventually after we checked a couple other sites. We found our way to the nest site of the infamous Jack (who has families with 2 females) and Angel where we met Carly. It was great to meet her and share a few minutes of falcon watching. Joyce had decided to go get her car and bring down to where we all were and in the process got into an accident. This pretty much ended our falcon watching as we spent the next 7 hours going through the Canadian accident process. Carly called Bruce from the CPF to come give us assistance and he couldn’t have done more. He stayed with us through the whole deal and even got a tow truck to take the car to the Collision Reporting Center. In Canada unless there’s an injury or damage to city property the police don’t come and you have 24 hrs. to go to this center to report your accident where they deem whether your car is drivable. Joyce was very adament about driving her car home and so she followed the tow truck driver in her car with Bruce and I behind her. She quickly found out that she wouldn’t be driving it home. She said the steering was horrendous but she did get to the center with it arriving a nervous wreck to say the least. After you report to the center people you get a police report from one of the officers on duty at the center. Joyce had a hard time finding a rental car that we could cross the border in but Bruce was a tremendous help as he drove her to the airport to get one there.  I stayed at the center because he had room for only one in his vehicle. An hour and a half later they returned with a vehicle with Michigan plates. Joyce and I got everything out of her car including her license plates as she didn’t want to worry about anything being stolen. She couldn’t wait to get out of there and after having a late dinner we made our way home arriving between 2;30-3:00am.

I want to thank all the CPF peeps for their efforts and friendship and a special thank you to Bruce for all of his help and compassion and to Carly who missed out on alot of her fledge watch to show us support.

Here is the link to my photo album (as always no sign in needed):

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 12th, 2011 at 12:26 PM and is filed under Falcon Watch. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.