Meeting Mr. Bubbles

Thursday, February 9, 2017

It had been nearly a week since we made the 80-mile-plus roundtrip to Florida City. When traveling, we can usually go longer than this between shopping/laundry trips, but this last hot sticky few days meant we had a fair amount of sweaty clothes and sheets. It seemed like a good use of another hot day to do laundry and shopping after a bit of early birding.

We have been rising before dawn the last few days. It gives us a bit of cool time and we can get out to whatever birding site early. Today was no exception. It was relatively cool and very wet out, so we skipped sitting outside. We were on the road by 7 AM and immediately ran into patches of thick fog. Our intent was to stop at four ponds along the road on the way out of the park—Mrazek Pond, West Lake, Nine Mile Pond and Paurotis Pond. It did not start out to be a very productive trip.

Mrazek Pond held a flock Blue-winged Teal but not much else. I think we saw a kingfisher and several grebes but nothing else. West lake was even less diverse. There was an enormous raft of coots, at least several hundred tightly packed together like they having a group hug, but that was it. At Nine Mile Pond, the most prevalent species were paddlers gathering for the daily guided canoe trip into the mangroves beyond the pond. It was so hot and windless that this didn't look very appealing. Also there was a single ibis poking along the shore and a few "bad" birds, the Black Vultures who hang around to nibble on cars.

At Paurotis Pond we hit the jackpot. As we pulled into the parking lot, a Wood Stork flew by, our first of the trip. There were several more perched in a snag at the edge of the parking lot along with both Black and Turkey Vultures. The far shore of the lake was even better. The trees were filled with Wood Storks (I counted over 60), along with Great Egrets, a few herons and some Roseate Spoonbills. There were also Snowy Egrets, Little Blue Herons and Great Blue Herons along the far shore. More White-crowned Pigeons flew overhead, the first we have ever seen them here. The trees right in front of us had little birds in them including a Yellow-throated Warbler and a Great-crested Flycatcher, more woodpeckers, and the first Red-winged Blackbird of the year.

We left Paurotis originally intending to head into Homestead next but decided to take a quick detour into the Royal Palm parking lot at the Anhinga Trail. We knew our friends and travling companions, Harry and Sally, had arrived at Long Pine last night and we expected that Sally might be birding the Anhinga Trail and Harry guarding against Black Vulture attack. We turned into the lot and there was their Roadtrek, the one we call Shiny. Harry and Nina, their sweet and wonderful dog, were waiting inside and Sally walked up before we could even get out of the van. It was hugs all around. They left about a week behind us and we expected that we'd intersect here although not necessarily in the Royal Palm parking lot.

It turned out that they had also planned to do laundry and shopping, so we headed off in convoy to Homestead and the Mr. Bubbles laundromat. We barely got out of the park before the first stop. After yesterday's birdwalk, Christie had mentioned that a pair of Scissor-tailed Flycatchers and a Smooth-billed Ani had been seen along the road just beyond the park entrance. Sally had seen them on their way into the park. We stopped at the first canal and saw nothing, but just a bit farther on, we spotted the flycatchers on a wire. Another stop for good looks at them and a bonus of an American Kestrel much further down on that same wire. We kept a close eye on the way in, but no Ani was seen.

Next stop, Mr. Bubbles. It was our second trip there and it was quite busy but Ellen and Sally both found available washers. I found Mr. Bubbles ... more on that after we get back from the bakery. It was then time to introduce Sally to the Palm Bakery, a quick walk up the block. This time the woman behind the counter spoke English. We tried to order a couple of the small Tres Leches cakes, but we couldn't as the ones they had were last weeks and they couldn't sell them (I don't know why they were still in the cabinet). We did see a large slab of what looked like bread pudding, so we bought one to split with Harry and Sally. Sally and I also got the filled cupcake-shaped pies like we bought last time and a couple of large coffees. It was back to the vans.

Ellen had gone back into the laundry to move the washing into dryers. I was sitting on the step of Speedy, eating my pastry and drinking my coffee when a young, well-built, bare-chested, heavily tattooed man came up and introduced himself and proceeded to tell me that he was a "bare-knuckle fighter who fought in backyards of bad neighborhoods for big bucks" (I couldn't make that up). He gave me give a link to his videos which will have to wait for better internet. Somehow he looked a little familiar. He then mentioned that he was the owner of the laundromat and he also owned another one. That was why I recognized him, but had only seen him inside with a shirt on. He was on his way to mow the grass in front of the building. This was Mr. Bubbles (or John Boom Boom André when he had his shirt off and fists up). I went inside to help with folding.

We finished with the laundry and drove on to the Publix Supermarket. Ellen and Sally disappeared inside while Harry and I stayed out in the vans (with generators and A/C on). They need to keep it a bit cool for Nina and I wanted to get in touch with the Cohasset Town Hall to get the amounts of our vehicle excise tax bills.

The town always releases the excise tax bills at the beginning of February, to be paid at the beginning of March. We are usually away when they arrive and get back after the due date. We first noticed this a few years ago when we got back and the bills were in our held mail. I noticed they were overdue, so went to town hall to pay them. There was a $50 overdue charge on each one, Subaru, Speedy, two motorcycles and two trailers. What was most galling was that the tax on each of the trailers was $5. We were not going to let that happen again, so if we are on the road, I call to get the bill numbers and amounts and pay online.

The Town Hall was closed today due to the weather. Seems we are missing a blizzard. Of course Ellen sighed longingly about a blizzard as we continued to swelter. Everything in Cohasset is closed for the storm. (I checked my remote backyard camera a couple of times today. The first time there was snow in the yard and the second time I couldn't see a thing as the snow had entirely covered the office window.) I was, however, able to go online to the site where you can pay directly (for a fee, of course) and find the bills, bill numbers and amounts. I can now pay them through our bank online bill pay service.

After that I went in to help Ellen finish the shopping. Then it was on to the U-Haul dealer to fill our propane tank. Of course I missed the corner and had to make several additional turns through traffic lights to get there. Both Harry and I filled the vans. Harry and Sally headed back to the park. We made an additional stop at Robert Is Here for arugula and a Key Lime Shake (odd list, I know).

As we were nearing the park, we noticed Shiny parked along side the road. Sally was flagging us down. There was another car there and four binocular-wielding people intently staring into a bush. We knew that it must be the Ani.

It was deep within the bush and we'd barely gotten a look when it flew across the road. Maybe not a great look, but at least we saw it. The other folks, who had initially found the bird, were a young couple who are local birding guides and two clients. We introduced ourselves, thanked them and got a few tips of other places to birding and what might seen. The only one I remember is a Grooved-bill Ani near Miami Airport.

We again bid farewell to Harry and Sally, although they will be joining us at Flamingo tomorrow, and stopped at the visitor center so Ellen could collect her email and upload here eBird lists for the day. Then it was back to camp.

As evening neared we noticed that the wind direction had changed and it was now coming from the north. It seemed a little drier but it also meant that we would not get as much of a breeze inside when we have the back facing away from the road. It has gotten cooler since dinner (the roast chicken and the bread pudding were both quite good) and it will hopefully be a better night for sleeping.