Looking for the Owl Channel Blog? Click below please for the new location !: Please see prev post for 8/22 to 8/23 ** Here is the GoogAbout !

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Please see prev post for 8/22 to 8/23 ** Here is the GoogAbout !

The GoogAbout- Kathy Goog's journies across the states with Hubby.!

death valley

Sat~Day 19~Today is the last day we wake up in CA & because we are inland, there is no fog. Not sure how the name Mammoth Lakes came to be, as there is no Mammoth (not even a fossil of one) or what I consider huge lakes. On our way thru Death Valley, I am transported back to history class. We see Mary Austins birthplace in CA; Manzanar, CA; Mercury, NV; & Snow Mtn, NV; which have nothing in common except area of location. They are an author, Japanese/American prison during WWII, Nuclear testing site & a golf course oasis in the middle of miles of desert, respectively. Temp in Death Valley was 114* F, the hottest we've seen so far, and gas was a whopping $5.48.9 gal reg! We get to Vegas (now with cheapest gas @ $3.39.9) & check in at the Luxor.
Anyone who has ever been in an elevator and/or plane with me will understand the terror of this: Our room is on the 17th floor & elevator stops on the 16th and doors do not open. Not panicking yet, we (just the two of us are in it) press some buttons, knock on door, even try to pry door open manually. After about 30 seconds, lights go out and it's PANIC time! In about 20 seconds someone came to use elevator and when they pressed button for it, our doors opened & I just about fell out! That's when they tell us you have to use your room key in the elevator to access a hotel floor. Lasted less than a minute possibly but it had to take years off my life! We take a $30 each way taxi ride to the 'Pawn Stars' shop (TV show) at the other end of the strip. What a disappointment, unless you want to purchase a souvenier T-shirt, mug, bumper sticker... that says you were there! I left empty-handed.

Sun~Day 20~Lucky us, we leave the Luxor with more money than we went in with. Drive by Lake Mead & Hoover Dam, then enter AZ, state #20! The restaurant we had planned on having lunch at burned to the ground on Thursday, so we ended up eating burgers at a gas station restaurant! There actually was no other choice for another 50 miles and it was going on 2 o'clock. We take the very first exit off of Rte 40 to get onto Old Rte 66, and see lots of seemingly deserted/abandoned towns, that he enjoys taking pictures of. The only towns that seen to be thriving are making the most of tourists nostalgia for a bygone era. We get to our hotel in Williams, AZ, the southern gateway to the Grand Canyon. Nice quite day.

Mon~Day 21~Leaving Williams, AZ, after some Route 66/souvenir shopping, and then on our way to the south rim of the Grand Canyon. The views are indeed very GRAND and even standing on rims edge looking down it is hard to comprehend how far down the canyon floor really is. As we drive from one fantabulous vista to the next, one thing is nagging at me & I try to get it out of my head, but you know the harder I try, the more I can't! There is not one car length that goes by where on one side of the road or both sides there are dead trees. Either standing dead, burnt, broken or down on the ground, there are dead trees everywhere! It is not a pretty sight, and for me it takes away from the beauty that should be in driving thru the park, as well. I think 20' or 30' in from the road can & should be maintained, and that's all I have to say about that!
We continue on Rte 64, thru Navajo Reservation, where many, many shops have been set up to sell the crafts that they make.
We then stop to take some pictures of us "Standing on a corner in Winslow, AZ, such a fine sight to see" and get to Holbrook, AZ where we are spending the night. We thought we had left Pacific time, but learned AZ doesn't do daylight savings time, so we won't lose an hour until we hit New Mexico tomorrow

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12 barn owl fascinating facts

Discover 12 fascinating facts about the beautiful barn owl.
1 The barn owl was voted Britain’s favourite farmland bird by the public in an RSPB poll in July 2007.
2 Historically, the barn owl was Britain’s most common owl species, but today only one farm in about 75 can boast a barn owl nest.
3 Barn owls screech, not hoot (that’s tawny owls).
4 The barn owl can fly almost silently. This enables it to hear the slightest sounds made by its rodent prey hidden in deep vegetation while it’s flying up to three metres overhead.
5 The barn owl’s heart-shaped face collects sound in the same way as human ears. Its hearing is the most sensitive of any creature tested.
6 Barn owls are non-territorial. Adults live in overlapping home ranges, each one covering approximately 5,000 hectares. That’s a staggering 12,500 acres or 7,100 football pitches!
7 It’s not uncommon for barn owl chicks in the nest to feed each other. This behaviour is incredibly rare in birds.
8 In order to live and breed, a pair of barn owls needs to eat around 5,000 prey items a year. These are mainly field voles, wood mice, and common shrews.
9 Though barn owls are capable of producing three broods of five to seven young each year, most breed only once and produce, on average, only two and a half young. 29 per cent of nests produce no young at all.
10 91 per cent of barn owls post-mortemed were found to contain rat poison. Some owls die as a direct result of consuming rodenticides, but most contain sub-lethal doses. The effects of this remain unknown.
11 In a typical year, around 3,000 juvenile barn owls are killed on Britain’s motorways, dual carriageways and other trunk roads. That’s about a third of all the young that fledge.
12 Everyone can help barn owls. Leave a patch of rough grassland to grow wild thus creating habitat for voles, erect a super-safe deep nest box, volunteer for your local barn owl group, switch to non-toxic rodent control