For three years folks have been telling us that we need to take a ride with Tommy on the Skimmer to see Aransas Wildlife Refuge from the bay side. Today is the day. It is sunny and cool and the bay is glass as smooth (unless you get too close to the Intercoastal and one of the tugs with its row of barges).  The Skimmer is a shallow draft powerboat that has permission to ferry the curious near shore in the protected waters of the Refuge and Tommy is a long time birder with a great eye and a fun personality.  Here we go.

It is a gorgeous 30 minute ride, plus some bird-triggered stops, to reach Refuge waters. Black Jack Peninsula is dotted with whooping cranes; some barely identifiable even through a scope and some just a couple hundred feet away.  Family groups can be found; doting parents work their way through the marshland teaching their brown tinged colts where the best meals can be found.  Groups of several dozen young singles hang out just eating and chilling.  In a couple years they too will mature, find their mate, and help bring this beautiful species further out of danger.

We poke along in the shallows in search of every manner of heron, egret, grebe and duck. We race across the open water.  Dolphins come to greet us.

The weather could not have been better. Whooping Cranes cooperated pretty well.  Tommy did a wonderful job educating and entertaining us.  It made for a great afternoon.