Had my normal breakfast. It was a bit windy this morning. :( We left at 8:30 in the Jeep.

We stopped at McDonald's so J could go in and get a take-away Breakfast Burrito and some coupons to access any McDonald's Wi-Fi. The service was slow, and they didn't have any coupons.

We went to the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum at 8:53 and J stopped to photograph a saguaro cactus on our way in. We went in the museum and photographed the male American kestrel that a docent was holding in the shade. I just couldn't resist photographing the little guy even though I'd prefer to have him in the sun. We went to the mountain area and J stopped to wait for the new cinnamon-phase black bear to come out, and I kept going. I went to the river otter enclosure, and the otter was lying to the side of her pond sleeping and sucking on her tail (left)! I had never seen such behavior before, and it was fascinating! After a while, she got up, stretched, then curled up going the other way and started to suck on her tail again! After a cactus wren that was making a racket chirping entered her enclosure, the otter woke up and started her regular swimming circuit.
I met up with J on the way to the morning Raptor Free Flight Program. (You may read more about the Raptor Free Flight Program on my blog entry for November 23, 2009.) Because of the wind, they flew the two Chihuahuan ravens, a great horned owl, a prairie falcon, and a juvenile female Harris's hawk. There was only about half the number of spectators as usual watching the program, so I was able to shoot in both directions from the path. I was quite pleased by the backlit images of the great horned owl like the one to the left. We left the museum after the free flight program at 11:20.

I had a Clif Bar on the way back to the RV as a first course of lunch.

We returned to the RV at 11:41, and I dropped off J who wanted to stay in the RV for the afternoon. I picked up two Clif Bars and left in the Jeep at 11:43 by myself.

I ate the two Clif Bars on the drive back to the museum.
I returned to the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum at 12:02 and took my zoo macro setup in with me. (You may read more about my zoo macro setup on my blog entry for November 24, 2009.) I photographed the Mexican boa, hypomelanistic kingsnake, and Arizona mountain kingsnake for the first time this trip. My favorite image was of the hypomelanistic diamond-backed rattlesnake (left) that had its head nicely aligned with the glass.

I went back to the Jeep and swapped camera gear for the 500 to get ready for the afternoon Raptor Free Flight Program. On my way back to the museum, a woman waiting with her teen-aged daughter asked if I had been at the morning free flight program. I said I had been, and the woman said that I had settled a bet between them. The daughter asked if my name was such-and-such, and I was surprised that she knew my last name. I asked how she knew, and the woman said that her daughter knew my work — I have a follower!
I got to the free flight area in plenty of time, so I kept walking down the path and watched the javalina for a while. I went back for the Raptor Free Flight Program, and they flew the family of Harris's hawks, and there were even fewer spectators than in the morning. I think Thanksgiving is a perfect day to go to this museum! :) The wind made it very difficult to get flight shots because the birds were mostly flying much lower than usual which meant they were flying behind cacti and snags more than usual. :( One of the female hawks didn't stick with the program and vanished beyond the edge of the usual flight area, so the program ended on an odd note.

I checked out the new "Life on the Rocks" exhibit. It's an interesting outdoor exhibit, but it's not set up for photography. There are portals so one can view species that have underground burrows like a hog-nosed skunk, Harris' antelope squirrel, and several species of rattlesnake that weren't in the reptile building. There are also lowland leopard frogs in an above-ground stream and an elf owl in another above-ground enclosure.

I went to the walk-in aviary and photographed some different species than I had before: black-necked stilt, red-lored parrot, and Gambel's quail (left).

I photographed the desert bighorns for a while, then photographed a free-range female phainopepla and a female gila woodpecker on my way out of the museum. I left at 4:58.
I stopped at a Family Dollar on the way back to pick up some crackers. They had closed at 3:00. :( Then I went to the Fry's grocery store, and they had closed at 4:00. Then I stopped at the Food City (IGA) on the way back to the RV, and they closed at 5:00. I called J, and she said we could make do with the crackers we already had in the RV.

I returned to the RV at 5:35 and started to download the images I took. I sampled some of J's herbed cream cheese on saltines — not nearly as good as if I had been able to pick up some sesame crackers. J took the baked whole lemon-pepper chicken out of the oven, and I noticed that it had a nice cavity that could have been filled with stuffing. I was raised with stuffing made in the cavity of a turkey, and love the stuff. J, who was a microbiologist in her former life, won't touch stuffing made that way with a ten foot pole because of the chance that some bugs are growing in it. Maybe I don't mind because I've been exposed to potential bugs since I was a child and have built up an immunity to them. :)

We had "Thanksgiving Dinner" of the lemon-pepper chicken (white meat for me, dark meat for J), green bean casserole, and Idahoan four-cheese mashed potatoes. It was all very tasty.

After doing the dishes, I started to downselect images from today in iView. We called my mother to wish her a happy Thanksgiving, and we talked for a while. Then we had some of J's carrot cake for a late dessert. I finished downselecting the images from today in iView, then I had some Aalborg Jubilæums Akvavit while finishing the blog entry I started this morning. Then I did a first downselect of the images from today in Capture One (C1) before going to bed just after midnight.