2/21/26 San Pancho

On the way into town last night we stopped partway down the hill to take pictures of a beautiful painted on a wall.  We decided to eat at Miralo as we had heard good things.  We actually go there a few minutes before opening time and chatted with a man who turned out to be the father of the owner.  He is from British Columbia and spends half the year there and the other half in San Pancho.  We had a lovely meal.  We ordered guacamole, salad, and roasted brussel sprouts with lemon/honey viniagrette dressing.  The sprouts were out of this world,  Everyone ordered fish (mahi mahi) and chips for the main coarse.  They were very good, but even though Cathie and I shared a plate, we had plenty of leftovers to bring home.  We then went to the plaza to check out the music festival which is running all weekend,  We stayed for a short time and then headed back to the house to play a game of cards.  This time the girls won!!

We had a quiet morning at the house, but the birds were a bit more active this morning.  The golden cheeked woodpecker graced us with his presence again.  We also saw a white winged dove and the great kiskadee.  And . . . the black throated magpie jay was finally spotted while in a static position.  Usually they fly past so quickly you can't get a picture.  This guy was quite far away, but sat posing for quite some time.  His tail is over half of its total length!  Russ went for a run in the neighborhood and saw a pale billed woodpecker which looks similar to the pileated woodpecker.  Dave and I went back with him to check it out, but no luck.  We ended up near the polo grounds and saw a young lady on a beautiful horse and then were lucky enough to catch the horses being put through their paces on the field.  We also stopped at a pond and spotted coots, blue winged teals, common egret, snowy egret, green egret, cinnamon teal, northern jacana, anhinga, and the neo tropic cormorant.

At 11, we all jumped in the golf cart and went to visit the observatory that is located at Luis's father's house.  The back yard is full of bird baths and a variety of species show up to drink or take a bath each day.  We saw the Inca dove, Nashville warbler, male and female painted buntings, a female summer tanager, golden cheeked woodpeckers, yellow breasted chat, blue-gray gnat catcher, and an iguana.  We came back for lunch and noticed that a cat that has been showing up each day was lounging on a chaise by the pool.  After lunch we went down to join him, but he didn't stick around too long.  We are now back in the house and reading for a bit until it is time for dinner.