wild life tour Feb 23

Hi everybody, today we went to the Cameron Prairie Nat. Wildlife refuge .It was only 1 stop on a circle tour that started in Lake Charles and did a loop around again to L. Charles, through Creole,Cameron,Holly Beach,Hackberrry and Sulfur.This nice big gator was sunning himself on the banks of the levee

we had to drive on for a bit.Three baby gators were just up the bank aways.We probably saw 25-30 gators today in the 2-3 ft range.There were also lots of egrets and blue herons,ibis,

and these common moorhens.
It was a very scenic drive with lots of noticeable damage from hurricane Rita just 3 short weeks after Katrina.
This is just one street down in Holly Beach that had damage.We believe maybe there used to be houses where now its vacant land,although there seems to be some new construction around the beach area.It was very foggy at the Gulf shore but disappeared as we headed northward.At times the Gulf was just 35 feet away from the main road Hwy 27.

Deserted natural gas plant with visible damage the closer you got to it (up on stilts like 90 % of the homes).
The mosquitoes are alive and thriving down here as its the perfect wet grasslands for them.The farther we travelled around the loop it it was much sunnier weather.We had to stop and do some shelling on the beach .Ron spotted tons of shark eyes(shells),this is our haul today.Emily ,Trent and Logan will sure like crafting with these babies.
Had a great time today --y'all take care Dee and Ron