The week leading up to our trip to Florida was one with several phone conversations with my brother Bill and his wife Carol whom we planned on visiting for the first few days in Florida. He had just had a PRP (platelet rich plasma) injection in his arthritic knee, and we having a terrible reaction with swelling and lots of pain. He was going to be unable to pick us up in Orlando, so we arranged the day prior for a one-way car rental, but about 15 minutes prior to my 3:05 alarm was to go off to get ready for our Lyft to Seatac Bill contacted me to know that he now had a cough and tested + for Covid. An abrupt change in plans, as I changed the car rental to a 5-day rental with a drop off in Marathon Keyca where we planned our second stay of the trip.
We drove to Cocoa, Florida for a couple of days near Cape Canaveral, the Kennedy Space Center, some local birding and to watch the Space X launch this evening. The night went as planned, and this morning we got up and headed to Merritt Island NWR where 4 adult American Flamingos have been seen most days since being blown in by Hurricane Idalia. We got to the Haulout Canal location, and easily saw the flamingos about a mile away by a small island. Easy to see, but difficult to ID for sure (Roseate Spoonbills are also bright pink) but a friendly birder gave us a scope view to confirm the ID. ABA lifer for me, lifer for Marian, and a nice start to the day. We got even better views, and I taught two visiting birders how to digiscope, for them and then for me!
The rest of the day was exploring. The highlight was the Merritt Island–Black Point Wildlife Drive. A fabulous 6+ mile auto loop, with getting out of the car allowed, and great looks at most of the possible waders.
From there we went to Titusville for very nice Mexican for lunch, where I got online to learn that the planned launch at Kennedy was postponed until tommorrow (windy?) and we birded a bit and came back to our hotel for some rest and dinner.
Tomorrow maybe Epcot if we have the energy.
I different, but very nice start to the trip