July 5, 2006: Denver (10 PHOTOS, 2 BIRD)

Today is "Denver" Day, a trip into the city to see some major attractions there ....

The Wildlife Experience, in suburban Parker. There was a lot of great bird art here, including winners of the yearly Children's Duck Stamp Art contest, and some great JJ Audubon's.

Crane statue at the Wildlife Experience (Melissa's phoeo)

Denver Zoo: Nice zoo, definitely worth visiting. They have a Birds of Prey show, though unfortuately two of the handlers were sick today, so we didn't get to see all the raptors, but it still still nice. We spent quite a bit of the time in the waterfowl area, where Melissa did some sketching.

White-Faced Whistling Ducks at the Denver Zoo waterfowl ponds.

One of the Waterfowl pond's Canvasbacks.

Egyptian Vulture

Bar-Headed Goose

I guess we're not that interesting.

Denver Museum of Nature and Science: This is in the same park as the Denver Zoo, just a short walk. They had that living body exhibit visiting, which made for quite some crowds. Neither of us had an interest in that, so we spent most of the time in the animal section - some nice bird mounts, including Ivory Billed Woodpecker and Passenger Pigeon. They also had a nice gem and mineral exhibit on the first floor.

Mounts of the nearly extinct Ivory Billed Woodpecker, at the Museum.

Dinner was delicious, at Caldonia's BBQ, in Aurora.

On a suggestion from the hotel, we drove back to Estes Park via. I-25 and CO-66, instead of through Boulder. It did seem to go faster, though it was sad to see all of the prairie being developed along that route.

Another development on the prairie.

BIRDING: Not much birding today, though we did see YELLOW-HEADED BLACKBIRDS near I-25 and CO-66, and at the zoo we enjoyed some DOUBLE-CRESTED CORMORANTS, and RED-SHAFTED FLICKERS.

Double Crested Cormorants were 'wild' guests at the Denver Zoo

Northern Flicker (Red-Shafted) feeding young on the zoo grounds