Trip Reports

My wife and I enjoy visiting the US National Parks. She enjoys photographing the outdoors, and the parks are a great place for that. And for me there are always birds. And as anyone who’s watched the Ken Burns’ documentary knows, the parks are just fantastic places.

When looking at a map of the parks across the country, it’s hard to avoid noticing the area of the Colorado Plateau, the region encompassing southern Utah, northern Arizona, and western Colorado. It stands out because there are seven national parks there, relatively close to each other. Proceeding counter-clockwise from the south, as we would be visiting them, they are Grand Canyon in Arizona; Mesa Verde in southwest Colorado; and Arches, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef, Bryce Canyon, and Zion in Utah. Collectively, this route is known as the Grand Circle.

Every year I typically get about a week to go off on a solo birding trip. Earlier this year I was contemplating where to go and basically decided on either Colorado or southern Florida in April. I had never birded in either location; so many lifers awaited me in both places. So I asked another birder for his recommendation. He told me there was absolutely no choice – I had to go to Colorado!