• Welcome to BirdForum, the internet's largest birding community with thousands of members from all over the world. The forums are dedicated to wild birds, birding, binoculars and equipment and all that goes with it.

    Please register for an account to take part in the discussions in the forum, post your pictures in the gallery and more.
Where premium quality meets exceptional value. ZEISS Conquest HDX.

Whooping Crane Tours in Texas (1 Viewer)

JeffMoh

Well-known member
My wife and I went to Fulton/Rockport last weekend to take a Whooping Crane tour. We reserved places for early Saturday morning on Captain Tommy's "Skimmer," so we drove down from Houston the night - 4 hours of driving in the rain.

We were at the wharf and excited at 7:10 Saturday morning but the crew didn't show. They had canceled the trip on Friday afternoon because there weren't ten reservations. They say they called us Friday afternoon, by which time we were already in Fulton anyway.

So we were out two tanks of gas, 8 hours of driving (roundtrip) and $140 for the hotel.

Luckily, we'd stopped off at Aransas NWR on the way down and had seen several Whooping Cranes there.

We made the best of a bad thing by stopping off at San Bernard NWR on the way home. It never stopped raining but we enjoyed good views of a Bald Eagle and an American Bittern among many other birds.

We'll try for a boat trip again before the end of March, but this time we're going to book the Wharf Cat. It seems that they run a regular schedule and, unlike the Skimmer, they don't cancel if they don't get a boatful of people.

Jeff
 
What a shame! I'm been on the Skimmer a couple times (most recently to see the Flamingo on Poverty Reef 2 or 3 years ago) a had great trips. Both trips were very full. The economy most be really hurting them. You would think that in spring break season they would be doing better.
 
That's a pain - although you saved a few bucks and still caught the cranes at Aransas, so maybe you're ahead, in a way?

Did they call on a cell phone? Or a home number?
 
Warning! This thread is more than 16 years ago old.
It's likely that no further discussion is required, in which case we recommend starting a new thread. If however you feel your response is required you can still do so.

Users who are viewing this thread

Back
Top