Walking along the boardwalk, we surprised a couple white tailed deer. One further on expressed no surprise at all but watched us without fear.
I noticed many warblers flying around, but the denseness of the canopy and underbrush hid them well. Two or three bird blinds gave views of several wading birds, but unlike the deer above they flew away quickly.
One more set of photographs from Times Beach Preserve in the next entry, this time the butterflies and insects.
More personal observations about Buffalo picking up from the last post:
The 1980s and 1990s saw some resurgence for the city. In the 2000s, I heard many comments from locals of all education levels that civil service remained the way to go for any kind of career and pension in the area. The locally owned small and medium sized businesses of my youth and very early career either no longer existed or merged into larger multi-nationals and reduced the number of local employees. The very large employers making steel and automobiles either closed or reduced and consolidated.
Over these years we visited with our tourist hats on, took family around to places we discovered (many new to them), sometimes in disrepair and difficult to find, and complained that the area did not capitalize on its assets. Luckily others living in the area felt the same, and now tours of the older sections run regularly in the summer months, and the waterfront looks wonderful and attracts summer crowds. Buffalo made its name in innovation (think electricity and city of light), heavy industry (steel, auto, grain silos), and transportation (Erie Canal). Finally, though past their prime in terms of many of those businesses, these areas are being highlighted and explored for their history and contributions to the country at large.
We ate at a local bar/pub/small brewer (Gene McCarthy’s, check it out) in the old First Ward that served an old fashioned beef on weck with fries and gravy! Only a native of Buffalo who grew up going to the local nightclubs/pubs/beach bars to dance and have fun with friends, and then retreated to a local diner about 3 a.m. for coffee and talk about the evening understands the perfect comfort food of fries and gravy to absorb some of the adult beverages imbibed!
Nichter Photography PLUS 