Quilting Among the Wild

Taking life slowly pays off. Adolfo and I just returned from a hike to a small spring. The spring was beautiful and surprising in this desert. Still, we were both burning from the hot sun, and were glad to get back to the trailer for some rest. After cooling off a while, I went outside to do some quilting on the picnic table. While I quilted quietly, I listened to all the activity around me. Adolfo and I seemed to be the only humans in the campground, but there were plenty of other creatures.

The birds sang to me in many languages. A woodpecker played the drums. Off to the side of me I heard a lot of rustling in the bushes. I assumed it was javelinas since I’d seen several in the campground yesterday. But when I looked to my left a large coyote was just 30 feet away. It was regal with a long bushy tail. I watched it for a while as it made its way to the open campsite beside us. It scoped out the site a bit, and then it slowly crossed the road and went off behind the restrooms. I went back to quilting. In less than five minutes, the coyote came running out chasing another coyote. They fought, or played, a bit and then ran back off the side of the campground.

Getting back to my quilting, I was aware of a dove scampering around me on the ground. It was followed by a bright red cardinal. They both disappeared under the trailer.

I decided that Adolfo was missing out on this wonderful experience I was having, so I went into the trailer to Invite him out. While talking to him, I looked out the opposite window of the trailer. There I saw twelve javelinas grazing on the campground grass a few campsites down. Both of us grabbed our cameras and went down where the javelinas were. Other humans had found their way to the site as well. There were five humans with cameras and twelve wild pigs that didn’t mind our presence one bit. The only indication that they noticed us was that their fur spiked up when we made a loud noise. We watched them some time and returned to our campsite. Within a half hour, the javelinas were down grazing at our site. We had fourteen of them. They came very close to me and I thoroughly enjoyed watching them as they dined.