Along the Blackbird Auto Tour
Posted April 20, 2006

Station #9

The tang of pine needles greeted me as I climbed out of the van and sauntered to the bench overlooking Pine Lake. The pure, earthy smell reminded me that the Tamarac National Wildlife Refuge is a unique place, far removed from the clamor and the four air that engulfs many metropoitan areas. "A special home for wildlife and other natural habitat," as the map-guide of the Bleackbird Auto Tour explains.

In front of me three trumpeter swans passed their time near the shoreline, among the reeds and cattails. So a rustling noice behind me twisted my need to witness a pair of whitetail deer bounding across the road. Minutes later a Forester Tern appeared patroling the lake. Abruptly the bird dove head first into the water. Again and again the tern repeated the maneuver until it came up with "its catch of the day."

Farther out, the sun-drenched lake sparkled as pelicans, swans and other waterfoul co-existed in peace by a rocky spit of land.

As I sat there pondering my surroundings I glanced at the brass name plate on the bench. It was a memorial to a Vietname veteran who found his "refuge" right here from a war that scarred his mind and body. A tranquil overlook that soothed his horrors of a confict that eventually clammed his life.