The Hooded Crane

Today I convinced Lauren to come on a little driving adventure. The plan was to head to the next town across, Kumage. In winter there is an area in Kumage where some hooded cranes come every year. This place is supposed to be well known and famous. The only problem for me is that I have never been there. I decided to head in the general direction and hope for good signage (not always available in Japan). Lucky for us the place was well signed. We wound our way up into the hills. More and more mountains and rice fields appeared. We finally found the right rice fields and parked the car. I strained my eyes and spotted a family of 3 cranes foraging for food amongst the rice roots. I had bought my good lens for my camera but they were still too far away. We discovered a small viewing building and there was a telescope inside. Looking through this, we could see how beautifully elegant these birds are. We were told that it was a small family including mother, father and a juvenile. A kind Japanese man hurriedly took us outside to point out a flock of some other tall bird and 4 more cranes - still far away. It was a moment I wasn't able to capture on film but I will remember it anyway.
The above photo is from the internet and if you want to know more about the cranes... try here...
http://www.ifna.com/hc.html