Day 1: Our trip begins at 6 p.m. in Ashland. After an introductory meeting and group dinner, we’ll see our first play, Shakespeare’s Henry V. Night in Ashland.      

Days 2-3: Our first birding will likely be near Ashland in a valley surrounded by forested hills. The oak and madrone woodlands are home to the common Western Scrub-Jay along with the more local California and Spotted Towhees, Oak Titmouse, White-breasted Nuthatch, and Acorn Woodpecker. Bushtit, Lesser Goldfinch, and Black-capped Chickadee are common garden birds in town, and even American Dipper can be found in the city park. Wandering farther from town, the back roads through mixed conifer forests are good for Mountain Quail, Sooty Grouse, and Northern Pygmy-Owl, three of the harder to locate western specialties. We’ll be back each day by early afternoon for the 1:30 pm theater performances, which this year will include an intriguing musical medley of Medea, Macbeth, and Cinderella on one day and Romeo and Juliet on the other. Nights in Ashland.

Day 4: We’ll take advantage of the one night free of performances to travel a bit farther abroad into the Klamath Basin, famous for its teeming national wildlife refuges. En route are diverse coniferous forests where we should see Dusky Flycatcher, White-headed Woodpecker, Cassin’s Vireo, Pygmy Nuthatch, Mountain Chickadee, and Mountain Bluebird. We’ll drive around the enormous Upper Klamath Lake in search of Ruddy Duck, Western and Clark’s Grebes, and American White Pelican. Staying overnight far from civilization among pine forests and sedge meadows, we’ll enjoy a home-grilled dinner on the patio, cooked by your leader. Afterward we may be lucky enough to hear Yellow Rail in its only known breeding location in western North America. Night in Fort Klamath.

Day 5: We’ll visit magnificent Crater Lake National Park, checking the coniferous forests on the way up the mountain for Williamson’s Sapsucker and Cassin’s Finch. Birding above treeline at the lodge and the rim overlooking the crystal blue lake (the deepest in North America) could produce Clark’s Nutcracker, Gray Jay, and Gray-crowned Rosy-Finch. It will be a memorable day in one of the most scenic national parks in the country. In the afternoon we’ll return to Ashland and the festival and attend the evening performance of the Shakespeare comedy As You Like It. Night in Ashland.

Day 6: During the last day we’ll repeat our pattern of birding in the morning and theater in the early afternoon, this year a commissioned piece titled All the Way, premiering at OSF. Options for today’s birding might include Mt. Ashland, where wildflowers attract several kinds of butterflies; searching for Great Gray Owl, which breeds in all the surrounding mountains; or working our way up the Rogue Valley to look for Wrentit, Yellow-breasted Chat, Blue-gray Gnatcatcher, Red-breasted Sapsucker, and Red-shouldered Hawk. If we have the energy, we can even spend a few post-theater minutes looking for Western Screech-Owl in the park behind the theaters. Night in Ashland.

Day 7: The tour ends this morning in Ashland.