Coming into Los Angeles

Don’t touch my bags if you please Mr. Customs Man.

They took Chris’ new travel nail clipper and tweezers in Colombia.

A glass of wine and all is forgiven 

Birding tour

A person has to be a little crazy, a serious bird fanatic, deeply in love - or a little of each - to spend their Mother’s Day doing this.  After spending our first day at base at Tandayapa Bird Lodge soaking up the hummingbirds and the dampness, the following day, Sunday, Mother’s Day, we arose before 5 am to set off for a full day touring with our guide Nelson and driver Nester. Chris can be grumpy and not too smiley at that hour especially after sleeping in a soggy bed - have we mentioned there is just NO escape from the dampness here?! But as these photos show - it’s all worth it and turned out to be a great day with many new species! The first stop at 6 am was to a blind overlooking the lek of the unusual looking cock on the rock bird.  We also hiked out from the blind with a gentleman who rents the land and has a few special birds that are usually very shy but he tosses out live worms and coos to them and remarkably they appear. We will add photos later of that little side expedition to the quail with chicks. After that we drove short distances between different private locations that allow the guides to bring birders to their property. There were some nightjars and parrots at one stop and then things picked up colorwise.  The red headed barbet was a must find on this trip and we were successful.  The flame faced tanager was a beauty to add to our already good list of tanagers from Panama.  The mountain toucan was at a lovely stop designed for birdwatching and photography which was extremely well done and a pleasant surprise- oddly although pouring rain it didn’t feel damp or dark there and we were still in the cloud forest. That may have been the highlight for Chris. We had our lunch there as well in the beautiful hummingbird garden. There was also a stop for coffee and our second breakfast which was the best empanada we’ve had the whole trip - and the birds came to the trees around the elevated sitting spot. It was a great day overall!

Birding in the cloud forest and more

This place is unbelievable.  Ten hummingbird feeders and many different speciess. We thought the racket-tail would be rare but the most common is the booted racket-tail.   The violet-tailed sylph has an incredibly long tail.  The toucan barbet is very colorful.  Then there’s the tayra a member of the weasel family.

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Off to the cloud forest

We are leaving Galapagos with a few issues. The hotel tries to take care of everything such as bringing our luggage to the boat for us.  They took our three bags and one from another room and they sent one of our bags with the other guest.  We “convinced” them to stop the other car so we could get our bag.

We were greeted at the transfer point by sea lions which is always fun.  We took a ride in a car to a boat and met with another car that broke down as soon as we got in.  We had time to find a land iguana and now we are waiting to board our flight to Quito where we will be met with a driver to take us to Tandayapa.

Hanging Out in Puerto Ayora

Early this morning, we walked to Las Grietas, a short hike from the hotel. In addition to the interesting geology, we got good looks at a Galapagos Flycatcher, and a fleeting glimpse of an adult male striated Heron.  After breakfast, we went to the Darwin Research center where they are breeding tortoises. We went into town for lunch and then hung out on the dock for a while and watched the birds, sea lions, and sea turtles.

Heron at the pool

We literally could not believe our eyes.  We have seen many great blue herons in many different states and different countries in all the usual posing, wading, stalking positions and behaviors.  Never ever have we seen one decide to take a nice swim in a pool and float around like a swan.  He really seemed relaxed and we spoke to our guide who said it is not the first time. Since it does not have the ability to fly straight out of the water quickly as a duck it must feel very safe to do this.  It used the ladder to get in but climbed out rather awkwardly clinging to the side with its large feet.  It regained its glorious composure and magnificent appearance in the drying off process.  

More birds at the pool

We spent a nice quiet day at the finch bay hotel pool today and our visitors included the white cheeked pintails, a pair of lava gulls and a mockingbird catching a snack of some creepy crawly (usually best when we don’t get good photos of that type or Chris threatens to pack up and leave.) The mockingbird flew right over our heads with its catch and fortunately did not drop it on our heads. A very good day of birding while lazing for us!  We saw the lava gulls on one of our prior excursions but they blended in with the gray lava rocks behind them and were far away. It was nice of them to drop by for a more relaxed viewing. There s a bedraggled looking cattle egret we have seen frequently as we walk along the raised boardwalk to the hotel. We think it was the same one that came to the pool today and it looks to have a broken wing - life can be harsh in the Galapagos and we are looking a little bedraggled ourselves. Fortunately no broken ankles or need for the medevac insurance so far.

A few days ago we were happy to see the striated heron.  Today, he came to the pool, and climbed  on one of the lunch tables and pooped. We ate inside.

South Plaza Island

This was our third tour out with the hotel yatch but with our private guide Maritza just for us. We were pretty relaxed by this point - mike only brought one camera.  Had to take the bus to the boat again, a 40 minute drive, but its a chance to rest a bit. Once aboard we opted not to do the first snorkel stop and just stayed on board relaxing with coffee. Anchor up again and off we went for about an hour. When we reached South Plaza Island, we let everyone else disembark first and then it was just us and Maritza with a great captain out in the panga mainly looking for red billed tropicbirds nesting. We found some and some more blue footed boobies along with many playful sea lions.  The color and clarity of the water around this island is beautiful and we hoped to jump in to cool off after we did our hike. This is a spot where no swimming is allowed, however, due to sharks. While we were in the panga, the group hiking the island was signaling to us that there was a shark in the water - they had a higher vantage point. We spent some time watching it and were surprised the sea lions did not sound an alarm and were frankly sort of toying with the shark coming so close to it.  After a while of that we did an abbreviated onshore hike to see the beautiful land iguanas and some finches. Back to the yatch and lunch - and this last day we were smart enough to have them load a bottle of wine for us! The sail back was about two hours because we went straight to port thereby skipping the bus ride. It was a little rougher than our other yatch rides but between the Dramamine and the wine, we were fine.

At this point, Chris is totally relaxed around crabs.

North Seymour Island

Mike really wanted to see a frigate nesting site and the courtship dance of the blue-footed boobies. Today on North Seymour Island we saw both, and a Land Iguana eating a cactus.