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!
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