It may sound surprising, but that’s exactly what happened, on more than one occasion, during a ten-day birding holiday to the Eastern Algarve [1-10 October] with my friends Malcolm, Carolyn, John, and Pete.
We were based in Arroteia, a few miles from Tavira, and stayed at the idyllic Quinta Cerro da Vela [The Lagoon Cottage]...
Early mornings were arguably the best part of the day. As we sat on the terrace birds were all around us and it wasn’t unusual for a bird new to me to fly past, or land on the salt marsh - Red-rumped Swallows one day, White Storks another.
During our stay we travelled from one end of the Algarve to the other; often near the coast but also inland - into the Alentejo and Cachopo regions. We paid a couple of visits to Cabranosa, a raptor watch point between Sagres and Cape St Vincent; and even nipped over the border into Spain, to Odiel Marshes. Needless to say, I saw many excellent birds (we managed 156 species in total for the trip), but before I go any further I must introduce the sixth member of our party...
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| Gordon Gecko |
Gordon and his family lived in the space between the roof and the bamboo ceiling of the cottage and one evening he decided to hang out with us while we went through our bird lists for the day.
Now for some birds...
Many of the sites we visited were wetlands - salt pans, marshes and lagoons. At Quinta do Lago we had good views of Little Bittern, Glossy Ibis, Purple Gallinule...
... and Squacco Heron (they're much smaller than I had imagined).
At Ludo Farm salt pans these two Black-winged Stilts were engaged in a courtship display and in fact mated just after this photo was taken.
Salgados lagoon was home to one of my favourite birds of the trip – Greater Flamingos. I found them fascinating – elegant yet at times ungainly; stately but also comical. Watching them was like watching an alternative production of Swan Lake, but in this performance the dancers really were large fluffy birds – and everything was pink.
It wasn’t all wetlands though. We spent one day with local guides Peter and June in the plains of the Alentejo region watching Great and Little Bustards, a field full of Stone Curlews, juvenile Spanish Imperial Eagle, and a group of Griffon Vultures giving a spectacular soaring display above the Hermitage at Monte Salto, after which they landed in a nearby field...
We even managed to squeeze in a ‘twitch’ during our stay. A couple of days before we’d flown in an Upland Sandpiper (a vagrant from North America) had been spotted near Tavira, and Peter and June took us to find it at the end of our day with them.
Other favourites of mine were...
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| Azure-winged Magpies |
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| Hoopoe |
Both were relatively common, but I've always wanted to see them - and wasn't disappointed.
A few ‘non-bird’ lifers were also seen... for mammals it was Short-beaked Common Dolphins, on a pelagic out of Sagres; Gordon was a reptile lifer for me; plus a couple of butterfly species - Swallowtails at Castro Marim and Cabranosa, and this stunning Monarch at Vilamoura...
We ended the holiday in style. On the final afternoon, back at Salgados, Carolyn spotted a Sacred Ibis on the far bank among some White Storks. There are feral populations of these birds in Spain and Italy so it may have been from one of those, or an escape. Whatever its provenance, we loved it. I wasn’t able to get a photo as it was distant and most of the time stayed hidden in long grass, but you knew it was there - this White Stork wasn’t at all keen on having a stranger on his patch.
So how to close this... well, instead of the usual sunset shot [lovely though they are], I’m going to end on the same note as I opened with - the magical early mornings.
Imagine...
You're sitting on the terrace watching the sun rise slowly over the distant sea, with calls of Grey Plover, Redshank and Curlew drifting over from the salt marsh. In the garden soft piping calls of Hoopoe distract you momentarily from the Sardinian Warblers and Waxbills flitting from shrub to shrub. Then all of a sudden your attention’s caught by a group of large birds flying sedately over the marsh – Flamingos. Wow... how’s that for a lifer before breakfast!
