Wednesday 30 November 2016

Peruvian Dream Part 2 - Paracas, Balestros Islands and Pisco

Wednesday 30th November


Part two of my birding fantasy >>>>>>

Let's dream again together ….............


Tambo Colorado Hostel, Pisco, Peru.

Back in 2014 I visited this hostel quite a few times. The best visit though was for my daughter, Rebecca's birthday . . . .




Flight over the Nasca lines with Happy Birthday sung by Japanese tourists.





A party back at the hostel afterwards.

So with Silvia Vilchez to organise our taxis and boats . . . . .

Paracas National Park


Surf cincloides (endemic)


Grey-headed gull



Peruvian pelican


Peruvian booby


Least sandpiper


Peruvian tern


Turkey vulture



Kelp gull


Royal tern

Pisco Beach


Wilson's phalarope


Striated heron


Snowy egret


Great egret


Cinnamon teal


Neotropic cormorant


Grey gull


Black-crowned night heron


Ballestos Islands


Red-legged cormorant


Humboldt penguin


Inca tern

I have heard today from a great friend, Jason Oliver. He phoned to say that he was going to accompany me when I return to Peru next year! Jason was a student of mine many years ago and became a superb birder. He is an original member of The Birding Clams; a Facebook group where the original members are from the bird club we had at Coppice High School in Wolverhampton, UK. Jason hasn't been to Peru before. It is going to be a superb start to my three month stay there.








What?! Another Day Off! I Thought you were THE Biking Birder!

Wednesday 30th November

So the end of another month, number 23 on the Biking Birder tour and the beginning of day 700! With 6.500 miles cycled this year so far I am going to enjoy another day off and explore York. I have only had one new bird for the year list this month; the white-billed diver off North Ronaldsay. There is another bird available about fifty miles away, pallid harrier near Spurn and that will be the direction I take tomorrow. York Minster and the Jorvik museum, I haven't been to them since the children were small.

Now there has been a lack of birds in my life recently. Winter thrushes occasionally whilst cycling and a few treecreepers from the window of the youth hostel dormitory yesterday isn't a large amount of birds but needs must. I need to get the distance covered.

When cycling one of my strategies to keep the negative voice at bay is to consider a route to bird when I return to Peru in April next year. >>>>>>

Let's dream together ….............

Lima, San Isidro Park and the pier at Miraflores


Long-tailed mockingbirds


Saffron finches


Vermilion flycatchers


Amazilian hummingbird


House wren



and the ubiquitous rufous-collared sparrow



Inca terns



Franklin's gulls


Blackish oystercatcher

A ride down to Los Pantanos de Villa


Black vulture


Great grebe


Multi-coloured rush tyrant


Peruvian meadowlark



Peruvian thick-knee


Burrowing owl


Pied-billed grebe


Black skimmer


Think I will dream of The Paracas and Ballestros Islands later!


Have a wonderful day, wherever you are – and please remember only 31 donating days until I finish! Thanks.





BB 2010 Oops, crash and a motorway Abominable Snowman in Hemel Hempstead January 5th

5 th January                                                            Tragedy                                              The Bee Gees   ...