With rain putting our plans to film volcanoes on hold at Antigua, we head to Sibinal and the volcanic slopes of the Pacific coast. This is an incredibly beautiful area and our bird guide Daniel Schumann is very excited as there are some great species to be seen and filmed here. The first of those is found withing an hour of arriving and is the main bird I wanted to see on this trip, Pink-headed Warbler. Not the best photos as they never stop moving and (yes, it was raining!) but not bad for the bridge camera. I'm loving the Nikon P1000.
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| Pink-headed Warbler, Sibinal |
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| Pink-headed Warbler |
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| Sharpest photo but burnt out the pink head sadly. |
These awesome little birds are something to behold. They are active and almost constantly calling or singing as they flit around the tree tops. By choosing a position up-slope we managed to get great eye-level views.
When the sun shone, the scenery was hard to beat.
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View from the road towards Lake Atitlan
enroute to Sibinal |
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| Pink-headed Warbler and Horned Guan country! |
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Vega del volcan - 3200 m above sea level
I had early signs of altitude sickness here! |
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The son of our host out in the thunderstorm...not
sure the brolly's a good idea? |
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| Cameraman Mike Hutchinson filming the sunset |
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The sunrise from the same view point
The volcano Tajumulco on the right of the photo
is the tallest point in Central America |
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| There were Broad-tailed Hummingbirds on the bushes in front. |
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| Nigel enjoying the view |
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Early dawn with Tajumulco on the left looking down
towards Chiapas, Mexico |
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| Spotted Towhee |
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| Townsend's Warbler |
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| Yellow-eyed Junco |
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White-naped Brushfinch (formerly Yellow-throated...
not sure why they changed it?) |
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Black-headed Siskin
Much brighter than in the books! |
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| Stella's Jay |
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| Eastern Bluebird |
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| Rufous-collared Sparrow |
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| Rufous-collared Thrush |
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| Stunning birds - same size as a European Blackbird |
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| Summer Tanager |
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| Summer Tanager |
Unfortunately, after two days on site, I was worse-the-wear for altitude sickness and had to sit out the final push up the volcano to see the Horned Guan. I intend to go back and see it one day but Daniel has kindly allowed me to show one of his photos from a previous occasion to illustrate these bizarre, almost prehistoric looking birds.
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| Horned Guan, Daniel A. Schumann |
It was time to continue to Lake Atitlan, former home to the now extinct Atitlan Grebe. After spending a last night in Sibinal, we left early the next morning on the four-hour journey to meet with our boat to cross the lake.
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