Jacobsbaai Arctic Tern

Ken Behrens and I spent an excellent afternoon today birding in Jacobsbaai, along the Atlantic coast about 100km north of Cape Town. We went to have a look at the fantastic tern roost at this spot. We were not disappointed; there were hundreds of Antarctic Terns, with a handful of Swift Terns, at least one Common Tern, and the Arctic Tern in the photos below. Antarctic Tern is the site's big draw--it breeds in Antarctica and only makes its way to South Africa for the winter. We also added an out-of-place Damara Tern along the coast while we were seawatching. Click on the images to see them bigger.

Here the Arctic Tern is on the right of the large rock, dwarfed by the adult Antarctic Tern next to it.

Here's a flight shot by Ken.

A day in Frankfurt

One of the nice things about traveling such long distances is that I occasionally get long enough layovers that I can spend a day in a random location. In the last year I have had a day in Amsterdam, a morning in Singapore, three days in Ethiopia, a few hours in London, and, yesterday, a day in Frankfurt, all on layovers. I did a small bit of research on the internet before leaving for Frankfurt to figure out how to get to the city center from the airport.

I arrived with 15 Euros burning a hole in my pocket and departed with not a (Euro) cent to my name. It lasted me for train rides to and from the city, a bottle of water, a big soft pretzel and a big soft delicious bratwurst. I even got some birding in at the end of my stay in a lovely bit of forest adjacent to the stadium train station, the first stop from the airport. I saw two lifers--Blackcap and Pied Flycatcher, as a I slowly continue to rack up common European birds. I also particularly enjoyed watching a Winter Wren sing it's heart out from atop a dead snag.

This forest is very close to the airport and held plenty of birds, even in the midday heat when I was there. I saw things like European Robin, Great Spotted Woodpecker, European Nuthatch and Eurasian Jay.

This is a square in downtown Frankfurt. I conveniently lined up the photo so that the skyscaper behind in entirely blocked by the building you see.

Have just come from my hometown of Chicago, I couldn't resist this photo.

Blogging Bhutan

I was lucky enough to spend nearly three weeks of April in the kingdom of Bhutan, a tiny, rugged country nestled between Tibet, China and Assam, India in the eastern Himalayas. It is sparsely populated, heavily forested, peaceful and religious, and has wonderful birding. I was there for a recce--checking out the place so that we can run tours there in the future. April is a great time to go, since spring migrants are passing through on their way north and breeding birds are arriving in high mountains, plus the huge flowering rhododendron trees are at their spectacular peak. Admittedly, I say this about every place I go, but I am dying to get back to Bhutan.

I actually missed the first two days of the tour because of difficulties obtaining a visa to get me through India (there are few ways to get into Bhutan, the easiest for me coming from South Africa is to fly from Delhi). I was told they thought I might be a journalist trying to sneak into Tibet via India, and it took a visit to the vice consul of the Indian consulate in Johannesburg to sort it out. I was incredibly lucky to be able to change all of my flights (Cape Town to Joburg, Joburg to Mumbai, Mumbai to Delhi, Delhi to Paro, Bhutan via Kathmandu), so once I got the visa sorted I was able to be on my way.

Here are a few photos from the trip, taken by my boss Christian Boix.

This is the group birding along the road to Shemgang, in the central part of the country. That's me on the far left.

The man is selling fiddleheads, new growth of fiddlehead ferns that he has picked in the forest. It's a common food in Bhutan that we regularly ate and is pretty tasty.

All the major towns in Bhutan have a dzong, which usually is translated as fortress-monastery. The are built in strategic places to protect the towns, but now they serve as both monasteries and administrative centers. They are built without building plans (except in the architect's head) and, traditionally, entirely without nails (though they use nails in renovations we noticed).

It snowed on us a couple times at high elevations. This is at Chele La (Pass), near the capital of Thimphu. Unfortunately this was one of the days I missed.