We were up bright and early and down at the restaurant for breakfast at 7am. It was just getting light, a cloudless sky with very high humidity and a temperature around 25C rising later to 33C.
We walked to the nearest 'tube' station and travelled to the Botanic Gardens in about 30 minutes, we made one line change, it was very crowded at that time of the morning. Travelling by tube is very quick and efficient, the trains and stations are spotlessly clean, no graffiti, no-one eats or drinks or chews gum or smokes or speaks! It is very cheap way to travel, it cost us £1.20 each way.
The tube station is at the gate of the Botanic Gardens which are free to enter, the high humidity really hit us there, we had to move very slowly or get soaked in perspiration.
We headed for a lake and after 10 meters we stopped to watch a White-breasted Waterhen, a lifer, we found several more of these during the rest of the walk. At the lake we saw a Black Swan, it is not listed in my field guide so I assume it is an escapee. Then we saw a bunch of pigeons perched high up in trees above the lake, they turned out to be Pink-necked Green Pigeons, then we got onto a Sunbird lower down which was a Plain-throated Sunbird, that's three lifers in 10 minutes.
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| WHITE-BREASTED WATERHEN |
From the lake we headed to the information centre and along the way we clocked a Common Tailorbird and for the next 30 minutes we sat drinking cold drinks and sheltering from the rain.
The rain stopped and we made it to The Orchid Garden where we saw some absolutely fantastic orchids, amazing colour and a vast range of species, some of them were simply stunning. In and around the orchid garden we found Black-naped Oriole and an Arctic Warbler, the last rime I saw this species was back in the nineties on Portland, Dorset.
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| EURASIAN TREE SPARROW |
Around another lake we found Common and White-throated Kingfishers, also lots of iguanas, terrapins (they looked like red-eared sliders), lizards and squirrels.
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| IGUANA SP. |
It was now 1pm we had been walking around for four hours in very high humidity and soaring temperatures so we called it a day and caught the tube back into town.
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| SQUIRREL SP. |
After another lovely cheap lunch we got back to the hotel at 3pm, shattered! The TV Ariel had a single Blue-tailed Bee-eater and a Glossy Starling sitting on it.
I had a short rest before I ventured out again and walked to a small parkland, an area of trees that we could see from our room. It was disappointing, but on the way back I located and ID'd an Asian Koel from its call, my last lifer of the day.
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| TERRAPINS SP. - THEY LOOK REMARMABLY LIKE RED-EARED SLIDERS TO ME |
We ate at an Indian restaurant in very lovely surroundings, it rained again briefly before we got back to the hotel.
NOTE FROM YESTERDAY
SPECIES NUMBER 18. PIED FANTAIL ....................... I forgot to list this species yesterday.
19. WHITE-BREASTED WATERHEN
20. PINK-NECKED GREEN-PIGEON
21. ARCTIC WARBLER
22. BLACK SWAN
23. COMMON KINGFISHER
24. BLACK-NAPED ORIOLE
25. COMMON TAILORBIRD
26. PLAIN-THROATED SUNBIRD
27. JAPANESE SPARROWHAWK
28. BUZZARD SP.
29. ASIAN KOEL
30. LTTLE EGRET
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