JUNE 19TH 2014 - PYRENEES & PICOS DE EUROPA - 9 DAY TOUR - DAY 7

TRANSFER FROM PYRENEES TO PICOS WITH STOPS AT; FOZ DE BINIES – SENCILLO HILLS - EMBALSE DE EBRO – SAN VICENTE SALT MARSHES .

 

NO PHOTOGRAPHS TODAY I'M AFRAID

Transfer days are often tedious with few birds seen, however today wasn’t quite that bad, we saw over 50 species with 8 new editions to the trip list. We drove all day from 9am to 7pm making several stops with at least 3 prolonged birding stops.

 

 

From the Hecho Valley we drove to Anson and them down through the most scenic of gorges at Foz de Binges. We stopped to look for our target species the Blue Rock Thrush and after a short while searching the sheer cliff faces we found at least three, and although our views of these montane beauty was limited to ‘in-the-scope’ long distance ones we enjoyed the sighting. Other species seen there were Griffon Vultures, Crag Martin, House Martin and Black Redstart.

Once on the main road to Pamplona we made a short stop at a garage for refreshments before we put a few miles on clock, we passed through Pamplona and Logrono before turning towards Santander. We listed several raptors on this stretch of the journey; Marsh Harrier, Common Buzzard, both Black and Red Kites, Egyptian Vulture and Common Kestrel.

Our picnic lunch was eaten by the roadside in alpine woods at some altitude, we never listed a single bird during that time. From there we travelled for 30 minutes and stopped in the hills just above Sencillo where we saw a nice selection of species, including Stonechat, Whinchat, Northern Wheatear, Red-backed Shrike and lots of finches. Also Ravens and Egyptian Vultures showed particular well.

Next we stopped at the Embalse de Ebro and along the route we saw Montagu’s Harrier, Southern Grey Shrike and a good number of Common Buzzards. The reservoir was a little disappointing, we found Mallard, Gadwall, Great-crested Grebe, Black-headed and Yellow-legged Gulls and a Common Coot. The best sighting was of a Melodious Warbler. Which sang to us and a Common Kestrel was seen mobbing a Common Buzzard.

We then drove for an hour to the coast west of Santander to a holiday resort called Saint Vicente, there a large salt marsh held a few species but not many. It was warm but humid and the group were getting tired of travelling by now. 

Our first signting was an unusual one, a female Common Scoter  sat I. The water just under the bridge, it seemed perfectly healthy but it shouldn’t have been there really. We also found a fair number of Eurasian Curlew and a smaller number of Whimbrel, it was nice to see these species side by side for comparison. Also on a large sand bar we found a gull roost which held, Black-headed, Yellow-legged, Lesser & Greater Black-backed Gulls.

That just about summed up our sightings so we then drove the last leg of the journey into the Picos de Europa national park. It about an hour and fifteen minutes to negotiate the winding roads and narrow gorges but the scenery was spectacular. We arrived at our hotel at 7:15pm, tired and hungry, dinner at 8pm was most welcomed and SO was the wine that went with it.