Thursday, May 13, 2010

Portugal/Spain

After all the ash problems over Portuguese airspace in recent days we departed Birmingham arriving in Faro on time and thankfully without delay, in fact the whole journey was pretty painless. Having picked up our hire car at the airport we took the 90-minute drive over the border and into Spain, arriving at the Riu Atlantico Hotel on the Costa Del La Luz at around midday local time.

The drive across gave us plenty of opportunity to begin our birding list and the first of note was a White Stork sitting proudly on her nest shortly after leaving the outskirts of Faro. A few hours nap at the hotel and out and about locally to get a feel for the surrounding areas and pick up some snacks for the hotel fridge.

Around the hotel grounds were Serin, Barn Swallow, with the odd Red Rumped, Swift, including a number of Pallid and House Martin. Lots of lagoons to stop and look through with plenty of Black Winged Stilt on numerous nests, along with Ringed Plover, Kentish Plover, Redshank, and Dunlin. Egrets too with Little and Cattle, plus a Marsh Harrier hunting close by. Plenty of Crested Lark, a few Little Tern fishing and 3 White Stork before returning to the hotel for dinner after our first brief sortie.

An excellent start to our week in Spain and as I write my first post thinking of a nice bath followed by dinner the thunder is beginning to rumble in the distance. Tomorrow we plan our first whole day with a trip to Donana National Park.