Ecuador 2025 Part4
Sani Lodge continued
Orange-Bellied Euphonia
White-Necked Puffbird
Paradise Tanager
Squirrel Cuckoo
Purple Honeycreeper
Opal-Crowned Tanager
Almost directly below the tower were golden-headed and wire-tailed manakin leks. We had no trouble locating a wire-tailed manakin, but the golden-headed eluded us.
Wire-Tailed Manakin
As we paddled back to the lodge we flushed an anhinga and a capped heron. This was our only sighting of either of these species.
Capped Heron
After lunch I spent the afternoon looking for new species around the lodge. I was able to photograph coco heron, silver-beaked tanager, greater ani, pale-vented pigeon, magpie tanager, and violaceous jay.
Violaceous Jay
Cocci Heron
Greater Ani
Pale-Vented Pigeon
On our last evening we picked up very few species. We did photograph a yellow-tufted woodpecker, blue-throated piping guan, black-mantled tamarin, guilded barbet, and wattled jacana.
Guilded Barbet
Yellow-Tufted Woodpecker
After it was to dark to shoot, Carlos lead us deep into the jungle to search for the zigzag heron. We did not find them. Do to some miscommunication between our guides we ended up hiking cross-county in the dark back to where we had left the canoes. It was a long, miserable hike. At one point Carlos spooked a tapir which went crashing by. Few places are as dark as the Amazon jungle.
The next morning we had yet another very early departure to return by canoe to the Sani dock. From the dock we would travel by motorboat to Cocoa. The other groups all left with their guides in their canoes. We waited about 15 minutes in the dark for Carlos to appear. When he did not, I rousted the Sani Lodge Manager who was also unable to locate Carlos. He assigned two young men to get us to the river dock. They paddled hard all the way and we arrived before the motorboat departed. After a three hour return boat ride we arrived in Cocoa and were bused to the airport and caught the 30-minute flight back to Quito. We were delighted to see Luis again as he showed up to transport us to our airport hotel and again the next morning when he dropped us off at the Quito airport for our return flight. We traveled from Quito to Miami where we had a three hour layover, then to Atlanta where we barely caught our flight to San Francisco.
I returned home with about 15,000 photographs. I observed 321 bird species on the trip of which 244 were life birds. I was very pleased with these results as well as the quality of the photographs I was able to capture. I highly recommend Luis Panama. He was an excellent guide and travel companion.
All the photographs included in this blog as well as those in the Ecuador album on this website are my own. Nearly all were captured using a Canon R5 camera and a Canon 200-800mm lens. This combo proved quite versatile.
Consider travel to Ecuador. It is a diverse, beautiful country with friendly people and many, many colorful birds.
After so many early mornings and rugged conditions in the Amazon Becky objects when I call the trip a vacation. She insists it was an "experience" and hinted that my future trip planning privileges may be revoked.