Let’s go Pig Hunting

An adventure in the lowlands of Bolivia  

3rd – 22nd August, 2005

FernBlue and Yellow MacawHenry and KeithButterfly

Author: Keith Martin.  55 Belmont Road, Twickenham, Middlesex TW2 5DA, U.K.

                                        keith AT borsuk.clara.co.uk         keith.martin AT rhul.ac.uk

Words: © Keith Martin; Images: © Henry and Keith Martin


Introduction

When Tony Scott announced he was organising a trip to Bolivia, and my father was threatening to go with him, the urge to join them became irresistible. Domestic objections, a lack of numbers and ultimately a health scare for my father nearly put the trip in jeopardy, but somehow it was destined. And this is what happened next…

Part I: Introduction

Part II: Diary

Part III: Bird and Mammal List

Part IV: Photo Gallery

 

Part I: Introduction

 

Planning

On my part, logistically, almost none. Tony and Gerda put the trip together with a great deal of help from their daughter Heidi, who has spent a considerable time in Bolivia as part of her research career. The destinations picked themselves fairly easily, but Tony ands Gerda’s work was all in sorting out the logistics. They had a great deal of help from the local travel company Transturin, who provided us with transport and a local organiser for each of our destinations. They also had help from Aidan Maccormick, a PhD student from Glasgow University who was conducting ornithological PhD research based at Santa Cruz de la Sierra. He in turn fixed us up with Arturo Munoz, a local biologist from Cochabamba, who joined us for part of the trip. And so the whole thing fell together very nicely in the end. I did put quite some time into ornithological planning however because, horror of horrors, Bolivia had no national field guide in 2005. Good solid preparation time did pay dividends. More on that below.

 

Bolivia

The Bolivia of my preconceived imagination, jagged peaks, pan pipes and black bowler hats, forms a surprisingly small part of this extremely varied country. Bolivia has an astonishing range of landscapes and we spent the bulk of the trip in a very different Bolivia to that of the high Andes and altiplano that forms the bulk of south-western Bolivia. The south-east of Bolivia is an arid zone of dry chaco forests and chiquitania tropical scrubs and grasslands that extend into Argentina and Paraguay. We only touched the edge of this area and spent most of our time in the moist broadleaf yungas rainforest of the Andean foothills, the lowlands of Amazonia and the moxos savannah of northern Bolivia. This gave us just the slightest flavour of what this wonderful country has to offer and I hope I will be back to see some more one day.

 

People and Language

We were well looked after throughout our stay and almost everyone we met was accommodating and extremely friendly. Certainly Spanish would be an essential for the independent traveller, but we had one Spanish speaker with us and always had a local guide at hand, so our experience was somewhat pampered. On the few occasions that I was let loose on my own, my appalling Spanglish just about got me what I needed, but I am not sure it would have extended to a legal argument.

 

Conditions

In a nutshell, dry. August is definitely the dry season and several locations on the trip looked very much more pastel and dusty than I expect they are for most of the rest of the year. Santa Cruz looked in dire need of a downpour and the rivers were so low in the last week of the trip that our boat trips became somewhat hazardous affairs. Of course dry also means few road access problems and no days rained off, so you take the package as it comes. It would be wonderful to see many of these places smothered in the luxuriance of the wet season, but I’m sure that comes with plenty accompanying hazards. It was often hot, but never too hot. La Paz was cool, but not too cold. There’s a lot to be said for August in Bolivia

 

Irritations

I’m struggling to think of any really. Altitude sickness is probably the main one to look out for. We had a couple of rather rapid altitudinal ascents, but these manifested themselves for me in terms of tiredness, a low appetite and sleeping difficulties. In each case they only lasted one night. La Paz felt a fairly safe city to walk around. There were no irritating bugs, anywhere, as far as I can remember. Ah – well – amnesia has set in after all. There were some extremely nasty stinging caterpillars at Chalalan. I had one creep up my shorts, but it was noticed just in time to stave off disaster, but in the process I received a nasty sting on the hand which throbbed for an hour or so. Don’t touch them! I suppose the juggling of internal flight times could be an irritation if you weren’t careful about checking in. We spent a bit of time hanging around waiting for planes, so I can imagine that you might spend even longer hanging about waiting for buses and trains. But by and large I found Bolivia a very comfortable place to travel around.

 

Itinerary, Transport and Accommodation

The general plan was to move around fairly regularly but to spend at least three nights at the main locations of interest. The focus was on the Bolivian lowlands. A full trip out along the altiplano would have required at least one further week of travel. We took internal flights between Santa Cruz, Cochabamba, La Paz and Rurrenebaque. We hired a minibus at each of the main locations, Chalalan’s boat service to get us to Chalalan Lodge and the Caracoles jeeps to get us out to Caracoles Lodge.

 

3rd  - 5thAug      Santa Cruz de la Sierra (Hotel Urbari)

6thAug              Samaipata (Los Volcanes)

7th – 8thAug      Samaipata (Quainta Parai)

9th - 11thAug      Villa Tunari (Victoria Resort)

12thAug La Paz (La Plaza)

13th - 16thAug    Chalalan Lodge

17thAug Rurrenebaque (Hotel Safari)

18th - 19thAug    Caracoles Lodge

2oth – 21stAug   La Paz (La Plaza)

 

Hotel Urbari was a good base for Santa Cruz, with spacious motel-style rooms and a shady courtyard for breakfast, as well as having the benefit of pool and restaurant access at the adjacent sports club. Los Volcanes was probably our favourite overnight and we only regret having just the one night there. Its secluded location, breathtaking views, exceptional hospitality and delicious catering were outstanding. By contrast, Quanta Parai was a very rudimentary cabin park on the edge of Samaipata whose plumbing desperately needed fixing. The Victoria Resort Hotel was a rather soulless tourist complex with very average food, but was conveniently located and had plenty birds in the spacious grounds. We were upgraded to the five-star La Plaza in La Paz, although I think it would score less than five stars in many other countries. It was a perfectly good, if characterless, hotel, but the poor service that we obtained on the top floor restaurant left a nasty taste in the mouth on our departure. In stark contrast Chalalan was a model of hospitality and an outstanding tourist lodge, with terrific local food, friendly staff and knowledgeable guides. Hotel Safari in Rurre had a charming colonial feel and was a good place for a brief stopover, especially as it came with a free rhea. Caracoles Lodge was also extremely welcoming and what it lacked in infrastructure, it made up for in charm.

 

Relevant Reading

[1] Lista Anotada de las Aves de Bolivia, Quinta Edicion, A. Bennett Hennessey, S. K. Herzog and F. Sagot, Armonia, 2003.

[2] A Field Guide to the Birds of Peru, J.F. Clements and N. Shany, Lynx Edicions, 2001.

[3] The Birds of Ecuador: Vol II  Field Guide, R.S. Ridgely and P.J. Greenfield, Cornell University Press, 2001.

[4] Birds of Southern South America and Antarctica, M.R. de la Pena and M. Rumboll, Collins, 1998.

[5] Birds of Bolivia 2.0: Sounds and Photographs, S. Mayer, Bird Songs International, 2000.

[6] Neotropical Rainforest Mammals: A Field Guide, Second Edition, L.H. Emmons and F. Feer, University of Chicago Press, 1997.

[7] Bolivia, A.D. Nystrom and M. Konn, Fifth Edition, Lonely Planet, 2004.

[8] Culture Shock! Bolivia, M. Cramer, Kuperard, 1997.

 

The lack of a dedicated Bolivian Field Guide made carrying an excessive amount of literature a frustrating necessity. Most birds that we saw were in one (or more) of [2], [3] and [4], with [4] mainly of use at the start (Santa Cruz) and end (La Paz) of the trip (although its illustrations are fairly poor). For Amazonia [2] and [3] were fairly adequate. I extracted the plates from both [2] and [3] and carried them in the field. I left the text of [2] at home as it is rather rudimentary and does not feature call descriptions. I carried the excellent text of [3] in my luggage. However the text I most often consulted was [1], which became extremely well-thumbed by the end of the trip as its complex code contains a wealth of habitat and regional information that was vital on the ground. I found the simple numeric code that described likelihood of seeing and hearing each species very useful. The few “missing” species were all featured in the excellent CD-Rom [5], which I did not carry, but did research before we left. I also added annotations to [1] to indicate which field guides featured an illustration of each species, and even a few call descriptions from [5]. Birders willing to travel with [5] will be in a very good position to research calls as this collection is extremely comprehensive and the photos of many species would also prove useful.  As on previous trips to this part of the world I carried [6] as the default mammal guide to Amazonia. The only background reading I did on Bolivia was from [7] and [8]. Neither was particularly useful as our logistics on the ground were largely catered for in advance. However [8] was an entertaining read and helped prepare me for the cultural diversity of Bolivia.  Most useful in [7] was the excellent overview of recent Bolivian history and politics.

 

Guiding and Effort

The trip was a pleasing mixture of guided and self-guided. In Santa Cruz we benefited from Aidan Maccormick’s local knowledge. Los Volcanes had a good spotter as a guide, but he didn’t know all the birds of the area and did not speak English. We were on our own at Samaipata. For the Villa Tunari leg of the trip we enjoyed the company of Arturo Munoz who had a limited knowledge of the local birds (he was an expert on frogs and bats) and part of the group hired a good local bird guide one of the afternoons. The only place we had top bird guide help was Chalalan, where both Sandro and Alejandro knew their local patches very well, although even for them some calls remained a mystery. Sandro accompanied us to Caracoles, but he was largely out of his depth there and was us much a student as we were. At Lake Titicaca we were once again on our own. Thus the careful scrutiny of Sjoerd Mayer’s CDRom and the thumbing of the Lista Anotada before we left paid handsome dividends. The birding effort was generally fairly relaxed. Where we made particularly early starts in Chalalan and Caracoles, we always had a leisurely afternoon siesta.  Elsewhere we took things fairly comfortably, although a birding eye was always roving. There are simply too many birds in Bolivia to take too much time off!

 

Nomenclature and sequence

This report adopts the nomenclature and sequence of [1], as it is the only text that I have that is dedicated to the birds of Bolivia.

 

Acknowledgements

First and foremost to Tony, Gerda and Heidi Scott for their planning and arrangements. Thanks to my travelling companions Henry, George, Cheuk, Tom, Margaret, John, Peter and Mike for their good company over the three weeks. Our Transturin guides Iver, Caroline and Ivan made every effort to keep the trip running smoothly. We were particularly impressed that Iver came over to Villa Tunari to join us for a few days off-duty and Caroline, we are still sorry for abandoning you just to see some stupid birds! Amadio was our favourite driver, on the Santa Cruz leg. Thanks to Aidan and Arturo for providing natural history expertise in the first few weeks. A big thanks to Sandro and Alejandro from Chalalan for all those hours of creeping around the rainforest at ungodly hours of the morning and of course for all the pig hunting. Sergio the Chalalan barman , you make a mean chuflay (and indeed all the staff at Chalalan deserve a mention for creating a wonderful atmosphere there). Cheers also to Marcel, our host at Caracoles Lodge, for all the precision paddling and the warm hospitality. I’d also like to thank Bennett Hennessey and Sjoerd Mayer for helping out with some post-trip identifications, and Sjoerd for all his help beforehand when I navigated through the “which guide book to take” dilemma. Good Luck Armonia, Bolivia’s Bird Life International partner, with all your Bolivian projects and I hope all visiting birders will help support your activities. And thanks to Anita and Kyla, who never actually gave me permission to go, but who did allow me back in the house when I got home.

 

 

 

Part II: Diary

 

 

Wednesday 3rd August 2005

 

Santa Cruz de la Sierra is probably not a city that resembles anybody’s preconceptions of Bolivia. Seen from a circling aircraft, the city is surrounded by grassy plains that in August are burnt dry, with the only visible signs of green provided by scattered clumps of palms. On our arrival the air was pleasantly warm and humid, while a savage wind howled over the flats, buffeting the palm trees in front the airport terminal and tossing a pair of Turkey Vultures as they struggled in the turbulent heat to survey the plains for carrion.

 

We piled into our minivan and took the highway into town. The suburbs were not particularly attractive, with many dirty, dusty industrial complexes. These were occasionally brightened by the sight of schoolchildren in white t-shirts emerging from classrooms into the care of alarmingly heavily-armed “lollipop men”. We joined a dual carriageway at a major junction, where girls in large hats sold rolled sticks of sugar cane to the waiting motorists, and followed the concrete channel of what in season must be a river, but was currently filled with mats of algae, piles of human detritus and occasional puddles of brown water. On the narrow strip between the channel and the carriageway were some makeshift tents, providing one of the least attractive home locations imaginable. And then suddenly we veered right into a quiet suburban street, where four-wheel drives were parked beneath flowering trees and the red-tiled roofs of urban haciendas poked over towering defensive garden walls. Here we found Hotel Urbari, a small motel with private upper floor rooms that overlooked a parched grassy park. Short-tailed Swifts swept high overhead and some pale blue tanagers perched on a nearby telegraph wire, which looked like Blue-Gray, but we later learned were the closely related Sayaca Tanagers.

 

We gathered to seek taxis into town in the early afternoon. Santa Cruz is a low city and arrival in the central square, Plaza 24 de Septiembre, caught me unaware as there was little perception amidst the twisting and turning of the taxi that we had actually reached the middle of anywhere. Plaza 24 de SeptiembreThe square was elegantly tiled and refreshingly spacious, with a small forest of pink flowering trees (once the home of a famous group of sloths) providing shade to dozens of benches. The sandy brick cathedral, with its two tall rounded towers, dominated one end of the square. The plaza seemed empty at first glance, but closer scrutiny of the benches revealed dozens of sprawling bodies partaking in siesta. For a major city centre it was a serene location and oozed surprising tranquillity.

 

After passing an astonishing plethora of ice-cream parlours, we found a quiet café courtyard in which to eat some lunch and see out our own siesta. A procession of waiters poured from the back kitchen carrying a dazzling array of cakes destined for the street-side display cabinets, while we enjoyed jugs of blended iced fruit juice and a first Bolivian beer in an unusual rounded goblet. Time then to visit the bank, the Internet Café and ultimately the pool at Hotel Urbari, where Cheuk’s Olympic strokes were almost as awesome as the bats that fluttered overhead to the dying evening chatter of Tropical Kingbirds on the telegraph wires. We were served dinner at a large table by the pool by a wonderful smiling host who looked as he had stepped fresh from the set of a spaghetti western. He was clearly delighted to have the custom and the substantial buffet was first rate. We also rendezvoused with Aidan, an ornithologist from Glasgow University who had volunteered to show us around a couple of the local sites. He seemed genuinely shocked by Tony’s suggestion of a luxuriously leisurely 08.30 start, but accepted that some of the party of 12 might be a bit travel worn. Some nodding heads during his short slide presentation on Bolivia provided a degree of supporting evidence…

 

Thursday 4th August 2005

 

Of course the alternative school of thought concerning first mornings in a new time zone is that far from a lie in, it is an early start that is most appropriate. We awoke at 05.00. The air conditioning unit rumbled quietly in the adjacent room and a wild wind blew through the palms outside, bringing with it distant traffic noise. The wooden window panels cast a delicate grid of gentle shadows on the wall, waving through the rippling of the net curtain and the dancing shadows of the palm fronds. The wind blew hard until dawn broke at 06.30, when it left in its wake a cool and still morning. Shiny Cowbirds clinked from the tops a tall radio mast in front of our veranda and we searched for glimpses of a tiny House Wren who sang boldly from the centre of a leafy bush. Our insomnia at least provided an opportunity to stroll through the grassy park and catch first glimpses of some of the commoner Santa Cruz birdlife, including a rollicking pair of Thrush-like Wrens, Saffron Finches on the telegraph wires and a small flock of Yellow-chevroned Parakeets feeding high up in what looked like a jacaranda.

 

Our minibus finally departed at 08.45 and we followed one of the city ring roads around Santa Cruz, which was ablaze with Bolivian flags as the national day was just 48 hours away. Our destination, the Jardín Botánico Municipal Santa Cruz, didn’t feel anything like its name suggests. Firstly it was quite detached from the city, lying well on the outskirts. Birding in Santa Cruz Botanical GardensSecondly it was absolutely deserted. And thirdly, it was parched. The open area just inside the security gate was burnt dry, although some startling yellow and red flowering trees provided some amazing colour. Within one minute of stepping out of the bus we enjoyed a flyover from some White Woodpeckers and various species of parrot, and within two minutes we were admiring an eye-level view of a Three-toed Sloth clambering around in a bush behind a low dam. Where the gardens did not do much to impress botanically at this time of year, the large wild area of chaco forest behind the gardens made for a fascinating walk. The dry woodland would have passed for similar habitat on other continents, were it not for the occasional giant cactus, which thrust from the forest floor like a man-made sculpture. The chaco birdlife was unsurprisingly low key given our late arrival, but we picked up around 30 species in the gardens overall, with close views of a White-backed Fire-eye hopping around a dry creek bed probably being the highlight. This was a location that clearly merited further visits but, through the inevitable compromises of a first-time visit to a new country, we were not to have the time.

 

We lunched at an artificially rustic restaurant off one of the main highways into town. The waiters wore enormous white hats but the fare was excellent, with a variety of regional dishes including rice with cottage cheese and beans and some fiery chilli pastes. Our local guide Iver briefed us on some local culture while I made a first (and only partially successful) attempt to comprehend the obscurities of Heidi’s research project in Bolivia.

 

The afternoon excursion to the Santa Cruz zoo brought with it a flood of confusingly mixed feelings concerning both desire and appropriateness of such a visit. The best and worst of these all duly unfolded with few surprises. Classy Macaw Phone comes in handy for phoming homeBeyond the zoo gates, which were flanked by a pair of plastic phone booths in the forms of a Scarlet Macaw and a Great Egret, lay a maze of cramped cages and enclosures that belonged very much to the “old school” of zoo management. Parrots were packed onto perches, a pair of American Kestrels sat forlornly in a cage barely worthy of a canary and a jaguar rolled with boredom on a concrete slab. Andean Condor in Santa Cruz zooA genuine attempt had been made to provide the Andean Condors with a towering enclosure in which to spread their wings, but the thrill of seeing this bird so close was dampened by the obvious fact that such a relatively luxurious cage was still no fit space for such a majestic beast. A huge free-flying aviary offered more promise and interest, but even here the Red-legged Seriemas that aggressively pecked at the shoes of visitors sported twisted feet from their endless pacing of the concrete walkway. Perhaps saddest of all was the nocturnal house, where a pair of poor Burrowing Owls were kept captive in an endless darkness that denied them their natural preference for the light of day, and a pair of little chickens were made to parade back and forth beneath the perch of a genuinely nocturnal owl who watched them intently, knowing that captivity offered him the luxury of picking his moment to put the tiny birds out of their misery. The farthest reaches of the zoo did hold more genuine interest as the watering areas attracted small flocks of Saffron Finches, Shiny Cowbirds and Red-crested Cardinals. Intriguingly we also had good views of two species of hummingbird, Gilded Hummingbird and Blue-tufted Starthroat, which we did not see again during the trip.

 

We recuperated by the Urbari poolside in the evening company of our friendly chef with some chilled beer, tender pork and a crisp watercress salad. For the first (and almost the last) time on the trip, Tony attempted an evening bird list, but such is the extent of the Bolivian checklist that this process simply took far more time than anyone really had the energy for. Exhausted, I retired to bed to spend a restless night, sporadically broken by the not unpleasant sound of a distant solo trumpeter who played into the night, and indeed the dawn, while the beat of the party that he accompanied was brought intermittently by the breeze to my open window.

 

Friday 5th August 2005

 

We were up at cockerel crow for an early start to get to Lomas de Arena, a local nature reserve on the outskirts of Santa Cruz. The open country of fields beyond the city limits did little to flatter, as every fence and thorny bush fluttered with abandoned plastic bags. Our minibus rattled over the ruts of some very rough tracks, tacking past a number of rundown homesteads, until we reached the guarded gateway to Lomas de Arena. Lomas de ArenaWinding down the windows of the van we could already hear the reedy piping of White-bellied Nothuras, invisible in the dense low scrub of the park. The one road traversing the park was slightly raised and offered reasonable views down over the tangled plain of dry grassland and impenetrable thorny scrub. Telescopes were essential to make sense of distant birds such as Chalk-browed Mockingbirds and Wedge-tailed Grassfinches, which were propped up on protruding perches. We hiked along a section of this road and I felt the first real thrill of wilderness amidst this arid landscape of bewitching calls and foreign flora. This was dampened by Aidan’s news that the low valley that we were overlooking had just been sectioned for housing. The sprawl of Santa Cruz was slowly seeping beyond its current city limits.

 

Further along this road we reached a shallow river crossing, to the right of which a small sandy track mounted a grass-clad dune and headed into the bush. This had the makings of a grand adventure but, as we ascended, the wind really whipped up and roared across the flats, making it as hard to wear a hat as find a bird. Three distant Savannah Hawks took flight and expertly surfed in the turbulent air before dropping down over the brow of the hill. As the wind had clearly set in for the day, we had little choice but to turn back. Colourful Campo Flickers perched on the fence posts around the bus and Henry spotted the first of many Burrowing Owls that were to ultimately prove the most abundant species of the day.

 

The minibus ploughed further along the degenerating roadway until the sand became too deep and we were recommended to continue our walk into the heart of Lomas de Arenas by foot. The populist value of this park to the local community rose ahead of us in the form of a bank of monstrous dunes, which rose, surprisingly sahara-like, a tantalisingly short distance in front of us. These were apparently highly regarded as venues for off-road riding. While the gale blew benignly at our backs on the outward journey, it was the thick sand of the track that made the going tough and gradually the party dwindled to the foolish few who finally made it to the base of the dunes. We ascended some grassy mounds to the left, flushing Burrowing Owls in all directions, and gained a view over a large, but shrinking, lagoon on which distant Brazilian Ducks and Pectoral Sandpipers could be seen through the shaking telescope and some flamboyantly plumaged Whistling Herons stalked the grassland. Mike and John, already established as the party’s action men, climbed a massive dune to the south and were already distant black specks atop a giant wall of sand. Later examination of the results from John’s digital camera revealed that a bit more care from the summit would have enhanced their bird list for the day! The walk back was a torrid and strenuous affair, directly into the inferno of roaring air and sand. We passed a magnificent gaucho on a horse who was patrolling his fence-line, armed with a vicious looking blade on the end of a long wooden pole. I didn’t dare to contemplate what he might be thinking as he glanced down at us from his lofty saddle.

 

After a packed lunch sitting in the newly renovated headquarters of Armonia, the Birdlife International partner in Bolivia, some of the party headed back into town while a few of us were dropped off at the unlikely birding location of Kim’s Golf Course, a short drive from Lomas de Arena. Kim's Golf Course - a surprisingly good birding spotThere were no golfers at Kim’s, which apparently only gets busy at the weekends when some of the local Asian community take to the fairways. Indeed this must be a course worthy of a skilful sportsperson as hazards not only included conventional ones such as deep gullies containing rush-lined creeks and thick rough, but golfers also needed to overcome roaming cattle, the holes of Burrowing Owls (and the birds) on the fairways and would need to develop a rule for balls that collided with crossing Red-winged Tinamous. Indeed we had a surprisingly good time during the couple of hours we spent strolling around this eccentric landscape, including a good half hour pursuing various species of seedeater in a dry swamp. Our walk ended at a quiet lagoon where the only major sighting was a cavorting couple enjoying some quality time in the shallows beneath the watching eye of a Snail Kite. Back at the entrance we fended off the excitable dogs and waited by the edge of a very productive lagoon, whose waters were being visited by a host of bird species in the late of afternoon, including three Limpkins, a Spectacled Black Tyrant and a tiny Austral Negrito, which was running about like a clockwork toy on a muddy spit.

 

We drove home alongside a giant red sun, which was hanging weakly in a pastel sky. Its strength was so sapped that it could be comfortably studied through binoculars and three sunspots were clearly visible. As it was our last night, our patron had prepared a special fish dish and had arranged his salad patriotically into the colours of the Bolivian flag. He delivered a gracious speech that was accompanied by a parade of his family and kitchen staff and we exchanged appreciative greetings. Margaret meanwhile was in the process of downloading an astonishing 400 digital images taken over the last 48 hours onto two CDs. I tried to make a quick calculation as to how many photos she could be expected to return home with but struggled mentally to get a handle on the bewildering row of zeros.

 

Saturday 6th August 2005

 

Hats off for Bolivian National Day! And farewell from us to Santa Cruz de la Sierra, as we left the city, passing John’s favourite shops (the “Niple Centre” and the store of “Senor Moron”), and out into a much lusher and verdant Bolivian countryside. A mixed landscape of maize and sugar cane was broken by patches of forest and tiny hamlets, where immaculately dressed schoolchildren walked along the roadside on their way to National Day celebrations. We passed through the busy market town of El Toro, where the bus pressed past men with street-side sewing machines, women sold bags of coca leaves and a massed throng shopped for vegetables of all shapes and sizes. The Bolivian flag rippled from almost every building and amplifiers were being set up in front of institutional buildings. Internal conflicts seemed to have been set aside for this celebration of nationhood with a fervour that we certainly were not familiar with from home.

 

The road passed a checkpoint and ascended a steep dry valley that wound its way beneath sheer cliffs, the road increasingly elevated above a rushing torrent. We had distant views of tabular mountains and experienced a refreshing drop in temperature. At a viewpoint we stared out over the canopy and saw our first Plush-crested and Purplish Jays, common inhabitants of the montane forest. While the switchbacks of this road had required some careful driving from Amadio, they were nothing compared to the effort required from him as we took a sharp right at the top of the valley and plunged up a red earth track that was providing tough walking for the groups of students who were hiking up its lower reaches. The road switch-backed, seemingly making a direct vertical ascent of the hillside for several kilometres until it ended at a broad saddle between two mountains that was shaped like a gentle bowl and filled by a tranquil lagoon. The trimmed lawns of the lagoon edge and the advanced construction work of a new hotel indicated that this beautiful spot was not much of a secret in these parts. Laguna VolcanesThe Laguna Volcanes was matted with lily leaves and Least Grebes, as well as being home to the relatively unusual Masked Duck, which lived in the thick rushes at the far end of the lake. Beyond the lagoon a gently sloping lip ended abruptly at the edge of a steep drop, over which fine canopy views of the other side of the mountain were offered, while a Black-and-white Hawk Eagle swept silently overhead. We followed Iver up a short trail that led to a small ridge, above which he said condors sometimes soared. Today it was only the ubiquitous Black and Turkey Vultures that swept low over the pass but it wasn’t hard to imagine a condor in this place, suddenly remote from the crowds beginning to arrive at the side of the lagoon. I wanted to lie back on a flat rock and stare up at the clouds, listen to the wind whistle through the tuffet grass and wait for my condor but, as always, the clock beckoned us back to the minibus all too soon.

 

We dropped back down into the valley and then took another road back up the hillside. This was a broader and less dramatic track, which climbed high up the mountainside through dry scrub and dense new growth. The views were awesome from this track and also from the ridge top where the bus stopped. It emerged that from here we would need to either walk down or wait for a jeep as our home for the night, Los Volcanes Lodge, could be seen in the small clearing of a sheltered valley far beneath us. Walking was the choice of most and so we set off down the narrow jeep track. No sooner had the first bend been turned than a giant vulture was spotted gliding over a nearby peak. It was neither a Black nor a Turkey, and someone voiced the obvious word “condor”. The location was perfect: high ridge, jagged peak, the silence of the mountains, Bolivia. But just a few seconds later I realised that something was not quite right and that there was another choice – it was a King. Slightly disappointedly we moved on, berating ourselves for being so easily fooled into identifying the bird we wanted to see rather than the bird we had seen. Another King sailed over the peak and drifted in the thermals above the ridge. But there was something wrong with this bird as well – its white patches were only on the upperwing… “Condor” was cried yet again, this time with a great deal more conviction and authority! The condor drifted above us, accompanied by a small group of Black Vultures, and then faded to a speck in the vastness of the sky.

 

We had a real spring in our step for the downward hike, which took an hour and a half in total. The descent was almost entirely soundless despite the attractive montane scrub and tall forest through which we passed. Not a bird, not a cicada, not even the buzz of an insect. The clearing at Volcanes LodgeHowever, when we did finally reach the clearing that we had seen from high above, it felt like discovering a lost paradise. The soft turf of a cut meadow led to a neat bungalow, dwarfed by domed red sandstone peaks that crowded around the clearing like monolithic guardians, sheltering the inhabitants from the evils of the rest of the world. A large tree stood by the edge of the clearing, adorned in pink blossom, and Monika our hostess stepped out and kissed a greeting to each of the weary travellers. We had found our Rivendale, and joy was impossible to suppress.

 

On the edge of the clearing was another discrete bungalow enclosed by a thick mesh, beyond wish a stream gushed therapeutically. We were served an unusual lunch of meat, cheese and deep fried fruit, which all tasted far more delectable than it sounds. Afterwards we sat around the meadow and soaked in the staggeringly beautiful views. Two black specks appeared above the sandstone horizon to our east and soon the whole party enjoyed sights of our very own condors flying over the valley from their roost in a high gully in the mountains. Not for the first time in my life all I wanted was for time to stand still. However it was hard not to resist guide Carlos’ suggestion that we take a stroll along one of the forest trails on the other side of the river. Apart from a small mixed flock at the river crossing, we saw very little on this hike save for a glimpse of a Short-tailed Antthrush scuttling into the understorey. It was hard to accept that paradise could be so relatively birdless! Tony had a bit more fortune with his wise strategy of spending the afternoon birding from a hammock outside the bedroom. Dusk fell to the sounds of a White-breasted Toucan, whose haunting cry echoed around the canyon walls. Darkness slowly engulfed our magic bowl and yet even this happened in utter silence – not an owl, not a howl, not a cricket.

 

We emerged from the satisfactions of a gourmet dinner into pitch-blackness. However, as the guests shuffled for bed or took last drinks on the veranda, the yawning darkness was stunningly shattered by a flashing light that started to flicker across the entire sky above us. The show was continuous and unaccompanied by thunder. As the shimmering sky pulsed, so the dramatic silhouettes of the tabletop mountains all around us were momentarily exposed.  It was utterly haunting and sent shivers up my spine. The more scientific might suggest that this was electrical activity high in the ionosphere, possibly the result of unusual geological formations in the area. However the locals apparently prefer to remain mystified and awestruck by this nightly display, and I don’t blame them.

 

Sunday 7th August 2005

 

We were up before dawn for an early breakfast. The night sky had calmed down and a lone cicada sang against the reassuring gurgling of the river. Half the party had opted for a morning of relaxation, while a small group chose to follow Carlos up into the hills. The initial jungle trail followed a small gully up a steady incline. The early light was murky and few birds were heard, let alone observed, in the depths of the forest. We glimpsed the jerky thrashing in the vegetation of an unidentified antbird, heard the close plaintive singing of an Undulated Tinamou and finally saw a bird, a Glossy Black Thrush, hopping along the track ahead of us. Further up the track we heard the whirring of wings and had to jerk our heads back and forth to keep sight of an amazingly fast Yungas Manakin that seemed capable of teleporting from one perch to another. As the track climbed, so the forest thinned, and soon we partly emerged from the forest and began to hug the edge of the gully as we worked towards a saddle in the mountains. A large tree high above us was dripping in fruit and many birds could be heard moving in the canopy. Flashes of green on birds dropping from this tree and gliding down into the valley were all we saw of a party of Emerald Toucanets.

 

Finally the saddle was reached and the forest gave way to low shrubs, amongst which were many delicate winter flowers, which were being pursued by several different species of hummingbird. The trail ended at a lookout point, where we could gaze way over the canopy and far beyond the sandstone hills, to another remote valley. Behind and above us lay the nest of the condors, although the hour was still too early to expect an encounter. Carlos picked up a distant noise and told us that Military Macaws were coming. Sure enough, some three minutes later a quartet of giant silhouettes worked their way high over the distant valley and then almost directly overhead until they tacked suddenly and passed on the other side of the sandstone dome beneath which we were sitting. We spent some forty minutes soaking in the soothing views, with the only signs of other humans being an ominous scarring in the forest on the other side of the valley, which marked a small clearing where cattle were now grazing.

 

We returned by a different route, climbing a very narrow trail that eventually straddled the top of a ridge, which was cloaked in a drier type of forest. We watched some White-throated Toucans far below us, although spotting them amidst the carpet of canopy was surprisingly difficult. Volcanes Lodge nestles in a tiny clearing in the mountainsA small troupe of Brown Capuchins also provided challenging watching as they quietly fed in the canopy just beneath us, requiring watchers to perform unusual yoga positions in order to find the requisite windows through the tangle of branches. Carlos performed occasional track maintenance with his machete, almost lovingly, for he and his brother had apparently built these trails some years ago. Finally the Los Volcanes clearing returned to view far below us on the other side and we were able to observe bird watchers lounging on the balconies while White-tipped Swifts streaked acrobatically across the sky. Another unusual atmospheric feature of this magical place revealed itself as we descended and entered the lodge clearing, for the air cooled as we descended and we had to slip on extra layers on arrival – it had been far warmer at the top of the ridge.

 

After lunch we broke camp and a jeep shuttle service commenced up the track to the bus pick-up point. Henry and I chose a later jeep and decided to walk the first part of the track. We left the Los Volcanes clearing with leaden feet, looking back more than once. Pulling away seemed to involve fighting a force stronger than just gravity. For all its charms, however, Los Volcanes had been slightly disappointing from an ornithological viewpoint as birds had been very thin on the ground. Out of the blue this situation changed, as we encountered our first mixed flock of any significance. The usual chaos reigned, with multiple species briefly showing in poor light high above the track and rapidly moving on. I put up a good fight but soon had to admit large-scale defeat, with only a handful of successful identifications. Los Volcanes had birds all right, but it would have needed the benefit of much more time to seek them out. 

 

Waiting at the Volcanes Bus Stop (high level)The jeep collected us and we ground our way up the track to the main road, where we all waited with our bags in a very different landscape of thick heath and bright yellow flowers, soaking in the distant peaks. And we waited for quite some time as Amadio was late for his rendezvous. Finally, perhaps summoned by our percussion drumming on the huge gas pipeline that followed the side of the road, our dreams of an unplanned further night at Los Volcanes were dashed and we were on our way once again. On the descent we passed a large bearded man by the roadside, sporting a pair of professional binoculars. He beamed, and waved, and for just a moment I felt he was calling me from the bus to live another life... But darkness rapidly cloaked the roadside and almost as soon as the thought had germinated, I was asleep.

 

When I woke we were entering the town of Samaipata. Its dusty streets were poorly lit and the headlights of the bus provided only unflattering images as we negotiated some back streets and climbed a small hill behind the town to find our lodgings at a rundown cabin park. It was cold and the cabin rooms stank of sewage. We ate at a rustic pizza parlour that strangely had no pizzas. Margaret was clad in such an enormous poncho that she appeared to have become an alpaca, and yet she was probably the only person suitably dressed for a cold night at Samaipata. I sank into bed with a blocked nose (in hindsight highly beneficial given the drainage defects). It seemed that the contrast with our previous night of magic could not have been any starker.

 

Monday 8th August 2005

 

A chorus of cockerel and House Wren greeted a frozen dawn. The fleeces and extra layers were piled on for a wander around the grounds of the cabin park, which offered a surprisingly pleasant view across an agricultural valley. The park consisted of twin-roomed cabins, each with a shared kitchen, and was largely unoccupied. Rufous-bellied Thrushes hopped over the lawns and Rufous-collared Sparrows sung from the hedgerows, indicative of our altitude of 1600 metres. We hunted an elusive songster in a patch of bamboo at the back of the park but were never very sure if we ever located it, for the birds that we saw there appeared silent. A hearty cooked breakfast was served in the glassed patio of the grand master cabin, home to the Scott family, while a dashing Yellow-browed Tyrant foraged just yards from the door.

 

Iver warned us that the weather forecast was poor and that we would need to rug up further for the morning trip up to the ruins of El Fuerte. This sounded ominous as it was already cool enough, so we pulled on our entire clothing allowances and set off promptly. Samaipata township looked much more appealing by daylight. In fact it was difficult to set aside analogies to spaghetti western sets, as this was exactly what the town resembled. The adobe stone buildings with their double-hatched swinging doors could all easily have hosted decent bar-room brawls. The main square was compact and tidy, providing a shady place to sleep away a lazy afternoon on a park bench. Samaipata gave the strange impression of being both bustling and deserted at the same time.

 

A few kilometres outside of town the road to El Fuerte swept to the right and traversed the side of a mountain, ascending through an extensive plantation of monotonous pines that had been planted to stabilise the soil. The archaeological site itself lay on a remote windswept ridge, beyond a simple visitors information centre. El Fuerte - where condors allegedly soarWe spent a few hours wandering slowly along the trails of this wild place, sharing it with the handful of other visitors who had all come to experience what my neighbour had referred to as one of the highlights of her year spent travelling in South America. The main feature was a massive base rock embedded into a narrow promontory and came with the reputation for being everything from an ancient temple to an alien landing strip. Worn carvings in the stone could be seen if you applied a very careful eye and exercised a token of imagination. I wonder if I lack sufficient cultural bones in my body, because the site did very little for me (but then again I have a colleague who claims to “really not understand this bird thing”, so there you go…). The lack of birds to relieve proceedings was highlighted by the intense interest paid to a timid Hellmayr’s Pipit, who posed decoratively amongst the ruins. The scrubby montane woodland that smothered some reconstructed Inca ruins looked a more promising place for interesting birds but again we saw very little, although the giant Red-tailed Comet hummingbirds provided some reward. The most interesting artefact was a deep well hidden in the forest, which was apparently used as an Incan punishment site. (Three days down there looked about as much fun as trying to fix the waterworks at our cabin park.) El Fuerte did however provide an excellent opportunity to wander around the Andean hilltops relatively freely, soaking in giant views of the surrounding hill country. I felt like the condor that we never saw there, but perhaps should have, scanning the spurs and valleys for a micro-whiff of distant carrion.

 

We grabbed a sandwich by the entrance station and then disentangled the group in order to cater for several alternative concepts of an interesting afternoon. The “hike back to Samaipata” action party set off down the road, the “shopping” party were dropped back in the main square and the “more birds please” party set off in the minibus for a village called Achira, where it was possible to walk a little way into the hills. While in fact being quite productive for birds, this latter visit was also in some ways a more interesting cultural experience than El Fuerte. View above Achira villageAchira was sited on the edge of the Amboro Protected Area and had been “invaded” by Altiplano settlers some years previously, thus establishing a community of smallholdings in an area that, for political appeasement purposes, was now designated “dual use”.  From our evidence this concept appeared to translate as “clear at will”, but the resulting mixed highland landscape provided an interesting afternoon stroll. We followed a road up the hillside, encountering several Ocellated Piculets and a small flock of Scaly-naped Parrots, and revelled in the superb views back across the main valley to distant El Fuerte, whose prominence on the distant horizon left  no doubt as to why the societies that revered El Fuerte had chosen such a domineering spot on which to base their civilisation. On our way up the road we passed the local baker, who was preparing dough for baking in his outdoor clay oven. By the time of our descent a white flag had been raised outside his house, which indicated to the valley community that the bread was now ready. Iver paid ten bolivianos (80 pence) for a bag of 40 mouth-watering cheese rolls, which lasted us for several days. A small boy chased us down the road and we let him watch a Black-backed Grosbeak through the telescope. His curiosity quenched, it appeared to comfortably confirm to him our madness and he smiled and sprinted onwards down the hill.

 

I experienced a minor dose of culture clash back in Samaipata by visiting the local Internet Café. Unlike backward countries such as Britain and Japan, every town of any size in Bolivia seemed to have its public connection to the web and so messages home could be exchange