Field Trip: In Search of the Giant Hummingbird

Free time on Monday morning dictated that I do something productive and get out of the house.  Our apartment is nice, but it's small -- and I bug out for bigger spaces.  Packing to hit up the páramo, I decided to go heavy and do some birding up high above the tree-line.  This meant I needed binoculars, some warm clothing, food of course, and the bigass bird book -- which must weigh eight pounds -- in addition to the usual bike kit and water.  

Heading out, I made a line to the taxi parada and found a couple of camionetas (truck-taxis).  Two guys were deep in conversation when the gringo with the big pack approached.

"Hey, any chance I can get a ride up the Lagunas Road...? as far a five dollars will take me."  A heated discussion ensued.   How far, indeed, could five bucks get me?  They may have also been negotiating who got stuck with me -- I didn't follow the whole conversation.  Both men were middle aged, and seemed to own their own camionetas.  In pointing out their ages vaguely, my only aim is to say that they were much more deliberate than their younger counterparts.  Finally, the guy in the black sweater agreed to take me up the road.

I know that my friend Sureshot calls this method cheating, but I did have a deadline for noon, to pick the boy up at his school.  And riding the whole 16K, 1200m way is beyond masochistic.  (I've only done it once, but when I forget how bad it was, I'll probably do it again.)  Plus, I wanted to spend some time looking for high elevation birds, like the Andean Snipe I'd flushed the last time in the flanks of the Fuya Fuya Volcano.  

Turns out five bucks would get me 8 or 9K up the hill, which I was happy about.  We had a tepid conversation on the ride up, the driver not minding long periods of silence.  Fine by me; I love taking in the scenery on the way up, especially the sun reflecting off the Cayambe glacier to the north.  

They always ask where you're from and what you're up to, but this guy was going deeper.  After a long pause, he'd ask something like, "So what's the pay at the University of Otavalo?" or "Is it expensive to live in the US?"  It's not easy to explain why I can live here on well less than half of what I live on in the states, in large part because I don't understand economics.  Really, I just wanted to go for a ride and look for birds.

Patagona gigas ranges from Columbia to Chile, mostly along the spine(s) of the Andes.  Hummingbirds supposedly have 30 times plus over humans' rate of metabolism.  The Giant Hummingbird flies "more like a swift or a swallow than a hummingbird" and "prefers semi-open scrub."  

"This is where we'll stop," said the driver.  And we did.  He hopped out, let down the tailgate, and wheeled my bike off.  I paid.  We shook hands, and I saddled up.  I'd ride 45 minutes before I stopped at a semi-open patch of scrub.  

On the edge of the páramo, I happily pulled off and laid the bike down, out of sight behind a hedge.  I donned the glasses, dropped the rest of the pack with the bike, and scrambled up the slope.  As I walked along the tree-line I kept my ears open.  There was a lot of bird activity, but while I got a few good looks at things, I couldn't ID anything positively.  

I headed up through the thigh-high grass along the edge of the tight forest, with an eye on the trees.  After a few strides, I fell through the grass and found myself eye-leve with the ground.  I'd walked into what was probably a rabbit burrow, their traces winding all through the páramo grasses.  This immediately put into context a story I'd heard from my friend Shawn, to wit: he'd been hiking with a friend and a couple of dogs when a dog had suddenly dropped out of sight... into a 2m pit, rabbit dens he'd guessed.

Well, I didn't waste any time extricating myself, glad that it wasn't a 6' hole I was climbing out of and also thinking that maybe I should have had a phone on me. 

I did not catch up with the Giant Hummingbird, but I did get into some micro-flora along the way.  And I did have a good break at Laguna Mojanda before turning around for the bonus descent of 3,600' or so.   Made it home just in time to pick Oakes up at school.