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| Crimson-rumped toucanet |
As Kerry recently posted, aside from a couple of hours here and there, neither of us has really had solo time in seven months. I understand that there won't be an overwhelming outpouring of sympathy for our plight, but the truth is that for the most part, we four are our own company. Yes, we have made friends and have a lot of acquaintances here, but it simply is not the same as the incredible network of family and friends that we left up north for the year.
So given this version of cabin fever, K and I each took solo trips to Mindo, Pichincha for four days, for a little break from the abundance of this us-ness. 80K northwest of Quito, essentially on the backside, or Pacific slope of Volcan Pichincha, Mindo sits at 1250m, some 1300m lower than Otavalo. This means that it's warmer and waaay moister. Moist as in either dripping wet or sopping wet, especially since it's equatorial winter. So wet that you put a fence post in the ground, it's going to resemble this in, like, a week:
There are plenty of farms here, but you still get the sense that the farmers are beating back the wilderness, rather than the more usual already subdued type of forest. I'm not so naive to believe that to be true, but it still feels that way in and around Mindo. Plus there's the Mindo-Nambillo Forest Reserve, 19,000 hectares of protected lush hills stretching upward toward the capital, Quito.
The biking here is also excellent, though I probably should have brought some oil and a second pair of gloves. It turns out that traveling with a bike by bus is remarkably easy, so long as you begin and end at the terminals. (I have been waved off by drivers several times when trying to catch a bus on the side of the road -- at the terminal, I guess they have more time to load and unload the bike, which usually has to ride in its own cargo hold at the very back of the bus.) Here I had the luxury to combine two of my favorite activities, both of which are huge time-consuming endeavors.
After one incredible morning of birding with guides, I set out on my own by bike. Complicated by moisture and equipment, I had to be selective. Obviously, I'd need the glasses (binoculars) and the damned 8 pound bird book -- to leave the book behind risked missing or mis-identifying species. I can't count the number of times I've been absolutely sure of what I saw, only to look it up later and find a dozen could-have-beens. So the book goes, as well as the bike tools/spare tubes/pump, which are also critical since I was headed out on very lightly traveled roads. Finally, the gore-tex shell and much needed spare/dry shirt rounded out the pack. I had Kerry's camera with the telephoto lens, but that was too heavy and too delicate to risk taking out in the rain.
By far, my favorite road for both bikes and birds was La Ecoruta del Quinde, an old cobble road that runs essentially uphill back to Quito through montane cloud forest and pasture. I'd take two tours on this remarkably well maintained "eco-route." From what I observed through breaks in the clouds, I'd reckon it about 15% farmland, though the farther in I pushed, the denser the forest and the fewer the farms. Mindo sits in a bowl, and from the main Quito road you have to drop about 6K straight down... or ride 6K up, as the case may be. I tried it the first day I found the Ecoruta, and the climb took 45 lung and knee-busting minutes. From there, however, it's just another click to the Ecoruta entrance.
The second trip, I'd take a taxi to the "Y," the junction of the Mindo and main roads and start from there. The first guy I hailed had a little sedan, and I wasn't sure about the bike. But he had no qualms: "La muerte es lo único que no tiene remedio," he said -- death is the only thing you can't fix! With that philosophy, he gunned it to the top of the hill. Once there we extracted the various parts of my bike, I reassembled them, and shoved off saluting the camioneta drivers lounging on the hoods of their trucks, chatting, and waiting for the next customers to happen along.
I'd taken advantage of a laundry service, I'm pretty sure for the first time in my life, for the simple fact that they had a drier, driers being a necessity for any hostel in Mindo. By the second day, everything I'd had was soaked, including my pack and bike shoes. So this particular morning, I'd set out with luxuriously clean, dry clothing, with the exception of the shoes. When I turned back, however, I'd descend in a steady downpour. Most of the ride would alternate between light mist and drizzle. For that, I prefer to breathe in damp short-sleeves, keeping a plastic bag wrapped around my glasses as I scanned the side of the road for birds.
I'd only cover about the first 25K of La Ecoruta on my second tour, eventually reaching the trails at the famed Bellavista reserve. At the second trailhead, I decided to ditch the bike up-trail, under a kiosk, don my dry shirt and shell and explore the forest at a slower pace. Almost immediately, I caught a big dark shape out of the corner of my eye. Scanning trees for movement is pretty much the essence of birding, but this pair was impossible to miss. I didn't need the glasses, and I didn't need the guide, as these guys were on the cover: a pair of Plate-billed mountain-toucans glided right into the tree I was standing under, hung out for a few minutes, and moved on. The image is burned into my brain, one of only a couple that will be with me long after the trip.
After 4 hours of biking and birding, the return to Mindo took just over half an hour. I'd had two interesting encounters at the intersection of birds and bikes. Disc breaks inevitably squeak a bit, and bikers sometimes refer to that "chirp" as "the bird." While riding at one point, my bike-bird actually drew a response call from a real bird in the bush -- amazing! I'd called a bird in just by riding by. The second experience involves the fact that I always wear bandanas under my helmet. On climbs, I often strap the helmet to my pack so my head can breathe. On two occasions, my red bandana actually provoked two different species of hummingbird to attack my head! Neither was terribly threatening, and I resisted the urge to swat at them.
By the numbers, I'd taken 2 busses each way for 2 hours apiece and spent just under 300 bucks for travel for 4 days and 3 nights of fat lodging, and fatter meals (with tourism comes really good food). I don't know what my total on the bike, but I'd guess 60 or 70K, most of it either climbing or descending. As for birds, I'd seen over 60 species, probably half of them new to me (listed below the pics).
As always, the pictures look better as a slide show -- click on one to start it. Thanks for looking!
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| Dark-backed wood-quail |
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| Super guides Angel and Danny Jumbo -- they could pick out any call (of 100s), and imitate most of them as well. If Danny eyed a bird, he could have it in his scope in seconds. |
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| Sickle-winged Guan |
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| Brown violet-ear |
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| White-necked Jacobin |
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| Rufous motmot |
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| Trail on Angel Paz's private reserve, one of only a couple of known sites for Andean Cock-of-the-Rock "leks" or breeding/courtship sites. We saw three males displaying that morning, but flashes were not allowed, and it was too dark and early for natural light. |
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| Birding with two professional photographers humping 100s of pounds of lenses and tripods. |
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| The ubiquitous bananaquit, chickadees of the cloud-forest |
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| A pair of Chestnut-mandibled toucans followed me for at least half a mile. Toucans generally eat fruit where they find it, but these two were obviously gathering it for their young. |
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| 4' tall bromeliad |
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| Green-crowned brilliant |
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| Rufous-tailed hummer |
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| Pugnacious and territorial in general, Violet-ears were the biggest bullies at the hummingbird feeders -- here's one guarding his stash. |
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| More agro hummers |
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Blue-grey tanager |
Complete (more or less) list of birds observed in Mindo, in no particular taxonomic order:
Naranja tapaculo
Andean cock-of-the-rockThree-striped warbler
Gray-breasted wood-wren
Golden-crowned flycatcher
Crimson-rumped toucanet
Golden-headed quetzal
Strong-billed woodcreeper
Olivaceous piha
Tawny-breasted flycatcher
Andean thrush
Montane woodcreeper
Slaty-throated whitestart
Sickle-winged guan
Dark-backed wood-quail
Buff-tailed coronet
Empress brilliant
Broad-winged hawk
Violet-tailed sylph
Flavescent flycatcher
White-tailed tyrannulet
Tropical parula
Ochre-breasted antpitta
Masked water-tyrant
Swallow-tailed kite
Black vulture
Golden tanager
Lemon-rumped tanager
Blue and white swallow
Roadside hawk
Collared forest-falcon
Blue-winged mountain-tanager
Andean emerald
Green-crowned brilliant
Buff-tailed coronet
Brown inca
Velvet-purple coronet
Buff-throated saltator
Brown violet-ear
Snowy egret
Turkey vulture
Bronze-winged parrot
Chestnut-mandibled toucan
Ringed kingfisher
White-lined tanager
White-whiskered hermit
Bananaquit
Summer tanager
Beryl-spangled tanager
Plate-billed mountain-toucan
Yellow-bellied seedeater
Blue-black grassquit
Bay wren
Metallic-green tanager
Fawn-breasted tanager
Pacific horneo
White-necked Jacobin
Golden-olive woodpecker
Rufous motmot
Golden-crowned tanager
Blue-grey tanager
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