Author Archive
Dec 27th by neilgd under Bird Watching, Travels, my Friends travels
PART 2
I had not intended to wait a year as per Ian’s comment for Part 2, but somehow here we are a year on!!
We stayed for four days at Bird safari Camp in our en-suite tent along with a number of other travellers wanting to escape the Christmas hype and do some birding instead. The camp was everything that we had hoped for with wonderful friendly staff, fantastic food all overseen by the boss lady Binta.
Mornings were spent on early walks at 7am with our guide Lamin who was expertly knowledgeable on all of the birds by …
Dec 17th by neilgd under Travels, my Friends travels
During my recent trip to Ghana, in addition to the birds there were many other natural wonders to view. Â In particular were the butterflies; Ghana has over 1000 species in comparison to the 50 or so species that we have in the UK. Â On a single morning walk we saw more than the total number of UK species – the photos are a few species that I managed to photograph.…
Dec 17th by neilgd under Bird Watching, Travels, my Friends travels
I have just returned from an eleven day birding trip in Ghana with Ashanti African Tours (www.ashantiafricantours.com). The eleven days were fully packed with birding and travelling the significant distances between the main birding sites. On arrival on Saturday night at Kotoka International Airport in Accra I was met by my two guides for the 11 days and transferred to our hotel at around 11pm. After checking in, the guides informed me that breakfast the next day was at 4.30am, leaving the hotel at 5am; this was the case for the remainder of the trip except for a …
Aug 7th by neilgd under Bird Watching
Tags: Fulmar, Herring Gull, Kittiwake, RSPB Fowlsheugh, Stonehaven
Last weekend I decided that I would pay a visit to the RSPB Fowlsheugh reserve on the east coast of Scotland near Stonehaven.  My aim was to see some auks and in particular some Puffins – it was late in the season and as such possibly too late.  Indeed it was too late and no auks were in evidence, however some great views of  Herring Gull, Fulmar and Kittiwake were had, including juveniles of all three species.  A great view of a Sedge Warbler was also had on the walk back to the carpark.…
Jan 25th by neilgd under Bird Watching, Travels, my Friends travels
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Having only glimpsed the spoonbills on the Saturday trip and with my booked trip for the Sunday shorter and more restricted, I decided to pay a visit to the Hong Kong Wetland Park in the morning before returning to Mai Po as the park is part of the same wetland. Arriving in the park I was met with a horde of people (again noisy!) and despaired at seeing any birdlife. The horde was short lived and seemed to be a number of organised tours which were on their way back to the park visitor centre. Although there were numerous …
Jan 24th by neilgd under Bird Watching, Travels, my Friends travels
Tags: Black Faced Spoonbill, Hong Kong, Mai Po Marshes, WWF
A second business trip to Hong Kong has afforded me the opportunity for further birding within the Special Administrative Region of China. On my previous trip I had wanted to have a trip to the Mai Po Marshes however I was unable to take this trip as the access to the area requires a special permit from the Agriculture, Fisheries & Conservation Department. Further research prior to my second trip suggested that I would need to join a guided tour to allow access to the marshes. I initially tried to book a tour with the Hong Kong Bird watching Society, …
PART 1
In 2010, to avoid the whole festive hype, we decided to spend Christmas in the sun in the west African country of The Gambia doing some birding and relaxing. The Gambia is Africa’s smallest mainland nation with a population of approximately 1.5million and a land area about the same as Yorkshire. The Gambia has a remarkable diversity of habitats making it an ideal birdwatching destination, with over 560 species having been recorded within its borders. Being the first green area south of the Sahara on the west coast of Africa it is also an important area for wintering …
Oct 18th by neilgd under Bird Watching, Travels, my Friends travels
On a recent trip to Morocco my wife and I had a whistlestop tour covering 2209km in a week in our hired Peugeot 306. Â Arriving on Saturday evening at Marrakech airport we had a lengthy wait while the AVIS rep kept assuring us that our car would be ready in 10 minutes; finally 2 hours later and somewhat frustrated we had our trusty Peugeot and headed out into the madness that is Saturday night Marrakech traffic. Â After a couple of detours and a few raised voices we found our guesthouse (http://www.darsouihla.fr)Â on the outskirts some 10km from Marrakech. Â Arriving …
Sep 19th by neilgd under Bird Watching, Travels, my Friends travels
Tags: Birds, Hong Kong, Po Toi Island, Scary Spiders
A second days birdwatching in Hong Kong started early. The meeting point for the ferry to Po Toi Island was at Aberdeen on the opposite side of the Hong Kong Island from my hotel – I had worked out the bus No. and approximate meeting place from the HKBWS website, but as everything here is so hectic I wanted to leave some spare time to find the meeting point. My strategy was to get to the Aberdeen harbour and simply walk up and down looking for a group of people sporting binoculars and cameras – my strategy soon paid off …
Sep 18th by neilgd under Bird Watching, Travels, my Friends travels
In Hong Kong on business with the weekend off it was a good excuse to do some birdwatching. With Ian telling me that there were no birds to see in Hong Kong I looked out my book ‘where to see birds in the worlds cities’ to see what the options were. I wanted to go to the Mai Po marshes but a permit was needed and I didn’t have one, my book indicated that the Hong Kong Wetland Park was a good bet. I arrived around lunchtime and wandered around until closing at 5pm.  The temperatures were topping 35 degrees C and as such …
Jun 24th by neilgd under Bird Watching
A couple of visits to Lochwinnoch RSPB centre over the last few days gave great views of many juvenile birds. Â Of particular interest was two juvenile great spotted woodpeckers that were feeding from the nut feeder only a few metres from the photo hide. Â My first visit on Sunday afternoon found the photo hide full of huge lenses and just enough room for me to fit in. Â Great views were had of the woodpeckers and numerous other birds. Â On Tuesday night the weather was still fine so I decided to pay another visit – this time I found the photo …
May 7th by neilgd under Bird Watching
Last night was the first outing to the site where the Long Eared Owls live. After an hour and a half of walking around and no sign of any activity, we spent 20 minutes standing close to the rough moorland that is a favourite hunting ground. Just as the sun was begining to set I caught some movement and there was the Owl. It flew within 20 feet of us and landed in a nearby tree where it spent 10 minutes surveying the surrounding area; it then flew to a another tree close by and continued its vigil. After about half an hour …
Nov 27th by neilgd under Bird Watching, Travels, my Friends travels
Finally I have added a post to Ian’s site. Â
I do have some good photos but as for great, I am not so sure. As a beginner to DSLR photography I am still finding my way and experimenting; after a year there are still many functions on my camera that I have no idea what they do, and many of my photos are down to luck. As a beginner to photography I have probably chosen the most difficult subjects – wildlife and in particular our avian friends.
Two weekends ago myself, my wife and two of our friends spent …