TOTAL URUGUAY

Dates:  Nov 2, 2023 – Nov 16, 2023

Uruguay: rich avian and habitat diversity in a small territory.

Enjoy, at a great price, a 15-day small group (6-8 person) trip that includes every national park and the majority of the country’s IBAs (Important Bird Areas). Birding With Me is a woman-owned and operated company.  Florencia Ocampo, a biologist, started “Birding With Me” over 10 years ago.

Photo: Rufous Hornero – Steve Hunter

This tour is led by fully bilingual Uruguayan birding expert Rafael Tosi.  This tour is also designed to show you less-seen Uruguayan lifestyles and food, where you will get a sense of how people live in different parts of the country, and have an opportunity to get to interact with local people.

Uruguay is a small country in the Southern Cone of South America that enjoys a temperate climate very similar to our own. It is approximately 375 miles long both from north to south and from east to west. In spite of this tiny territory, it contains many different environments: the Pampas, the Atlantic Forest, savannas, wetlands, ocean coasts, countless water courses, grasslands, ravines, several hill ranges, palm tree forests, and  many others. This richness of landscapes results in a great diversity of bird species that can be seen easily, in a short time and traveling short distances.

The territory is also an important feeding and breeding destination for many migrant species, including in November (Austral Spring) birds on migration to southernmost areas of South America and South American birds coming to nest in Uruguay.

On this tour you will visit the most important hot spots in the country for birdwatching. Two of the principal 13 destinations on this tour were recently explored by scientists: Rincón de Franquía and Paso del Centurión. These are relatively new protected areas where biologists have only recently begun to research the flora and fauna. Many new bird species have been recorded in these areas in the last 3 years.

By the end of the tour, we hope to see over 250 bird species.

Total Uruguay Cost Structure:

8 guests @ US $2,800 per person, based on double room occupancy.

7 guests @ US $3,000 per person, based on double room occupancy.

6 guests @ US $3,200 per person, based on double room occupancy.

Single room supplement @ US $200 (limited availability).…

This seven-day trip is designed for birders who haven’t traveled abroad previously AND it offers the best of everything for birders who are on a tight schedule. Both beginning birders and seasoned veterans will be able to enjoy this birding tour and perhaps tick off a few mega-finds along the way! It can be combined with the Santa Marta trip, but it’s a self-contained itinerary, a trip that will ensure your international birding experience is a great one.

Why Colombia? Easy. It’s the birdiest country on earth, with 1,930 species—almost 20% of the world’s total in 1% of its landmass, with new species still being discovered and new records being announced regularly. There are several reasons for this: Colombia is tropical yet it also has ample elevation changes due to the Andes; it has both the Pacific and Caribbean coasts; it has a wide range of different habitats, and different habitats ensure a wide range of bird species.

Your home for the trip will be one of Colombia’s newest birding lodges, which will allow you to stay in very comfortable accommodations while birding some of the best sites in Colombia without having to spend much time in a vehicle—or packing your suitcase every other day! Araucana Lodge opened in January 2019 and was designed specifically for birders and nature lovers, with spacious rooms and all the comforts that ensure a good night’s rest.

Don’t forget to pack your camera—Araucana Lodge and many of the reserves along the route have excellent feeder set-ups that provide some of the best photographic opportunities in Colombia, with targets ranging from hummingbirds to toucans.

This trip includes visits to some of Colombia most iconic birding locations, including KM 18 and the San Antonio Cloud Forest (an excellent introduction to birding in the Colombian Andes), the San Cipriano Reserve (which features the humid forests of the Pacific lowlands), the Anchicaya Valley (which is located in one of the most biodiverse national parks in the planet), and an active Andean Cock-of-the-rock lek.

View Trip Bird List Here…

On this five-day tour, explore California’s unique Mojave and Coloradan desert systems to search for specialized avifauna and other wildlife adapted to thrive in arid conditions PLUS the wildly scenic and wonderfully eccentric Salton Sea. Travel as a small group with desert-experienced nature & bird guides from Nature Trip to visit San Andreas fault Geothermal zones; High Desert, Joshua Tree habitats; Native Washington Palm Desert Oasis; the ultra-rich delta of the Imperial Valley, the incomparable Salton Sea; and Anza Borrego, California’s largest state park.

Your guides for this trip, Eddie Bartley & Noreen Weeden, have been leading Nature Trip tours since 2004 in California and birding the Palm Desert region for over 25 years.

More questions? Contact GGBA Travel Coordinator Dawn Lemoine at travelprogram@goldengatebirdalliance.org.

ITINERARY Available Soon!…

Mark Pretti has taken Golden Gate Bird Alliance members to SE Arizona, Oaxaca, Costa Rica, Ecuador and probably other places before my time on the Travel Desk.  We now have the exciting opportunity to travel with Mark to an all new location.  If you’ve traveled with Mark before, you know why he is one of our most beloved guides. 

Harboring about ten percent of Earth’s biodiversity, Mexico is one of the most biologically rich countries in the world.  During this journey, you’ll explore and learn about some of that richness as we visit Isla Cozumel and the Yucatan Peninsula. Though the region is well known as a popular resort destination, what’s often overlooked are its extensive tracts of native forest and its impressive diversity of flora and fauna.  In addition to rainforest, lagoons, mangroves, beaches, cenotes, and coral reefs, the area is of course rich in Mayan culture.

The trip starts in Cozumel and ends in Cancun.  All lodging, meals, guides, GGBA administration fee, and ground transportation is included in the cost.

Please see the detailed itinerary for all of the exciting details.

Estimated Cost for this 10-day trip:  $3,650 per person, based on double occupancy

Estimated Single Supplement:  $550

More questions? Contact GGBA Travel Coordinator Dawn Lemoine at travelprogram@goldengatebirdalliance.org

Ready to register?  Contact Dawn first.  She will put you in touch with Mark Pretti Nature Tours.…

This trip is designed for birders who haven’t traveled abroad previously, but its wide variety of target birds makes it suitable for both beginning birders and seasoned veterans. It can be combined with the Araucana Lodge trip, but it’s a self-contained itinerary—a trip that will ensure your first international birding experience is a great one.

Why Colombia? Easy. It’s the birdiest country on earth, with 1,930 species—almost 20% of the world’s total in 1% of its landmass, with new species still being discovered and new records being announced regularly. There are several reasons for this: Colombia is tropical yet it also has ample elevation changes due to the Andes; it has both the Pacific and Caribbean coasts; it has a wide range of different habitats, and different habitats ensure a wide range of bird species.

This tour begins and ends in the city of Barranquilla, on Colombia’s Caribbean coast, a very different part of Colombia than our tour at Araucana Lodge. The Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta is the highest coastal mountain in the world and one of the most important endemism centers in the world, with 22 species of birds restricted to it. Join us on a search for many of these endemics, including Santa Marta Screech-owl, antpittas (four species), tapaculos (two species), foliage-gleaners (two species), Brush-finches (two species), parakeets, (five species) sabrewings (two species), bush-tyrants (three species), seedeaters (nine species), and, of course, a huge array of warblers (thirty species!), and tanagers (fifty-four species!)

This trip will also take us to Isla Salamanca, Tayrona, and Los Flamencos National Parks, where birding through mangroves and coastal wetlands along  the ocean and in dry scrub forest should yield species such as the near endemic Buffy Hummingbird, the endemic Chestnut-winged Chachalaca, Russet-throated Puffbird, the near endemic Chestnut Piculet,  Bicolored Conebill, Tocuyo Sparrow, and Panama Flycatcher.

View Trip Birdlist Here…