Part One. Quito and the Guango Lodge.
Since retirement last year we have been travelling and hitting some bucket list locations. One of those sites was the Galapagos islands and our friends at Carefree Birding had set up a trip with Kevin Loughlin of Wildside Nature Tours. Our trip went from 15 June to 1 July 2018 and started at the hotel San Jose de Puembo in Quito, Ecuador. Quito, is Ecuador's capital city and sits at 9300 feet above sea level so we felt right at home, unlike some others who came from sea level. The city is quite large and takes a while to drive through or around. The population is well over 2.7 million people and covers an area of over 125 square miles which is close to the size of the Denver metro area. Several of us arrived a day early and decided to take a tour of Quito and the old city. We also went to a museum that happens to be on the latitude 00.00.00, so that was fun also. The hotel grounds had plenty of birds to get us up to speed and introduce some newer birders to birding the fast moving hummingbirds and higher canopy species around the hotel. On our second day we took a trip outside of Quito into the cloud forest to Guango Lodge for more hummingbirds and mixed flocks of Tanagers, Conebills, and Redstarts. Here are a few pictures of those first two days.
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| The Airport (So you know where you are) |
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| Downtown Quito |
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| Quito, the old city |
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| Our Hotel |
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| The hotel Llawnmowers |
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| Great Thrush |
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| Galapagos Dove |
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| Our Hotel |
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| Equator Museum |
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| Locals in Quito |
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| Some of the group at the museum |
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| Down town old Quito |
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| Quito housing |
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| Llamas at the hotel |
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| The equator museum |
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| Balance an egg on the equator |
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| Yellow Grosbeak |
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| Quito street vendors |
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| More street vendors. Everything is a dollar. |
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| Old Quito up front and newer Quito beyond the cathedral |
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| Musicians in Qutio |
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| Rufous-collard Sparrow |
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| Diorama of how to make a shrunken head |
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| Typical lunch in Quito |
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| Rise"s friend, the scarf lady. |
Back at the hotel we were able to do a bit more birding and get another chance to look at the hummingbirds in the back yard. We had to share the yard with the Llamas that were cutting the lawn each morning.
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| Green Violet-ear |
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| American Kestral |
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| Llama |
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| Vermillion Flycatcher, male |
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| Vermillion Flycatcher, female |
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| Galapagos Dove |
Guango Lodge
Our next outing was the official start of the trip and we headed out early to the east through the Papallacta Pass, at 13,000 feet, to the Guango Lodge to enjoy hummingbirds in the gardens and whatever other birds would happen through while feeding. We were fortunate enough to see 31 species of birds and one Mountain Tapir while we were there birding in the rain. The Guango Lodge is a paradise for hummingbird lovers and photographers with 14 species generally seen on the property. There are also a variety of trails to hike and the opportunity to see other species of birds and animals. The small but cozy lodge is right in the middle of everything and serves a great lunch with big bowls of warm soup that really hit the spot in the cool and rainy forest.
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| Add caption |
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| Turquois Jay |
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| Spectacled Redstart |
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| Lunch at Guango Lodge |
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| Collared Inca, male |
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| Long-tailed Sylph |
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| Speckled Hummingbird |
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| Mountain Tapir |
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| Sword-billed Hummingbird |
We ended up with 20 confirmed species at the hotel and 31 species at the Guango Lodge. Some of those were the same but we were seeing birds and lovely natural areas so everything was good, including the food.
