A little underwhelmed so far . . . . . .

Spent a half day of birding out yesterday afternoon to the famous Pipeline Road with a guide.  We didn't completely dip but we've had more successful outings. Dark lighting made it hard to capture the few we did see.

This morning from the rooftop at our tower we saw a few new birds and got a new manakin, the red capped manakin, to round out our list. Mike just gave him a good nickname; Lucille Ball. 

We hiked out the road ourselves this morning and found antwrens, euphonias, tanagers and a sloth hanging and munching on a flower. 

A certain perfectionist is not happy with his sloth photos so we will wait for hopefully a better opportunity to post on that. The Geoffrey's Tamarinds came in for banana while we were having lunch and put on a great show.

Healthy living in Panama

Apparently Mike is going to have to eat his vegetables here whether he likes it or not. Chris always eats hers anyway. Naturally we will take good care of the water. This was on the wall at the overnight hotel by the airport our first night.

On the drive in to Canopy Tower we saw a white nosed coatti and another climbing on the roof outside our room. We go out with a guide this afternoon and hope to get a good first round of birding.

Packing for Panama

Chris is super organized and prides herself on packing light and packing early. Mike throws everything in a suitcase at the last minute - but he gets us ready with all the technology for finding and identifying the birds we look forward to seeing. Here's a packing tip from Chris - why spend money on "packing cubes"? If you are the type to save random things because they might be useful for something else, save those clear zipper containers that sets of sheets and other linens come packaged in; they are great for packing. My suitcase is so organized for this trip I may not want to even take anything out of it! As per usual, the only one not happy about the suitcases being out is the cat, Miss Roxy. Only tip I can share for that is get yourself a great pet sitter - it makes all the difference! Heading to airport soon ..............