La Casa de Lourdes

We were tired of the simple hearty meals of the birding lodge and wanted to experience some Panama culture not associated with birding.

Mike found a restaurant using Google maps that had a creative menu. The lodge arranged a driver to get us there.

The meal was exquisite, fresh watercress, smoked pork chop with tamarind sauce, sea bass with a garlic mojo and a wider selection of wine than the lodge.

The taxi ride back was an adventure.  We previously found out that taxis in Panama pick up multiple passengers, but we were still surprised to find a family of three in the back when the taxi pulled up.   The driver beeped and waved at all his friends, stopped for gas, let the other passengers out, and took us to the lodge for a total of $3.

Stop the car!

We were heading back in from a good morning round when Chris shouted, stop the car. She had spotted something with a long tail. Our guide, Danilo Jr.,  is fantastic on all levels, safe driving, finding birds we would never see, knowing EVERY call and song, and being an all around pleasant good sport, but it's always fun to spot things on your own. And having a guide be excited by it and identifying it for us is a bonus. Okay, Chris will just take one more bow for spotting the Long-tailed Tyrant and move on.

A family portrait

These yellow bellied seedeaters were our entertainment while we were waiting for the golden hooded tanagers. Mike is having trouble being satisfied with his photos of the golden hooded tanagers so we needed a cute diversion like this as we stand around a fig tree in wait.

Never ending tanagers

Many many beautiful tanagers and some we didn't even plan to see or know about. This is a silver throated tanager found when we hiked with our guide to a different elevation. Such beautiful detail!  To get a little better shot and all the detail, Mike climbed off trail and took a spill onto his back to protect the camera, and as our guide said, "It's all part of the adventure."

Can't decide which camera to use.

The new super zoom point and shoot is very versatile and easy to use, particularly in dark light.  The old DSLR with a 500mm reflex lens and a larger sensor takes better photos, particularly in good light or of very distant birds.  Here's the boat-billed heron with each.

We forget to mention the owl

Here's a spectacled owl.  There's no way we would have found it without our guide.  It was hidden beneath a palm off the  trail.

Four toucans

We saw four members of the toucan family in Panama.

Keel-billed Toucan

Chestnut mandibled toucan (Yellow throated toucan)



Collared Aracari

Northern Emerald Toucanet