The next day we were up in the Büyük Çamlıca, a great raptor watching hill that overlooks Istanbul. Groups of Levant Sparrowhawks were the only things moving through that area in the morning.
It's a popular spot with Istanbul locals, so birding there on a Sunday morning can be interesting.
The migration may have been occurring in another area, so we headed towards the Black Sea and decide to bird at Lake Terkos. A wonderful birding location with Pygmy Cormorants, Little Egrets, Marsh Harrier, Redstart, Reed Bunting, Golden Oriole, Squacco Heron, Snipe, and even a Grass Snake.
Next stop, a fish lunch at Riva on the Black Sea, and view of Red-backed Shrikes, a Hoopoe, Green Sandpiper, Kingfisher, Short-toed Eagle, Red-rumped Swallows and a migrating flock of 50 Common Cranes.
More Black Sea birding.
I had to go and feel the waters of the famous Black Sea.
It was time to head to Bursa the next day, so another wonderful ferry from Eskihisar to Topçular, beautiful trip. Good birding along the way as well, Honey Buzzard, Short-toed Eagle, Bee-eaters, Kingfisher, Mediterranean Gulls and Baltic Gulls.
The view from the rooftop restaurant at our hotel, the nice Burcman Hotel in the centre of Bursa. Time for a quick wash at the hotel, then it's off to explore Bursa with our guide Kerem.
The inside of Bursa's Great Mosque.
Wonderful artworks, mostly of blue-green tiles cover the tomb.
The next day found the group birding on Mount Uludağ. The mountain has a number of vegetation zones with their different birds. Here we are in the Black Pine forest zone, having just seen 3 Kruper’s Nuthatches (new and must-see bird for Liz and me). We are very happy!
Kruper's Nuthatch.
The ski resort near the summit at 2500 metres.
A beautiful day for watching Water Pipits, Black Redstarts, Willow Warblers and Stonechats.
We hunt for our main target bird in this area, Red-fronted Serin.
The Serin hunt went on, but alas we ran out of time.
The following day, a journey to Lake Ulubat and the village of Gölyazı. The area had some wonderful birds such as Marsh Harriers, Squacco Herons, Pygmy Cormorants, Bee-eaters, Water Rails, Ferruginous Ducks, Lesser Grey Shrike and 3 Little Bitterns!
Interesting rustic buildings in the village, including some ancient Roman baths (that were closed, damn it).
We were back in Istanbul and time for the history part of the Naturetrek tour. It was good to see the obelisk at the Hippodrome on a sunny day.
Something I had not noticed on the obelisk base last time, a carving of how the obelisk was moved there.
A newer and different style ceiling artwork, compared to the other buildings we had seen in Istanbul.
The Sultan's widow must have been small!
While standing here, we saw an amazing flock of 250+ migrating Levant Sparrowhawks.
After Tokapi, the rest of the group went on to explore the Basilica Cisterns, but seeing Liz and I had already seen those, we explored other areas of Istanbul, such as the nice coffee shops!
Time to catch the ferry back to our Hotel Harem. It had been a long but enjoyable day.
The last morning before the group flew out, we decided to go back to a good migration birding spot we had visited some days before, the hill of Toygar Tepesi. By lunchtime we had seen 319 Lesser Spotted Eagles, 50 Short-toed Eagles, 19 Booted Eagles, with double-figure counts of Steppe Buzzard and Levant Sparrowhawk, two Black Storks and to cap it all a sub-adult Steppe Eagle.
At the end of the 8 day tour, we had logged 122 bird species. We are looking forward to our next Naturetrek tour, probably in Peru.
After another couple days in Istanbul by ourselves, it was time to head back home via Dubai. We had a fantastic birding holiday, seen lots of history, visited family. On the flight home we were already planning our next trip, yep, maybe it's time to head towards South America!
1 comment:
Just wonderful
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