31 Jan 26 - ORCA Canaries Cruise - Birding On La Palma

There was no time for any surveying as we approached our third destination in the Canaries: the island of La Palma. This is one of the two most Westerly islands and as such it receives a lot of rain. Consequently, the island has lush Laurel forests, where they haven't been clear for agriculture.

We were berthed next to the elegant-looking Wind Star: She can carry just under one hundred and fifty passengers

A map of La Palma: I was heading to locations in the North East of the island

I wanted to make the most of my time on La Palma and so I left the ship soon after the gangplank had been connected and we were allowed to disembark. The car hire company was next to the quayside and within a few minutes I was heading off to my first destination of the Laurel forests at Los Tilos. There are forest trails at Los Tilos and I rightly suspected that there would be limited parking. My plan was to find somewhere I could watch the forest slopes, rather than walking the trails, and I found a convenient viewpoint next to the entrance hut to the reserve.

A view over the forest at Los Tilos: This looked to be a good place to look for Laurel Pigeons. There are occasional eBird records of Bolle's Laurel Pigeon from here, but the only species I saw for certain was the commoner White-tailed Laurel Pigeon

White-tailed Laurel Pigeon: This monotypic species occurs on the Western Canary islands of La Palma, La Gomera & Tenerife

White-tailed Laurel Pigeon: All the Laurel Pigeons seen were flying around the upper slopes of the forest. Therefore, it seemed unlikely I would have bumped into them on the trails

White-tailed Laurel Pigeon: White-tailed Laurel Pigeons have uniform upperwings, whereas, Bolle's Laurel Pigeons have paler grey coverts

Buzzard: This is the insularum subspecies which is restricted to the Canaries. I saw a Marsh Harrier at Laguna de Barlovento, which has been seen there on a few occasions. Otherwise, the only other large Raptor I saw on the Canaries were Buzzards

After about an hour at Los Tilos, I was ready to move on have seen one of the two Laurel Pigeons species. The forest around Laguna de Barlovento looked to be a better location for Bolle's Laurel Pigeon. After another three-quarters of an hour of driving I arrived at the site. It is a massive and nearly empty concrete reservoir and frustratingly it was fenced off, so it wasn't possible to see if there were any Birds on the relatively small amount of water in it. There were plenty of extensive Laurel forests surrounding it, but the forest wasn't as close as it had been at Los Tilos. Unfortunately, it was not late morning and that isn't a great time for Pigeon activity.

The forest around Laguna de Barlovento

A view of Mount Teide on nearby Tenerife

I tried a number of viewpoints over the forest, but I failed to see either of the Laurel Pigeon species. After a while, I drove back to a campsite and ornamental lake next to the reservoir as Birds are often tamer at campsites. I did manage to finally get some reasonable photographs of a Canary Island Chaffinch.

Moorhen: This is the nominate chloropus subspecies which occurs from the UK to Europe, North Africa, the Canaries & Madeira, East through Asia to Sri Lanka, the central Malayan Peninsula, China & Japan

Blackbird: This is the cabrerae subspecies which is restricted to the Western Canaries & Madeira

Canary Islands Chiffchaff: This monotypic species is restricted to the Canaries

Canary Islands Chiffchaff: The song is similar to a Chiffchaff, but different enough to be immediately obvious

Canary Islands Chaffinch: Male. This is the palmae subspecies which is restricted to La Palma. There are another three subspecies on the Canaries

Canary Islands Chaffinch: Male. It is interesting that all of the Chaffinch species on the Canaries are much bluer than our Chaffinch

Canary Islands Chaffinch: Male

Canary Islands Chaffinch: Female. The females look more similar to a Chaffinch in the UK

Canary: This monotypic species is restricted to the Azores, the western Canaries & Madeira

Canary: They were a commonly seen species in grassland areas

I had seen very few Butterflies so far in the Canaries, but there were a few Butterflies flying around the grassy edges to the forest at Laguna de Barlovento. They were flighty and I only had a couple of opportunities to take some quick photos, as I was focusing on looking for flying Pigeons. It was disappointing to find that the two species photographed were regular visitors to my UK garden.

Red Admiral

Small White

It was now around one-thirty. I figured I wasn't likely to see any Bolle's Laurel Pigeons at Laguna de Barlovento and I might as well head back to the Spirit of Discovery for a late lunch. On port days, it's possible to get a late lunch as long as it's ordered before three.

The island has a much larger population that Lanzarote and the houses are very different to the traditional houses on Lanzarote

I stopped for a few scenic photos and at one of these stops, I bumped into a feeding Monarch. At last a Butterfly species that isn't on my garden list, albeit I have seen pukka individuals on the local Winspit patch back in the 90s.

Monarch: The Canaries population is believed to have originated from North American migrants to Mexico which were blown into the Atlantic and were lucky enough to have arrived on the Canaries, where one of it's food plants, Tropical Milkweed, has been commonly introduced

The lower slopes of La Palma are covered in small fields

After about an hour's drive I was back in the city of Santa Cruz de la Palma.

Replica of Santa Maria: This replica of Columbus's ship is actually a naval museum

Replica of Santa Maria: Had I realised it was a museum, I would have stopped for a look at the exhibits which are within its hull

Heading toward the main town

I like the way this old tree has been used to provide shade for this cafe

A breaching multicoloured Humpback Whale

We departed at five and managed to get about ninety minutes of surveying in before we lost the light. I saw a couple of Dolphins, which were too brief a sighting to be possible to identified.

The coastal edge of the island was very heavily scarred by valleys

An atmospheric sunset: With all the storms we weren't going to get the lovely orangey sunsets I had seen on the previous two Saga cruises

It was time to head off for dinner, followed by booking a hire car for our next Atlantic island of Madeira. I will cover that in the next Blog Post.

30 Jan 26 - ORCA Canaries Cruise - A Tour Of Lanzarote

On our second day in the Canaries, we approached the port of Arrecife on Lanzarote. We were tied up in the half-light, so, there was no chance of any early morning surveying. There weren't any Birds I was keen to look for on the island and therefore, my plan was to book onto one of the ship organised coach tours.

Sandwich Tern: Chris and I were watching Arrecife's bay from the cabin's balcony and suggesting potential species we might see. Top of the list was Sandwich Tern and within five minutes, there were half a dozen flying around the bay

The wreck of the Telamon: Back in 1981, she started flooding on a trip from Ivory Coast to Thessaloniki with a cargo of logs. She was beached by the port and the fuel oil and logs were offloaded. After breaking her back in a storm, she could no longer go to sea. In recent years, she has been partially dismantled, but that work stopped a couple of years ago. Conveniently, the Greek company who owned her no longer exists and so won't have to pay for the clean up

Fortunately, there was room on one of the coach tours around the island. The first stop was the delightful small tourist town of Teguise, which was the capital of Lanzarote from the early 15th Century until the capital moved to Arrecife in 1852. As we were travelling around the island, our guide said that there was a famous artist, Cesar Manrique, who lives on the island until his death in 1992. He worked hard to convince the locals to paint their houses while to revive an old tradition on the island. As these photos show he was very successful in this regard.

The small tourist town of Teguise

The old church was at the centre of Teguise

The square around the old church

Another view of the square

The buildings have a very Moorish look to them: This isn't surprising as while the Canaries were first mentioned by the Romans, they were first settled by Moors from 999 AD. In the early 14th Century, a Portuguese ship captained by Genoese navigator Lancelotto Malocello arrived. Within a few years, the locals were being captured and sold into Spanish slavery. The Spanish started to settle in the Canaries from the start of the 15th Century. Early settlers continued with the building styles of the first inhabitants as the houses were easy to build, with flat roofs which were designed to channel water into underground storage

An old street

This old 15th Century church tithe barn is now the local bank

The bank has retained many of the old structural features of the building

I really like how many of the building stones stand out from the lime mortar: Cacti and Succulents were often replacing more typical garden plants on the island

A statue celebrating the local musical style of dancing with a tambourine

Collared Dove: This was one of the Bird species around the town

Collared Dove

Santa Barbara Castle dominated the hill next to the town: This started as a simple 15th Century watch tower, but it was converted into a proper fortress by 1576

Having had a good wander around the town, it was time to move on. The next stop was the beach next to the surfing beach village of Caleta de Famara, which had excellent views of bumpy sand dunes and some stunning hills. It was little more than a quick photo stop, but there was time to look around the village and photograph a couple of Spanish Sparrows I had seen.

A nice looking cafe: Everything in the village seem to be surfing related with a surf school, surf shop, surfing hotel and this cafe which presumably welcomes surfers

There were a few hardy surfers in the waves next to the village

The bay was very scenic

There were these little hummock dunes behind the beach

Spanish Sparrow: Male. The is the nominate hispaniolensis subspecies which occurs in Cape Verde, the Canaries, Madeira, Southern Europe & North Africa

Spanish Sparrow: Male

All too soon we were back on the coach to head to the Southern end of the island.

Wherever you go on Lanzarote, there are these small volcanic hills

Monumento al Campesino by local artist Cesar Manrique: To me, he was clearly more successful at convincing the locals to paint their houses white, than at his sculptures

The drive took us through the Parque Natural de Los Volcanes and Timanfaya National Park: Albeit we missed the best parts of the area

Another volcanic area

These walled hollows in the volcanic soil provided to be good ways to grow grape vines on the island: The walls and hollows provide shelter and a way to collect and retain any moisture on this arid island

Our final stop was an Aloe Vera museum. To be honest, this felt more like the obligatory visit to a Turkish Carpet shop where the guide stops hoping you buy a carpet you don't need. I opted to have a walk along the road, rather than look around the small Aloe Vera exhibition and shop.

The highlight of my walk was this Cacti and Succulent garden by a large house

Finally, it was time to head back to the ship for a late lunch. As I was waiting for the coach to depart from the Aloe Vera museum, I saw two large Falcons circling over the nearby hill, but there wasn't time for a photo. This subspecies was formally split as Barbary Falcons, but it has now been relegated to a subspecies of Peregrine.

Our guide say that there had been more rainfall than normal on Lanzarote: Consequently, there were lots of plants appearing where it is normally barren, including this lovely display of purple flowers

We left at 17:00 as planned and there for time for ninety minutes or so of surveying from the top deck before it got dark. I managed to see a two single unidentified Dolphins in that time: one of which was probably an Atlantic Spotted Dolphin. It had been an enjoyable day and I spent a bit of time booking a hire car for our next destination of La Palma. I will cover the in the next Blog Post.

This was our first good sunset at sea