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.

2 Feb 25 - ORCA Saga Eastern Med Cruise Day 14 - Rhodes: A World Heritage City

Our sixth landing on the ORCA Saga Eastern Mediterranean Cruise was Rhodes, which was awarded World Heritage City status by UNESCO in 1988. The city is surrounded by four kilometres of well-preserved city walls.

We were making our final approach around seven to the unimaginatively named city of Rhodes: Rhodes is the main city on the island of Rhodes. This Greek island lies about ten miles South of the South East corner of the Turkish mainland

We were tied up by the time it was light. A number of the passengers were pleased to see the Blue Sapphire tied up on the adjacent mooring. These passengers had travelled on her when she was the Saga Sapphire, until she was sold in Autumn 20 when she was replaced by our ship, the Spirit of Adventure. Interesting as the Blue Sapphire was, I thought the closer quayside fortress was more interesting.

The Blue Sapphire and the quayside fort

The quayside fort was separate from the main city walls

The city walls continues around the far side of the harbour

The ship had cleared customs while we were having breakfast and we were free to go ashore for the day as soon as we were ready.

The wall of the harbour fort: These are two of fourteen ancient Windmills around the old harbour that were used to grind grain in the times of the Knights Hospitallers

The wall of the harbour fort looking towards the sea

It was good to see this lovely Dolphin statue on the quayside

Terry had been here in Sep 24 and he mentioned there was a park area just outside the city walls that had been worth a visit on that trip, as it had attracted a few migrants. I decided to take the big camera and see if there were any migrants this early in the year. Sadly, there weren't any migrants, but there were a few wintering Black Redstarts, Chiffchaffs and Chaffinches, as well as, a few expected Sardinian Warblers.

A final view of the harbour walls, before I headed off into the town

It was impressive how much of the original town walls had survived. All too often as fortresses go out of use, their stone get robbed and sold on as building material for local houses. Much of my neighbouring village of Corfe Castle is thought to be built on stone sold on after Corfe Castle was destroyed in the English Civil War. One piece was found in my neighbours farm house as he was extending it twenty years ago.

This site of an old church was just inside the city walls

There was a small park beyond the old church

Most of the streets inside the city walls were narrow and windy

This building must have been impressive given the signs of a vaulted ceiling

Just inside the main city walls

A good way to use the moat within the main city walls

The main city walls were impressive

Another view of the main city walls

Black Redstart: This Black Redstart wasn't very photogenic. I didn't try to get better photos, as the day was focused on enjoying the heritage, rather than photographing common Bird species

Further along the city walls, I saw three or four Hooded Crows getting very excited in the tops of some trees. Initially, I couldn't see what was exciting them, but assumed it was likely to be a Bird of Prey or an Owl. Moving a bit closer, I saw the trouble maker was a Steppe Buzzard that was perched in the tree. It endured the mobbing for several minutes, before it flew.

Hooded Crow: One of three or four Hooded Crows mobbing the Steppe Buzzard

Steppe Buzzard: Steppe Buzzards are the Eastern subspecies of Buzzards. This is the vulpinus subspecies which is one of two subspecies which are called Steppe Buzzards. They occur in the North Palearctic and winter to South Asia and Africa south of the Sahara. The other subspecies of Steppe Buzzard occurs from South Crimea & the Caucasus to North Iran

A tatty Red Admiral

I carried on through the park outside the city walls until I reached St John's Gate. This was an impressive gate with a set of defences to help defend it.

St John's Gate: This bridge funnels any attackers into a narrow area where they could be killed by archers

Any attackers would be in the moat which are surrounded by high walls and overlapping fields of fire

Looking back on the inside of the first gatehouse: Under the gatehouse, there was a narrow twisty entrance which would have made it difficult to attack, as defenders could fight back without the risk of being shot by attacking archers, who couldn't get a good line of fire. Meanwhile the attackers would have been targets for the defenders, who were protected within the gatehouse. Originally, there would have been heavy portcullis and other defences which would have slowed down any attackers who had breached the first gatehouse. Finally, there was a second bridge and further defences around that

The sign shows how many historical sites lie within the city walls

Having passed through all the defences around the city walls, I was back in the narrow, twisty city streets. There were quite a few mopeds passing, which were the most effective transport option in this part of the old city. There were also a few cars, but they were all small Fiat 500 sized cars.

This was the road from the main gateway

Further along the same road

I carried on meandering through the old city.

Another old building near the Square of the Hebrew Martyrs: Rhodes didn't escape Jewish persecution during WW2 from the long established Jewish quarter of the city. Over sixteen hundred Jews deported to Auschwitz in 1944, with only around one hundred and fifty surviving

A Seahorse Fountain in the Square of the Hebrew Martyrs

Part of the walls surrounding the harbour

Next, I headed back to explore the harbour.

Hooded Crow: Finally, one decided to perform well for the camera

The Fortress of St Nicholas helps to guard the harbour: The inner tower was built between 1464 and 1467. It was extended after the siege of Rhodes in 1480

The harbour edge opposite the Fortress of St Nicholas

The Rhodes Windmills: These Windmills date to the era of the Knights Hospitallers and were used to grind grain brought into the harbour

Deer Status next to the Fortress of St Nicholas: This statue in on top of a pillar at the inner harbour entrance. It is one of the suggested locations for the Colossus of Rhodes, which was a thirty-three metre bronze statue built between 292 and 280 BC. There is a lot of speculation for the location of the Colossus by authors who lived many hundreds of years after the Colossus was destroyed by an earthquake in 226 BC, but there is no real historical evidence as to its appearance

Yellow-legged Gulls: Adults. This is the nominate michahellis subspecies which occurs on the Macaronesian Islands & North West Africa East through the Mediterranean

Yellow-legged Gull: Adult. This individual allowed me to get a bit closer

After a good morning walking around Rhodes, I headed back to the Spirit of Adventure for lunch.

White Wagtail: White Wagtails are the nominate alba subspecies of Pied Wagtail. They occur from South East Greenland & Iceland to Faeroes, Europe (except the West coast of Europe adjacent to the UK), the South Urals & Asia Minor

White Wagtail: The same individual

After lunch, Terry, Lexie & I decided to return to explore more of the city. I will cover that in the next Blog Post.