France Holiday - Day 1

Time for a holiday! We have friends who live on their boat, which has been harboured in or around Port Grimaud in the south of France for over ten years, and having got back in touch through Friends Reunited, we headed on down to visit. We flew from Gatwick to Nice and collected a hire car en route. Immediately we headed to the mouth of the River Var and the nature reserve there (you can see the river from the car rental area) - park in the shopping centre in Saint-Laurent-du-Var.

The first bird we saw was a reminder of home, though it appeared a darker variant of the normal Wren plumage:
















Walking alongside the nature reserve we tracked this Black Redstart but he kept his distance, this being the best snap:















Whilst in the reserve we could hear a number of Cetti's Warblers. One called while we were on the bank overlooking the broadest section of land, and then I caught sight of it in the bushes, this is the best snap I've managed so far of a Cetti's, seeing it this clearly is very unusual:

















We saw a Sardinian Warbler but he wouldn't pose for a snap, however this female Blackcap did stop flitting briefly:













Throughout the nature reserve and up along the river there were numerous Indian Silverbills, which I gather aren't native but are a population that has developed from an earlier escape. This bird seemed quite undisturbed at being photographed and generally gawked at:













I saw at least ten of these birds, including this pair, one of which has just taken flight:
















From the Var we headed back to the aiport to collect our host, who himself had returned from the UK that afternoon and then on to our hotel in Port Grimaud.