Brazil: Itatiaia

The last section of our trip to South-East Brazil was the hastily rearranged (thank you Demis!) trip to Itatiaia National Park a, couple of days of R&R and then finally a day-trip we put together with our guide for this section, Thomaz.

We picked the Ype hotel to stay at in the park and arrived after the three hour drive to spend the afternoon settling in and watching the birds on the feeders.   Oh and the macaques, too:

This one looks to have a guilty conscience, probably because they regularly come through pulling up the roof tiles and taking food from the bird feeders!

The next day we started with an early morning hike on a birding trail.   Conditions were tricky as it was quite overgrown, so not many bird photographs, we did however see a Coral Snake:

And in the gardens of the hotel in which the trail started, a Masked Water Tyrant perched briefly:

Back at the lodge one of the most 'popular' birds amongst birders and photographers alike was the Frilled Coquette, seen here feeding:

I can't decide which image I prefer:

The last full day was spent driving down from 1,200m to ground level, going round a bit and then ascending to 2,450m, rising reasonably quickly above the weather:

The view from the top of the mountain was fantastic:

One of the specialist species of the region in terms of habitat and altitude is the Itatiaia Spinetail, we had unusually good views of one:

The last bird of the day was spotted as we headed downhill again, a Velvety Black Tyrant:

After a couple of days rest and recuperation at a hotel near Sao Paulo airport, Thomaz picked us up at 5am for a day trip to Pousada da Fazenda.   We stopped off en route to spot a new species of Parakeet then arrived to watch the hummingbirds on the feeders while enjoying breakfast.

One of the species there is Swallow-tailed Hummingbird:

Just round the corner was the Glittering-bellied Emerald, feeding on a different plant, albeit resting briefly here:

There's simply loads of butterflies and moths in Brazil, this is just one example, again briefly paused:

We drove to see Great Horned Owl and on the way back to the lodge, a Burrowing Owl was perched:

Visiting Brazil was fascinating, rewarding, challenging and fun.  In total we saw 288 new species making a total of 3,938 seen so far.   Next up, the Galapagos....