Santa Marta Mountains

Left at 04:30am and drove up to the top of the mountain on the horrid track that’s more akin to a dry riverbed. Anyway, it took around 90 minutes to reach the top ridge and upon arrival the weather was clear with occasional bouts of low cloud obscuring things for short periods. A Santa Marta Warbler played hard to get initially but a little later we enjoyed point-blank views over breakfast, and we also had nice looks at several Santa Marta Parakeets, some Scaly-naped Parrots perched up close by, incredibly close Santa Marta Brushfinch, the endemic Yellow-crowned Whitestart, a pair of endemic Hermit Wood-Wrens, Streak-capped Spinetail, Santa Marta Toucanet (not yet a full species but a ssp of White-throated Toucanet…), Santa Marta Mountain Tanager, a very brief Brown-rumped Tapaculo, a pair of Scarlet-fronted Parakeets, and a few flyover Red-billed Parrots. 

Santa Marta Parakeet

Santa Marta Brushfinch

Scaly-naped Amazon

Hermit Wood-Wren

Then we headed lower, stopping at a few places to look for Santa Marta Antpitta without any joy. And then the heavens opened  so we headed down to lunch.

Back at the lodge we had a fine meal and waited for the rain to stop, which it did shortly after. The hummer activity in the garden was frenzied and we saw all the same species as yesterday but of particular note was the female White-tailed Starfrontlet perching up on several occasions, at least 2 male Lazuline Sabrewings, and amazingly 3 White-tipped Quetzals found at the front of the lodge. 

White-tailed Starfrontlet

With some of the group opting for an easy afternoon around the lodge the rest of us headed back up the mountain on our antpitta quest. Well, it took a while but in the end we enjoyed fantastic views of a pair of Santa Marta Antpittas ‘doing their thing’ and feeding in a relatively open patch of forest even if the photos don’t do this awesome bird justice. 

Santa Marta Antpitta

We also enjoyed good views of the endemic White-lored Warbler here too. Higher up we surprisingly watched an endemic Brown-rumped Tapaculo feeding on the track right out in the open for a few brief seconds! With a dramatic sunset and awesome scenery we waited until dark before calling in a fantastic Stygian Owl. And that was the end of another great day, just a shame the calling Spectacled Owl didn’t show to everyone after dinner.

Santa Marta Sunset